Act of Murder *** (1964, John Carson, Anthony Bate, Justine Lord) – Classic Movie Review 12,200

Director Alan Bridges’s superior noirish 1964 British black and white crime thriller Act of Murder is a gripping little support feature, based on an Edgar Wallace yarn about a couple, Ralph Longman and Anne Longman (Anthony Bate, Justine Lord), who arrange one of those holidays where you exchange homes with strangers.

In real life you give up your lovely house for something uncomfortable; in films of course, the result is mayhem. Meanwhile an actor named Tim Ford (John Carson) is trying everything he knows to get ex-actress Anne Longman (Lord) back into his bed and tries to persuade her to return to the stage.

It reads like a TV cast of the day, but they know exactly what they are doing with the intriguing material, and so does director Alan Bridges, who brings some style to the film.

The cast are Anthony Bate as Ralph Longman, John Carson as Tim Ford, Justine Lord as Anne Longman, Duncan Lewis as Will Peterson, Dandy Nichols as Maud Peterson, Richard Burrell as John Quick, Sheena Marshe, Norman Scace, Robin Wentworth, John Moore, Michael Brennan, Kenneth Laud, Edward Roscoe, and Marianne Stone.

Act of Murder is directed by Alan Bridges, runs 62 minutes, is made by Merton Park Studios, is released by Anglo-Amalgamated (UK) and Warner (US), is written by Lewis Davidson, is shot in black and white by James Wilson, is produced by Jack Greenwood, and is scored by Bernard Ebbinghouse.

It is one of the Edgar Wallace Mysteries series, the British second-feature film series produced at Merton Park Studios for Anglo-Amalgamated. The 47 films in the series were released between 1960 and 1965.

It is Alan Bridges’s first film as director.

© Derek Winnert 2022 Classic Movie Review 12,200

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