Accidental Death ** (1963, John Carson, Jacqueline Ellis, Derrick Sherwin, Richard Vernon) – Classic Movie Review 12,936

The 1963 film Accidental Death is a minor and musty though still quite interesting black and white Edgar Wallace series British filler thriller, in which someone is up to a World War Two revenge murder.

Director Geoffrey Nethercott’s 1963 film Accidental Death is a minor and musty though still quite interesting black and white Edgar Wallace series British filler thriller, in which someone is up to a World War Two revenge murder.

Henriette (Jacqueline Ellis) and her guardian, Colonel Johnnie Paxton (Richard Vernon), are surprised at home by an intruder, Paul Lanson (John Carson), who says he is there to kill the man because he believes he collaborated with the Nazis in the war and caused the death of his fiancée.

John Carson, Jacqueline Ellis and Richard Vernon all work hard and make an impression as Paul Lanson, Henriette and Paxton, and so do Derrick Sherwin as Henriette’s fiancé and Gerald Case as the police inspector. The acting gives it a lift, but the contrived plot is none too involving or credible, and the film is adequate only. It is a bit stagey and has a cast of only eight, though director Geoffrey Nethercott does manage some tension and suspense.

Arthur La Bern writes the screenplay, based on the novel Jack O’Judgement by Edgar Wallace.

It is one of four Edgar Wallace Mysteries written by Arthur LaBern, who also penned the novel Goodbye Piccadillly, Farewell Leicester Square, on which Alfred Hitchcock’s film Frenzy is based, and the novel of It Always Rains on Sundays.

The cast are John Carson, Jacqueline Ellis, Derrick Sherwin, Richard Vernon, Joan Lodge, Gerald Case, Jacqueline Lacey, and Rilla Madden.

Accidental Death is directed by Geoffrey Nethercott, runs 58 minutes, is made by Merton Park Studios, is released by Anglo-Amalgamated Film Distributors (UK) and AVCO Embassy Television (US), is written by Arthur La Bern, is shot in black and white by James Wilson, is produced by Jack Greenwood and Cyril Randell, is scored by Bernard Ebbinghouse, and is designed by Peter Mullins.

It is one of a series of second feature films based on Edgar Wallace novels, released in British cinemas between 1960 and 1965. The films were later sold to American TV and screened as The Edgar Wallace Mystery Theatre.

Jacqueline Ellis was born on June 21, 1934 in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. She appeared as both good girls and bad girls in many British crime B-movies and TV shows in England. They include The Traitors and The Sinister Man (both with Patrick Allen); The Hi-Jackers with Anthony Booth; Accidental Death with John Carson; and on TV in The Saint with Roger Moore. She had a busy two-decade career from 1955 to 1974.

© Derek Winnert 2024 – Classic Movie Review 12,936

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