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The Lady Vanishes
UK 1938
produced by Edward Black for Gainsborough
directed by Alfred Hitchcock
starring Margaret Lockwood, Michael Redgrave, Paul Lukas, Dame May Whitty, Cecil Parker, Linden Travers, Naunton Wayne, Basil Radford, Mary Clare, Emile Boreo, Googie Withers, Sally Stewart, Philip Leaver, Selma Vaz Dias, Catherine Lacey, Josephine Wilson, Charles Oliver, Kathleen Tremaine
screenplay by Sidney Gilliat, Frank Launder, based on the novel The Wheel Spins by Ethel Lina White, music by Louis Levy, Charles Williams
Charters and Caldicott
review by Mike Haberfelner
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Some fantasy Eastern European country: Young Iris (Margaret Lockwood)
is hit by a falling stone when she wants to board a train, and is helped
onto the train by middle-aged Miss Froy (Dame May Whitty) - who shortly
after disappears completely, and when Iris wants to look for her,
everybody claims there has never been a Miss Froy. The only one who helps
her is slightly annoying writer Gilbert (Michael Redgrave), but the more
Iris gets into looking for Miss Froy, the less convinced even he becomes
that this woman even exists, and his doubts are only fuelled by the very
friendly Doctor Hartz (Paul Lukas), who comes up with explanation after
explanation why Iris could have only imagined Miss Froy - that is until
Gilbert and Iris are attacked in the luggage appartment by Signor Doppo
(Philip Leaver), an Italian magician ... and from here on, Gilbert and
Iris begin to piece together the puzzle about Miss Froy, who's obviously a
British agent who has to be smuggled off the train one way or another, and
they also start to figure out the various reasons the other passengers
refused to remember her. Unfortunately though, they then report all
evidence they have gathered to that nice Doctor Hartz, not realizing that
he is the head of the baddies, and indeed he tries to kill them, but they
are saved by Hartz' half-British assistant (Catherine Lacey), who also
helps them save Miss Froy - and for the finale, Iris and Gilbert team up
with all the British passengers of the train to fight the Eastern European
secret service that's actually behind the plot, and after an extended
chase and shootout, they save themselves and Miss Froy - and of course,
Gilbert and Iris become a couple. Basil Radford and Naunton Wayne play
the roles of Charters and Caldicott, two chaps remarkably
uninterested in what's going on around them - and their characters were so
successful that they were actually reused in three other films (including
one, John Baxter's Crook's Tour from 1941, with them as
headliners), all starring Wayne and Radford ov course. Wayne and Radford
also became a popular team outside of their characters in film and on
radio.
Nice, deliberately light-weight and unpretencious thriller from the
tail-end of Alfred Hitchcock's British era. True, the film might not be as
accomplished as Hitchcock's later Hollywood films (it even features quite
a few plotholes), made on a lower budget and Hitchcock's suspense
techniques seem not yet to be fully developed ... but that actually works
for the film rather than against it, it's a film that can afford to be
humourous in parts, that's brought to life by a great ensemble cast rather
than just its stars, and that moves along incredibly swiftly. Recommended.
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