Burnt Evidence

Once again a sum that today seems tiny - £300 - is enormous in the context of an old movie, and the constant daily grind of life in early fifties Britain (rationing finally ended the year this film was released) is the starting point for this police procedural in which we are gradually fed information that keeps the audience informed at the same rate as the various interested parties until a rather abrupt but satisfying conclusion.

Jane Hylton has been carrying on an affair with Donald Gray, the best friend of husband, Duncan Lamont. Lamont has been trying to make a go of his own business, but is near the point where he must throw it in. When he sees evidence of the affair, he heads off, trying to raise money. Miss Hylton is worried about him, so she sends Gray looking. He finds Lamont in his work space, angry words are exchanged, a fight begins, and soon the fire brigade is on the scene, where they find a corpse which Police Inspector Meredith Edwards can't identify. Who is it? And is it murder?

It's a very interesting set-up, but the script, and especially the direction by Daniel Birt, makes a dull affair of it. The camera set-ups are uninteresting, and it's all talk, talk and more talk to neatly disentangle the snarls of the situation through ordinary procedure. Everyone is polite, kind and the only interesting variation is when Edwards is being dressed down by Assistant Commissioner Hugh Moxey for not following ordinary procedure and wasting resources. Much the same can be said of this movie.

I know nothing about Director Daniel Birt, but he does an impressive job on the usual shoestring of Monarch Studio and with a very limited 59'.

He definitely makes the most of a compelling screenplay by Percy Hoskins, off Ted Willis' original.

The cast of unknowns does not compromise. I have never found Jane Hylton more than a mediocre actress, but the script also allows her an easy copout in that she does not convey any emotions that might explain why she loves Jimmy if she still also loves her hubby Jack. In the end, she just gets back on with the hubby, as if nothing but an innocuous little affair had happened - in most cases, that is fatal to a marriage, especially back in the 1950s. In fact, it was so frowned upon even in an open-minded society like the UK's, that Diana (Hylton) never admits to Inspector Edwards that she was having an affair with Jimmy.

Duncan Lamont, as Jack, comes across as the sympathetic killer, honest and considerate to a fault. His character development is logical: he does not demand payment for his jobs and he accepts the status of cuckolded hubby without too much fuss.

Meredith, as Inspector Edwards, gets his knuckles rapped for pursuing the wrong man, and he leaves at least one stone unturned in his investigation: why was Jimmy's face so damaged if he believes Jack's account that his former army pal's face was untouched when he left the homicide/fire scene?

In the end, the 59' go by quickly and I was engrossed throughout.

It is really more of a love story than your classical noir: Hylton as femme fatale does not quite make the grade, and neither hubby nor lover are morally blemished by her deception.

I liked the police and fire department cooperation, sounded like the real item!

This was one of many B feature films produced between 1951 and 1962 (see IMDb for details) by the ACT - the cinema technicians trade union. The films seem to have in common, a good all British cast, reasonably resourced production values and themes rather off the mainstream, generally centred on the domestic but with an underlying serious work/economic theme. This although ostensibly a (lurid) crime who-dunnit, could well have been titled "The Perils of Self-Employment" - the conclusion makes this abundantly clear. The central character is a modest carpenter with a small but failing business, "too soft" to press for money owing and consequently on the edge of bankruptcy and losing his (improbably rather glamorous and stylish wife, Jane Hilton) to a suave and moneyed rival. The weakness seems to be in the writing/direction - perhaps the emphasis on a serious theme compromised the other elements but it left room for some wit, by no means flat-footed, with the humane detective (Meridith Edwards) and his dim assistant. Surprisingly the screenplay was by Ted Willis who was to become a respected name in TV. Overall it was of a quality that could have been an evening's highlight on the ITV of the day, watched from the sofa whilst eating a "TV dinner". The theme - everyday working life and the domestic economy - would rarely if ever be on the screen again. A 5.5

One of the stodgier of the British crime films of the 1950s that I've watched. The story in this low budget tale is a love triangle between a glamorous housewife, her hard-working, self-employed, and down on his luck husband, and her suave lover. The backdrop of industry hangs over the proceedings, but when a quarrel leads to a violent argument and death, BURNT EVIDENCE turns into a police procedural drama.

Sadly it's a slow moving affair rather lacking in intrigue or indeed interest. The nature of the plot means that the principal characters have to disappear from the screen about a third of the way in at which point it all becomes rather aimless and unfocused, only to clear things up for the lacklustre ending. Jane Hylton is an arresting presence but would be better suited as a gangster's moll than the housewife she portrays here, although Duncan Lamont successfully portrays his character's world weariness. Watch out for old-timer Kynaston Reeves as a pathologist, Irene Handl in an improbable wig, and co-star Donald Gray's false left arm.