The Queen of Spades **** (1949, Anton Walbrook, Edith Evans, Yvonne Mitchell) – Classic Movie Review 2460

The 1949 fantasy horror film The Queen of Spades is based on the 1834 short story by Alexander Pushkin, and stars Anton Walbrook, Edith Evans and Yvonne Mitchell. Martin Scorsese said: ‘This stunning film is one of the few true classics of supernatural cinema.’

Director Thorold Dickinson’s acclaimed 1949 British film version of the Alexander Pushkin short story The Queen of Spades showcases Edith Evans’s outstanding, mesmerisingly extravagant performance as the elderly Russian Countess Ranevskaya who knows the secret of how always to win at playing cards.

Anton Walbrook is remarkable too as card fanatic Captain Herman Suvorin, the poor army officer who is willing to do anything for the secret, for which the Countess has made a pact with the Devil and exchanged her soul for the ability to have success at cards. Herman seduces the countess’s helper Lizaveta Ivanova (Yvonne Mitchell) to gain admission to the old lady’s chamber.

[Spoiler alert] Eventually the Captain murders the Countess for her secret, but then finds himself haunted by old woman’s spirit.

This remarkable, eerie classic fantasy horror film is deservedly admired, especially for Evans’s performance and its great, startling visual style thanks to William Kellner’s splendid baroque sets, Oliver Messel’s costume designs and Otto Heller’s gorgeously rich, fussy cinematography. Dickinson’s direction is stately and precise.

Although Evans and Mitchell were both experienced stage actors, this was their cinema debuts (though Evans appeared in three silent movies in 1915-16 and Mitchell had an un-credited walk-on as ‘factory worker at gate’ in 1941’s Love on the Dole).

Production is by Anatole de Grunwald and score by Georges Auric, and the screenplay is written by Arthur Boys and Rodney Ackland. Ackland was also originally the film’s director before disagreements with de Grunwald and Walbrook caused him to be replaced, supposedly suffering from poor health, at a few days notice by Dickinson, who also rewrote sections of the script.

The exterior shots of St Petersburg were filmed in Welwyn Studios, Welwyn Garden City, Hertfordshire, using the sets created by Kellner from designs by Oliver Messel.

It was bereft of prizes, though it was nominated for a BAFTA Award for Best British Film and was nominated for the Grand Prize of the Festival at the 1949 Cannes Film Festival.

Also in the select cast are Ronald Howard, Mary Jerrold, Miles Malleson, Athene Seyler, Michael Medwin, Anthony Dawson, Pauline Tennant, Ivor Barnard, Valentine Dyall, Gibb McLaughlin, Gordon Begg, Aubrey Mallalieu, Drusilla Wills, George Woodbridge, Pauline Jameson, Hay Petrie, John Howard and Aubrey Woods.

It was released on 16 March 1949 (London) by Associated British-Pathé and 30 June 1949 (US) by Republic Pictures.

The Queen of Spades was for long thought lost but it was rediscovered and re-released in British cinemas on 26 December 2009 and released on DVD in January 2010, with an introduction by Martin Scorsese, who said: ‘This stunning film is one of the few true classics of supernatural cinema.’

The main cast are Anton Walbrook as Captain Herman Suvorin, Edith Evans as Countess Ranevskaya, Yvonne Mitchell as Lizavetta Ivanova, Ronald Howard as Andrei, Mary Jerrold as Old Varvarushka, Anthony Dawson as Fyodor, Miles Malleson as Tchybukin, Michael Medwin as Hovaisky, Athene Seyler as Princess Ivashin, Ivor Barnard as bookseller, Aubrey Mallalieu as Fedya, Maroussia Dimitrevitch as gypsy singer, Violetta Elvin as gypsy dancer, Pauline Tennant as young Countess Ranevskaya, Hay Petrie as Herman’s servant, and Aubrey Woods as Dimitri.

© Derek Winnert 2015 Classic Movie Review 2460

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