Murder in Eden

Art expert Robert Lepler tells gallery owner Mark Singleton that the old master he is about to deliver is a fine forgery. Someone switched it for the real one after Lepler authenticated it. He's working on a book on forgeries. He also tells Singleton that the latest painting he is touting is a forgery. Singleton pulls it, but Lepler dies in a hit-and-run, just as French journalist Catherine Feller shows up to interview him; she finds Inspector Ray McAnally crossing her path, as well as oil magnate and collector Jack Aranson, and restorer Michael Lucas.

It's a nice little script, fairly ambitious in its coverage of the hothouse world of art collection for a B movie, and always threatening to turn farcical when Miss Feller and McAnally cross paths. While director Max Vanel is good at covering the story and the visuals, the accents come and go, and a lot of the actors speak Received Pronunciation with what sounds to me like an Irish lilt. Some very smelly red herrings get dragged along the path, and it's a fair, although not too challenging mystery.