Highly Dangerous [Time Running Out] *** (1950, Margaret Lockwood, Dane Clark, Marius Goring, Naunton Wayne) – Classic Movie Review 4979

Margaret Lockwood stars in the J Arthur Rank Organisation’s 1950 British spy film Highly Dangerous as entomologist Frances Gray, sent by British Intelligence on a dangerous espionage mission to an Eastern European Iron Curtain country to obtain vital information and collect specimens after reports arrive in the UK that insects are being bred there for bacteriological warfare.

She gets into the country but her cover is blown and her contact is murdered. Minor Hollywood tough guy actor Dane Clark plays an American newsman who joins Lockwood in her desperate bid to destroy the insect lab, grab the specimens and flee the country.

Screen-writer Eric Ambler’s exciting, cheeky little comedy action thriller in the spirit of Lockwood’s hits The Lady Vanishes and Night Train to Munich is directed at a smart pace by Roy Ward Baker, who encourages larky performances from his cast of welcome faces, especially Marius Goring, Naunton Wayne, Eugene Deckers, Wilfrid Hyde White, Michael Hordern, Gladys Henson, Olaf Pooley, Eric Pohlmann and Paul Hardtmuth.

A bright, appealing Lockwood is in her element, but alas undeservedly her star was fading. It was her last movie under her Rank contract. She had not made a film in 18 months and it was designed as a comeback vehicle.

Also in the cast are Joan Haythorne, Patrick Doonan, Anthony Newley, Jill Balcon, Ernest Butcher, Tom Frost, Anton Diffring and John Horsley (in his film debut).

Highly Dangerous is directed by Roy Ward Baker, runs 90 minutes, is a Two Cities Films and Rank production, is released by General Film Distributors (UK) and Lippert Pictures (US), is written by Eric Ambler, is shot in black and white by Reginald H Wyer, is produced by Antony Darnborough (producer) and Earl St John (executive producer), and scored by Richard Addinsell, with Art Direction by Alex Vetchinsky. The music is played by The Philharmonia Orchestra. It was released in the US as Time Running Out.

Baker recalled: ‘It was Eric Ambler’s first or second book, although it had a different title and its main character was a man. Eric changed it to a woman to make it more interesting. Eric presents you with a script that is beautifully finished in every detail. It wasn’t a very successful picture. It was a good idea although I don’t think I did it very well.’

It is one of the six classic movies starring Margaret Lockwood in The Margaret Lockwood Collection DVD, also including The Wicked Lady (1945), Love Story (1944), Bank Holiday (1938), Give Us the Moon (1944), and The Lady Vanishes (1938).

Dorset-born Olaf Pooley, who plays the Detective-Interrogator, died on 14 July 2015 and made a grand 101.

© Derek Winnert 2017 Classic Movie Review 4979

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