User Reviews

Stephen Baker is an American citizen and a reformed character, a former safe cracker who's given up a life of crime to settle down with his beautiful wife Soroya, in her native Arab Country. Stephen is one day arrested and thrown in jail, Soroya tries desperately to get hold of some help for Stephen, she calls in her ex husband Zayid. Two British detectives wish to speak to Baker, to bring him to account for crimes that had occurred in the UK some years before.

Some pretty crappy effects if truth be told, the attempt to recreate a beautiful house in what's presumably Jordan did not work at all, the set looked cheap and the lighting was awful, like something from a School play.

A fun performance from Nadim Sawalha (Zayid Halim) noted for being the father of daughters Julia and Nadia.

The story is quite good, but on the whole it's quite poorly made.

5/10

Tales of the Unexpected: The Finger of Suspicion is set in a Middle Eastern country which has just agreed an extradition treaty with the UK, living there is Stephen Baker (Michael Brandon) & his Arab wife Soroya (Lucy Gutteridge). They get a knock on the front door & Stephen is taken to the local police station by Inspector Aziz (Stefan Kalipha) where two cops from Scotland Yard, Burke (Michael O'Hagan) & Hook (Rob Spendlove), are waiting to question him about an armed robbery. Back home & Soyora is worrying & decides to use drastic measures to try & help her husband...

This Tales of the Unexpected story was episode 8 from season 9 that originally aired here in the UK during April 1988, the third of three Tales of the Unexpected episodes to be directed by Rodney Bennett one has to say that in keeping with the majority of season nine The Finger of Suspicion is pretty rubbish. The story by Tony Wilmot was dramatised by Robin Chapman & one has to say it's a pretty slow moving poor tale with two distinct stories which are supposed to give two twist endings but it's all really dull, predictable & uninspiring stuff. I only saw it a few hours ago & I barely remember anything about it, the story doesn't really build up in any satisfying or interesting way & the when the twist endings come they have little impact & I was just glad it was finished. In fact they aren't really twists, they are more like silly plot developments.

Entirely studio-bound the sets are terrible, we are meant to believe The Finger of Suspicion is taking place in a Middle Eastern country but the it's so obviously a badly constructed set in a studio in the UK it's hard to take it seriously. There's slightly more bad language than usual for a Tales of the Unexpected episode but otherwise this is totally forgettable. Again there's a decent guest cast including Michael Brandon.

The Finger of Suspicion (there's definitely a 'The' in the title) is another rubbishy Tales of the Unexpected episode from the generally dire season nine, no wonder it was put out of it's misery (along with us the audience) & was canned. It's sort of sad to see a once great series that used some classic stories from some of the world's best short story writers churn crap like The Finger of Suspicion out.