| A Question of Suspense | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Directed by | Max Varnel |
| Screenplay by | Lawrence Huntington |
| Story by | Roy Vickers |
| Based on | an original story by Roy Vickers |
| Produced by | Bill Luckwell Jock MacGregor |
| Starring | Peter Reynolds Noelle Middleton Yvonne Buckingham |
| Cinematography | Philip Grindrod |
| Edited by | Robert Hill |
| Music by | Wilfred Burns |
Production company | Bill & Michael Luckwell Limited |
| Distributed by | Columbia Pictures |
Release date | 1961 |
Running time | 63 mins |
A Question of Suspense is a low budget 1961 British black and white crime drama "B" film directed by Max Varnel, based on a story by Roy Vickers, starring Peter Reynolds, Noelle Middleton and Yvonne Buckingham.[1]
Plot
Tellman Drew is a businessman who has deposited £30,000 worth of forged bonds with his bank. When his chief clerk and childhood friend Frank Brigstock discovers the fraud, Drew offers him a partnership in his business, but lures him to a lonely spot by the coast and murders him and buries his body. Drew persuades the police that it was Frank who had been behind the scan and has absconded.
Rose Marples, who has been living with Frank as his wife, and has known both men since her youth, is not convinced. She begins her own investigation, ultimately discovering the burial site and bringing about Drew's demise.
Cast
- Peter Reynolds as Tellman Drew
- Noelle Middleton as Rose Marples
- Yvonne Buckingham[Note 1] as Jean Forbes
- Norman Rodway as Frank Brigstock
- James Neylin as Inspector Hunter
- Pauline Delany as Mrs. Barlow
- Anne Mulvey as Sally
- Peter Dix as Det. Sgt. White
- Fergus Cogley as bank manager
- Dennis Franks as estate agent
- John Hoey as hall porter
Critical reception
Monthly Film Bulletin said "Thinly scripted murder-and-revenge melodrama, unexceptionally directed and working up to a tidy climax which was never in doubt for a moment."[3]
The Daily Cinema noted on 26 June 1961 that the film "concentrates its drama on the characters and what makes them tick."[4]
Production
The 1968 Report of the Film Industry Committee shows that the Irish Film Finance Corporation had invested in the production of the film.[5]
It was made at Ardmore Studios, Bray in Ireland. Although set in England, external scenes were filmed around Dublin and Greystones, including Frank Brigstock going to work on a CIÉ (Córas Iompair Éireann – Irish Transport Company) bus.
Notes
- ↑ Yvonne Buckingham had prominent roles in two 1961 films, A Question of Suspense and Murder in Eden. As a result, she forfeited £4,000 which might have been paid from an insurance policy she took out in 1958 when she was aged 20, against failure to become a star within five years.[2]
References
- ↑ "A Question of Suspense". British Film Institute Collections Search. Retrieved 4 November 2023.
- ↑ Farmer, Richard (2017). "The Profumo affair in popular culture: The Keeler Affair (1963) and 'the commercial exploitation of a public scandal'". Contemporary British History. 31 (3): 452–470. doi:10.1080/13619462.2016.1261698.
- ↑ "A Question of Suspense". Monthly Film Bulletin. 28 (324): 116. 1 January 1967 – via ProQuest.
- ↑ Clinton, Franz Antony (30 October 2020). British Thrillers, 1950-1979: 845 Films of Suspense, Mystery, Murder and Espionage. McFarland. p. 98. ISBN 9780786410323. Retrieved 4 September 2023.
- ↑ Rockett, Kevin; Gibbons, Luke; Hill, John (11 November 2013). Cinema and Ireland. Routledge. p. 123. ISBN 978-0415726481. Retrieved 4 September 2023.