Do You Know This Voice?

Dan Duryea went to the other side of the pond to star in this very neat and no frills British noir film about a child kidnapping. At least that's how it starts.

Like Bruno Hauptman when he dropped the infant Lindbergh baby climbing out a ladder and killing him, Duryea snatches a child going to a somewhat posh English public school and promptly kills him, he says by accident.

Isa Miranda spots the ransom call being made though she paid no real attention to the caller, Duryea gets paranoid. It's his paranoia because she is a neighbor that drives the rest of the film.

That and the fact that Duryea's wife played by Gwen Watford gives an almost perfect performance of a battered spouse who stands by her man come what may.

You'll like this film, especially with a couple of nice twists in the end that I didn't see coming.

A child is kidnapped in the mistaken belief the parents have money. A phone call is made from a public telephone. Then the corpse is found. The police speak to Isa Miranda, who used the public almost immediately after, but she was too involved with her own thoughts to notice anything. Nonetheless, she comes up with the idea of saying she did recognize the kidnapper to draw them out. The police say no, but she tells the newspaper she did, which forces the police to plant a plainclothesman in her house, and draw the attention of the kidnappers: next-door neighbors Dan Duryea and Gwen Watford. Duryea decides she has to die.

It's a very good cat-and-mouse game, with a fine performance my Signorina Miranda and a good one by Duryea., just clever enough to avoid the traps, spreading chaos as he goes along. With Peter Madden and Barry Warren.

Recorded from Talking Pictures TV, 2025.

In times where murder is commonplace in dramas, quite often supported by the accompanying violence and/or graphic images, it is ironic that I found it more shocking that the murder of a young boy at the start of the film was only conveyed in words. It had far greater impact.

I really could not decide whether Dan Duryea was good or awful. An American out of place for sure in this film.

The supporting cast of Peter Madden, Gwen Watford and Barry Warren were very good and helped keep things tight.

The whole thing was completely implausible but it was still an enjoyable thriller of 1960s vintage.

A good suspenseful crime story, with some great performances, especially by Dan Duryea as the scheming bad guy. I liked his line when he realises what might happen if he's ever found out - "before ya know it, I'll be doing the trapdoor fandango". Well worth watching.

The title of this film is the first of many feints this well-acted little thriller set in Bristol throws the audience, since it suggests a police procedural but then proves anything but. What seem to be being laid down as final twists are actually revealed surprisingly early all the better to confound expectations, while the relationship between the blundering villain and the one eyewitness pans out like a straight version of 'The Ladykillers' or 'A Fish Called Wanda'. As in most cheap British thrillers of the period, Arthur Lavis' black & white photography is beautifully clean and crisp.