Home | Movies By Year | Movies from 1954
Murder by Proxy
Buy Murder by Proxy now from AmazonFirst, read the Wikipedia article. Then, scroll down to see what other TopShelfReviews readers thought about the movie. And once you've experienced the movie, tell everyone what you thought about it.
Wikipedia article
'Murder by Proxy' is a 1954 British film noir crime drama film directed by Terence Fisher and starring Dane Clark, Belinda Lee and Betty Ann Davies. The screenplay concerns a man who is offered money to marry a woman. It was produced by Hammer Films and shot at the company's Bray Studios in Berkshire with sets designed by the art director J. Elder Wills. It released in the United States by Lippert Pictures as 'Blackout'.
Plot summary
Drunk and down-and-out Casey Morrow (Clark) in London is approached by a young and beautiful heiress, Phyllis Brunner (Lee), offering him much money if he will marry her. He accepts, but then wakes up the next morning in some other woman's apartment with blood on his coat from the murder of Brunner's father. Now he must unravel the mystery to clear his name, which leads him into a twisted labyrinth of encounters with various suspicious characters who seem to make his situation worse the more he learns.
Cast
* Dane Clark as Casey Morrow
* Belinda Lee as Phyllis Brunner
* Betty Ann Davies as Mrs. Alicia Brunner
* Eleanor Summerfield as Maggie Doone
* Andrew Osborn as Lance Gordon
* Harold Lang as Travis / Victor Vanno
* Jill Melford as Miss Nardis
* Alvys Maben as Lita Huntley
* Michael Golden as Inspector Johnson
* Nora Gordon as Casey's mother
* Alfie Bass as Ernie
* Delphi Lawrence as Linda
* Arnold Diamond as Mrs. Brunner's Butler
* Cleo Laine as Singer
* Olive Sloane as Landlady
Production
The film was based on a novel 'Murder by Proxy' which was published in 1952. It was the first movie in an eight picture contact between Hammer Films and Lippert Pictures.
Dane Clark's casting was announced in September 1953.ZUKOR SEES VALUE IN VARIED METHODS: New York Times 21 Sep 1953: 22. He stayed on in England to make 'Five Days'.Round the British Studios
Nepean, Edith. Picture Show; London Vol. 62, Iss. 1605, (Jan 2, 1954): 11.
Script supervisor Renee Glynne later recalled that Belinda Lee "was still very inexperienced at that time and I had to watch her quite carefully. She'd cross her legs the wrong way or turn her head at the wrong moment or come out with the wrong line, so I'd have to correct her and try to help her out. Dane obviously fancied her and got very cross with my professional interference'. He got quite nasty and was actually pushing me away from her." Glynne says she had to take medication "in order to survive the rest of the film. After that I had to give all my instructions to him through the director, Terry Fisher...after some shots he'd have to put his head under cold water because he was so enraged that I was even there. Eventually he realised how silly it all was and went down on his knees, tears streaming down his face, begging me to forgive him, But I still asked Tony Hinds to take me off the next film he was in."
Reception
The 'Monthly Film Bulletin'said "the treatment is sufficiently persuasive to bring a fair amount of excitement to the well tried material."MURDER BY PROXY
Monthly Film Bulletin; London Vol. 22, Iss. 252, (Jan 1, 1955): 59.
'Variety' called it "a gabby, overlong, import from England that has Dane Clark heading the cast as the only name known in the domestic market. Condition of the supporting feature market is such currently that the film will have no trouble getting bookings, even though it offers scant measure of entertainment.... Theres nothing the players can do with the plot as presented under the production helming of Michael Carreras, and Terence Fisher's direction is deliberate to the extreme, even for a British offering."[https://archive.org/details/variety194-1954-05/page/n5/mode/1up?q=%22belinda+lee%22 Review of film] at Variety
'Filmink' called it "an entirely decent, unpretentious film noir; the age gap between the leads is annoying, but Lee is an ideal femme-fatale-or-isnt-she?"
References
Buy Murder by Proxy now from Amazon
<-- Return to movies from 1954