The Man Behind the Mask

Michael Powell's final quota quickie now only exists in an abbreviated, recut form made after WWII, cutting out twenty minutes of its final runtime to get it under an hour. I feel like those missing twenty minutes would have made this a fair bit better, but the end result is interesting nonetheless. I mean, it's not good. It's a weird combination of Hitchcock's British period and, of all things, Flash Gordon, but some of what makes it less than good is an abbreviated feel to, especially, its early sections where pieces don't quite seem to fit together. I doubt the missing twenty minutes would make this a masterpiece of silly wrong man nonsense, but it would probably just make it better.

Nick (Hugh Williams) is an amateur aviator (something that never becomes important ever, so a waste) who is in love with June Slade (Jane Baxter), daughter to Lord Slade (Peter Gawthorne) who opposes their match. On the night of Lord Slade's party to celebrate his acquisition of a mysterious and ancient golden shield, New Years' Eve, Nick gets shot by an intruder with a familiar tattoo on his wrist who steals Nick's costume for the masquerade. This man steals into Lord Slade's party in Nick's costume, steals the shield, makes off with June, and Nick ends up the prime suspect.

So, the early parts of this, pretty much the whole setup, feel unnaturally truncated and staccato, especially the history that ties Nick with June's brother Jimmy (Ronald Ward). They were two parts of three to a secret brotherhood, the third being Allan Hayden (Reginald Tate), presumed dead, information pretty much hidden from the audience until his reveal at being alive. Honestly, this feels more like the fourth or fifth entry in a serial than a standalone mystery thriller.

So, the focus of the plot ends up trying to track down where June went, who she was taken by, and who he was working for all while the police are after Nick. It's unclear why either he doesn't have an alibi or why Doctor Harold (Donald Calthrop) believes him so readily, fixing him up after he gets back from that central party that he was attending. However, Nick uses him to divert the police while he goes to the shop where a tie he pulled off of his assailant was purchased, leading to the discovery of Hayden. This is compounded by the fact that Hayden is betraying his employer, The Master (Maurice Schwartz), whose lieutenant, Harrah (Gerald Fielding) is in pursuit as well.

Where the film actually works is in pieces of the whole mystery thing, like the chase and individual sequences of some suspense, like when Jimmy has to rescue Nick from Hayden in the tie shop. There are also a good number of sources of light comedy to help even the tone out, especially from Dr. Harold's American assistant, Marian (Kitty Kelly). Also, the whole presentation of The Master, who feels like a copy of Ming the Merciless from Flash Gordon, especially in his astronomy tower as he gazes up at the stars in between orders to have Nick killed and the shield returned. It feels so out of place in the rest of the film's setting of the English countryside, a small city street, and a country manor that it's just fascinating how the clean angles and exacting and mannered performances, especially from Schwartz, contrasts with everything else around it.

The movements of the plot get almost incomprehensible as people get kidnapped, Nick and June keep getting pursued even though they shouldn't (or maybe they should? The ownership of the shield gets unclear for a while). And it's all anchored by characters that we never got any real time to develop (the central reason I feel like the longer cut is probably better, should it ever be discovered), leaving the film's finale to focus on The Master because no one else is particularly interesting.

So, it's not a good film. It's far from his best, and it might be the worst surviving quota quickie Powell made, but it has some limited charms. The light comedy that gets sprinkled through is nice to have, and there are some decently built sequences. However, the whole just doesn't connect particularly well, the gaping holes of the cuts too obviously hampering what's left in the film. Eh, there are worse things out there, but I wouldn't exactly rush to discover this.

Lord Peter Gawthorne has just bought an antique relic for his collection. Little does he know that others want it, and are willing to kill for it. This means that his daughter, Jane Baxter, is kidnapped. As she is supposed to marry Hugh Williams, this involves him. Especially as the police are looking for him as a murderer.

There are more than twenty minutes missing from this movie. This, no doubt, increases its melodramatic air. It certainly makes it somewhat incoherent, despite an interesting cast that includes Donald Calthorp and Maurice Schwartz. Add in the fact that this was directed by Michael Powell, and its current state becomes a great pity. Did it make more sense in its original release? Undoubtedly. However, we cannot judge what we cannot see. So the hints that there are sequences in which the movie was heavily influences by Hitchcock's THE 39 STEPS have to be written off. Perhaps a more complete copy will turn up one of these days, unlikely as that seems. For the moment, it's a mess.