Review of The Riverside Murder

Any movie with Alastair Sim is a good movie and this one is notable for presenting Sim in a major role in his movie debut. Sim provides this murder mystery with much his usual characterization. True, he's inclined to be a bit over-emphatic in his delivery, but that's a fault displayed by the lead role's Basil Sydney as well. We also enjoyed the performance of Judy Gunn as the stop-at-nothing reporter. This was her third film and we would have thought she had a big career in front of her, but she retired in 1937 (presumably when she married Anthony Hue-Williams). By the humble standard of director Albert Parker, the movie is very competently made. In fact, Parker manages to juggle the many characters and set-pieces in Selwyn Jepson's adaptation of Andre Steeman's novel, "Six Dead Men", with reasonable competence and only misses two or three beats. This was actually the first of Steeman's many novels to be adapted to the screen. It wasn't until 1941 that another was attempted, and then in 1942 came the memorable, "The Murderer Lives at Number 21"! Available on a very good Alpha DVD.