Trouble in the Glen ** (1954, Margaret Lockwood, Orson Welles, Forrest Tucker) – Classic Movie Review 9573

Unexpectedly, English director Herbert Wilcox directs Orson Welles as a wealthy South American in a Scottish comedy about a row over a closed road.

The 1954 Trouble in the Glen boasts high-powered, if highly improbable casting. Apart from Welles as Sanin Cejador y Mengues, a wealthy South American mogul who becomes the new Scots Highlands laird, there are Forrest Tucker as an American visitor Major Jim ‘Lance’ Lansing, a US Air Corps ex-pilot who returns to Scotland after the war and finds much trouble in the glen; Margaret Lockwood as Welles’s daughter Marissa Mengues, the woman Lansing falls for; and Victor McLaglen as Parlan MacFarr, John McCallum as Malcolm MacFarr and Eddie Byrne as Dinny Sullivan too, as well as Archie Duncan as the Mengues foreman Nolly Dukes.

The only trouble is Frank S Nugent’s stodgy, fake-seeming screenplay from Maurice Walsh’s story, with its forced whimsical mood. Nevertheless, Trouble in the Glen is attractively quirky, quaint and actually quite charming, and it is attractively shot by Max Greene in colour (Trucolor).

Sadly, however, Lockwood and Welles’s careers were now in decline and this one didn’t help them. This time there is no Anna Neagle, Wilcox’s wife, business partner and regular star.

Lansing and Dukes end up in an unlikely bout of fisticuffs, supposedly the film’s action highlight, reminding us that Victor McLaglen starred in The Quiet Man (1952), also based on a story by Maurice Walsh, with a screenplay Frank S Nugent.

Also in the cast are Margaret McCourt, Archie Duncan, Gudrun Ure [Ann Gudrun], Moultrie Kelsall, Alex McCrindle, Mary Mackenzie, Jack Watling, Peter Sinclair, Janet Burrow, Albert Chevalier, George Cormack, Dorothea Dell, Grizelda Harvey, Michael Shepley and Jack Stewart.

Lockwood and Welles had already teamed with Wilcox for Trent’s Last Case (1952).

Welles (aged 39) was just a year older than Lockwood, playing her father.

Trouble in the Glen is directed by Herbert Wilcox, runs 91 minutes, is made by Herbert Wilcox Productions (as Everest), is released by Republic Pictures, is written by Frank S Nugent, based on a story by Maurice Walsh, is shot by Max Greene (Trucolor), is produced by Stuart Robertson and is scored by Victor Young.

© Derek Winnert 2020 Classic Movie Review 9573

Check out more reviews on http://derekwinnert.com