Dr Crippen *** (1963, Donald Pleasence, Samantha Eggar, Coral Browne, Donald Wolfit) – Classic Movie Review 5917

‘The crime of the century! Was he really guilty?’ Director Robert Lynn’s 1962 British horror thriller finds Donald Pleasence is ideally cast as Dr Hawley Harvey Crippen, the mild English Edwardian doctor who killed his ghastly alcoholic shrewish wife Belle (Coral Browne) and attempted to flee by ship to America with his lover, trampy young secretary Ethel Le Neve (Samantha Eggar), masquerading as his son.

Though Pleasence is outstanding, this is a disappointingly ordinary film of the famous case. The fascinating real-life story does not get the imaginative script it deserves in Leigh Vance’s screenplay, and Lynn’s handling is very muted in an intriguing but unexciting film. What a film this could have been in the hands of a major writer and director!

However, the film is redeemed by being quite the showcase for a little feast of compelling acting, though, particularly from the highly involving Pleasence and Donald Wolfit as the Old Bailey trial prosecuting counsel R D Muir, but also from Browne and Eggar.

Also Nicolas Roeg’s distinguished black and white cinematography is worth noticing, too.

Also in the cast are James Robertson Justice, Geoffrey Toone, Elspeth March, Olga Lindo (in her final film, as Mrs Clara Arditti), Paul Carpenter as Bruce Martin, Basil Henson, John Arnatt, Edward Underdown, Oliver Johnstone, Edward Ogden, Douglas Bradley-Smith, Betty Baskombe, Basil Beale, Ted Cast, Ian Whitaker and John Lee.

[Spoiler alert] Dr Crippen was hanged in London in 1910 for poisoning his wife and dismembering her body. But the film seeks to put doubt on whether it was a deliberate act of murder, though. The film sees Crippen claiming that his wife drove him to distraction and that her death was an accident.

© Derek Winnert 2017 Classic Movie Review 5917

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Paul Carpenter plays Bruce Martin.