The Scarlet Web **½ (1954, Griffith Jones, Hazel Court, Zena Marshall) – Classic Movie Review 13,380

The likeable 1954 British second feature crime thriller film The Scarlet Web stars Griffith Jones, Hazel Court and Zena Marshall. 

Director Charles Saunders’s likeable, witty banter-led 1954 British second feature crime thriller film The Scarlet Web features Griffith Jones, Hazel Court, Zena Marshall, and Robert Percival. It is made by Fortress Film Productions and released by Eros Films in June 1954.

Griffith Jones stars as an undercover insurance investigator, just released from jail, who is met at the prison gates and then framed for murder when a pretty woman called Laura Vane (Zena Marshall) hires him to recover a letter from a man who wants to blackmail her husband. Or so she says.

Winter finds himself drugged next to the body of a woman, goes on the run from the police, but his new boss at the insurance company, Susan Honeywell (Hazel Court), helps him try to prove he is innocent.

The three stars are excellent in this well-acted, pretty good old-style B movie comedy thriller, with the highly improbable, but involving murder story better than the script’s inconsequential wise-cracking throwaway banter comedy elements. The film is quite a lot of fun if not too much is expected of it, but it would be much better with a hardboiled detective mystery tone, taking it much more seriously. After all, it is a murder mystery.

Probably the wise-cracking has not worn terribly well, maybe the banter isn’t witty enough, though it’s not bad, and Hazel Court and Griffith Jones have a very good go at making it work smoothly enough. They are really quite appealing, a nice double act with good chemistry, and the formidable Zena Marshall makes a tremendous femme fatale.

David Stoll as Alphonse the hairdresser is a bit of a stain, and Robert Percival doesn’t have enough to do as the villain Charles Dexter, but Molly Raynor as Dexter’s mousy secretary Miss Riggs, Ronnie Stevens as her underling Simpson, and Michael Balfour as the barman are amusing. Robert Moore gives an odd, workably offbeat performance as Inspector Henry. At least it’s different.

The film was made at Walton Studios Surrey, England. with some, but not nearly enough, precious location shooting in London, and some horrible back projections and painted backdrops.

Given that it is a humble second feature, it really is quite commendable. Director Charles Saunders moves it along slickly and very briskly, which he has to, as there’s a heck of a lot of plot in Doreen Montgomery’s screenplay to get through in 63 minutes. Griffith Jones is unusually cast as a sexy young romantic lead, but he’s a good enough actor to work cheerily against type like this. And Hazel Court and Zena Marshall are so very alluring in the Fifties style.

The cast

The cast are Griffith Jones as Jake Winter, Hazel Court as Susan Honeywell, Zena Marshall as Laura Vane, Robert Percival as Charles Dexter, Molly Raynor as Miss Riggs, Ronnie Stevens as Simpson, John Fitzgerald as Bert, Stuart Douglass as Cyril, Michael Balfour as barman, David Stoll as Alphonse the hairdresser, and Robert Moore as Inspector Henry.

© Derek Winnert 2025 – Classic Movie Review 13,380

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