L'homme en noir

This was the first video i bought to go with my new video player about a decade ago. Having spent a part of my childhood in the area where it was filmed it was fun to spot the locations, the heroine getting on the bus to go to the beach at what looks like Hastings only to get off near the Romney marshes, which is some way to go for a quick bit of sunbathing. The story of the criminal classes up to no good and an innocent bystander in danger has been told many times before,and since. Maxwell Reed as the moody Dark Man is worth the price of the video alone, William Hartnell ( future Dr who)always watchable. But the main reason is seeing the final scenes at the "pre-nuclear" Dungeness coastline. The only negative is with the UK video release which has part of the story missing, I assume this is a copy of the US release which was shorter.

Actress Natasha Parry is bicycling on the road when she hears a couple of shots, and sees a dark man emerge from the woods to stand by a standing auto. She thinks nothing of it, but in the dressing room that night, her fellow actress tells her the police are looking for witnesses. Miss Parry says she saw nothing useful, but her friend points out that it's always useful for an actress to get her name in the papers. Miss Parry reports the very little she knows to the police, and thinks that will be the end of it... until Superintendent of Police William Hartnell sees the item. With the unknown man having committed two murders, he thinks she's in for it, so he sends down Detective Inspector Edward Underdown to guard her, and possibly catch the dark man before he can kill her.

It's a handsomely shot movie, directed and written by Jeffrey Dell, with an intelligently plausible arc of action that ends in a chase across the seashore in the darkling. It's photographed in long takes by Eric Cross; the lengthening shadows convert a taut policier into a shadowy noir at the end.

Poor old "Molly" (Natasha Parry) has the misfortune to witness the eponymous character commit double murder. He knows she knows, and she knows he knows that she does, and so now he (Maxwell Reed) is determined to shut her up before she can tell pursuing police inspector "Vine" (Edward Underdown) and he faces the gallows. There's no real jeopardy here - we all know who did what to whom, but it's still quite an engaging little cat and mouse thriller that, though it could certainly do with losing twenty minutes or so, has a strong supporting cast and some nice photography of England's Sussex coast as the adventure hots up to an exciting, if predictable, denouement. The acting and script are all pretty generic, but it's still worth a watch.

A young actress happens to witness a ruthless criminal commit a second murder, putting her own life in danger. Filmed in England on the south-east coast it is very much a film of the time - everybody speaks with a stiff upper lip and everybody smokes, even when in the back of an ambulance! It's not exactly Hitchcock but does have some effective moments of suspense, plus it also makes good use of outdoor locations. Also notable for starring William Hartnell, who went on to become the first Dr Who.

You can punch a lot of holes in this one.

From 1951, The Dark Man, directed and written by Jeffrey Dell, stars (and is) Maxwell Reed. He was Joan Collins' first husband, and ever since I heard what she said about him, I've never been able to stand him. Good thing he always plays creeps.

In this film, on a lonely road, he (Dark Man) kills a cab driver who could recognize him (his second murder that we know about). A young actress, Molly Lester (Natasha Perry) out on her bike hears the shot and sees him in the distance.

When a fellow thespian reads that the police are looking for witnesses, a reluctant Molly tells an officer (Edward Underdown) what she knows, and he informs her that her life is in danger. She will have to be guarded. There's a romantic interest, though he's 43 and she's 21.

Well, when you're being guarded, that means all the time, one would think. In Molly's case, I guess it's when they get around to it. At one point, Dark Man breaks into her apartment, removes the lightbulbs, and attacks her.

The guy has killed twice. Does he kill her? No. He turns on the gas. She lives.

Okay, then he picks her up in a cab. He wants to kill her because she may recognize him. Obviously she doesn't know who the heck he is or why he is heading out to a remote place.

It's well photographed, keeping Dark Man tall and in the dark. I wouldn't have recognized him either.