This film was a major breakthrough as the first British picture with recorded sound. Based on a hit play by Charles Bennett, this taut melodrama about an ingenue who is driven to murder, then blackmailed, is one of the earliest of the master’s suspense-thrillers - a genre which he elevated to an art form. The girl, Anny Ondra, has a flirtation with a Scotland Yard inspector (Charles Paton) which leads to murder which is discovered by the blackmailer played by Donald Calthrop. The new explored sound gambits, harrowing chase sequence and offbeat montage gave 1929 audiences a nightmarish but witty film that anticipated many of Hitchcock’s classics.
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How to watch
Collection
In ACMI's collection
Credits
Collection metadata
ACMI Identifier
305550
Language
English
Audience classification
PG
Subject categories
Courtroom, Crime, Espionage & Thrillers
Courtroom, Crime, Espionage & Thrillers → Detective and mystery films
Sound/audio
Sound
Colour
Black and White
Holdings
VHS; Access Print (Section 1)