Radio crime show host Lionel Hulme (Lee Patterson) wants to reconstruct a real life criminal case on his programme. He runs an ad in the newspapers asking for information as to the whereabouts of Arthur Smithers who has recently finished a jail sentence for the murder of his accomplice Nick Domego. They had pulled off a £20,000 raid on a bank together and the money was never recovered. Hulme receives three replies to his ad and visits them - a Greek barber, Dimitriado, who tells him that his man was drowned at sea, a Kensington pub landlady, Mrs Glass, who contradicts him by saying that he is alive and well and often drinks in her bar. The third is a street photographer called Charlie Gelf, an ex-con who did time with Smithers and recalls that he used to mutter in his sleep about a key. Gelf assumes that it was the key to a safe deposit where the loot is hidden away. In addition, he tells Hulme that there was a second accomplice called Haddow who he says is extremely dangerous and currently serving a sentence for GBH. He advises Hulme to be careful since he has spotted that he is being followed by somebody. But who could it be? A plain clothes copper trying to locate the loot or someone rather more sinister? Gelf is subsequently murdered when he spots Smithers on the street and takes a photograph of him. Naturally, the killer takes his camera away and Hulme's only remaining lead is Smithers' ex-wife Gaby (Hy Hazel) who works as a dancer at a Soho nightclub. However, when he visits her, he discovers that she and her husband are still very much together and he is working as the doorman at the club. He denies killing Domego and reveals that the key that Gelf referred to is actually one of two needed to open a safe deposit box where the money is stashed. He has one but the other appears to have been buried with Domego. Smithers trained as a locksmith whilst he was serving his prison sentence and succeeded in making a copy of the missing key from an impression he made of the lock. He strikes a bargain with Hulme agreeing to split the £20,000 if he goes to get it from the hiding place at the Key Lane Underground Safe. In return, Smithers asks for £250 upfront so he and Gaby can buy a safe passage out of Britain. Hulme agrees but his life is immediately put in serious danger. He tries the keys in the lock - one fits, but the other does not. Suddenly a figure appears from behind, inserts a key into the second keyhole and it opens. It's Haddow, Smithers' second accomplice. He removes the money and leads Hulme at gunpoint to an old bombsite where he admits to killing Domego and letting Smithers take the rap for it. Now, he plans to kill Hulme too, but is someone planning a double cross?
Very agreeable, unpretentious and brisk paced b-pic crime drama shot in just three weeks at Merton Park by director Montgomery Tully. For a film of its size and modest aspirations, it manages to pack in quite a lot of action including a fairly exciting climatic cross London car chase and a fight at a salon. Lit only by a flashing neon sign across the street, this makes it all the more unnerving since it is hard to see who is landing the most punches and who will emerge from it in one piece. There is also some suspense when Hulme's wife, Pauline (competently played by Paula Byrne), is trapped by the killer at their flat and he discovers that her husband is at the safe. She finally manages to elude her attacker and call the police, but we are kept gripping the sides of our seats wondering if they will get to him before it is too late.
The screenplay by J. McLaren Ross (who also penned Tully's programmer The Strange Awakening) allows for some down to earth insight into Hulme's home life. He allows his career to take him over and his wife is dismayed that she spends most of her time alone at home without seeing anyone, going to the movies or being able to buy a new dress. Hulme's obsession in tracking down his man culminates when he forgets to pay his bills and a baliff appears on the doorstep serving a court order for rent arrears. The exchange that takes place between Hulme and the baliff is quite amusing. "I was hoping to get home in time for your show, Mr Hulme. My fiancee never misses it." "Are you getting married?", Hulme replies. "Yes, in three weeks". "Take a tip - don't!" says Hulme fed up with Pauline's constant nagging and obviously thinking "That guy doesn't know what he's in for." Canadian leading man and a regular in British 'B's at the time, Lee Patterson, offers a down to earth and convincing portrayal as the dogged radio presenter-journalist.
Montgomery Tully allows himself a few low key, deft directorial touches such as a dissolve from a murder in a phone box to Hy Hazel's exotic dance in a Soho nightclub, which is backed by a faintly sinister accompaniment giving it a film noir type feel. We even get a pre-credits prologue set on VE day, which is intercut with what must have been stock footage of civilians and soldiers partying on London's streets celebrating the end of the war and a reasonably convincing studio set of a street at night deserted long after the celebrations are over. Smithers arrives at home and is arrested and there is a nice visual touch in which a discarded newspaper floats along the pavement in the breeze revealing that he is a man wanted for murder and his part in the £20,000 bank job. The credits unscroll as the key to the safe, which has fallen out of his pocket lies on the ground as discarded decorations blow across it.
Very agreeable, unpretentious and brisk paced b-pic crime drama shot in just three weeks at Merton Park by director Montgomery Tully. For a film of its size and modest aspirations, it manages to pack in quite a lot of action including a fairly exciting climatic cross London car chase and a fight at a salon. Lit only by a flashing neon sign across the street, this makes it all the more unnerving since it is hard to see who is landing the most punches and who will emerge from it in one piece. There is also some suspense when Hulme's wife, Pauline (competently played by Paula Byrne), is trapped by the killer at their flat and he discovers that her husband is at the safe. She finally manages to elude her attacker and call the police, but we are kept gripping the sides of our seats wondering if they will get to him before it is too late.
The screenplay by J. McLaren Ross (who also penned Tully's programmer The Strange Awakening) allows for some down to earth insight into Hulme's home life. He allows his career to take him over and his wife is dismayed that she spends most of her time alone at home without seeing anyone, going to the movies or being able to buy a new dress. Hulme's obsession in tracking down his man culminates when he forgets to pay his bills and a baliff appears on the doorstep serving a court order for rent arrears. The exchange that takes place between Hulme and the baliff is quite amusing. "I was hoping to get home in time for your show, Mr Hulme. My fiancee never misses it." "Are you getting married?", Hulme replies. "Yes, in three weeks". "Take a tip - don't!" says Hulme fed up with Pauline's constant nagging and obviously thinking "That guy doesn't know what he's in for." Canadian leading man and a regular in British 'B's at the time, Lee Patterson, offers a down to earth and convincing portrayal as the dogged radio presenter-journalist.
Montgomery Tully allows himself a few low key, deft directorial touches such as a dissolve from a murder in a phone box to Hy Hazel's exotic dance in a Soho nightclub, which is backed by a faintly sinister accompaniment giving it a film noir type feel. We even get a pre-credits prologue set on VE day, which is intercut with what must have been stock footage of civilians and soldiers partying on London's streets celebrating the end of the war and a reasonably convincing studio set of a street at night deserted long after the celebrations are over. Smithers arrives at home and is arrested and there is a nice visual touch in which a discarded newspaper floats along the pavement in the breeze revealing that he is a man wanted for murder and his part in the £20,000 bank job. The credits unscroll as the key to the safe, which has fallen out of his pocket lies on the ground as discarded decorations blow across it.