Smokescreen (1964)

Plenty to Like, Plenty to Dislike

How sad is this?

I cannot think of one single thing that I would change about this film. The acting is incomparable, the directing deft, and the writing poignantly brilliant.

If you like to be scared, if you like to laugh, and if you like to learn a thing or two at the movies, this absolutely cannot be missed.

A blazing car crashes over a cliff. No body is found. It belonged to a co-owner of a business. Both owners had recently taken out large insurance policies. The insurance company is naturally suspicious and send an agent (Peter Vaughn) to investigate. The time frame of the accident adds to his suspicions. To complicate matters it turns out that there was an offer to buy the business that the missing man rejected but which his partner wanted to accept. To further complicate matters the local insurer (John Carson) who sold the policies loves the missing man's wife (the beautiful Yvonne Romain).The film has a bit more depth than normal B-movie fare. Throughout there is a running theme about Vaughan's expenses. This seems to be for low comedic effect but later we learn why he is so tight with money. Similarly with the denouement we learn why the film's title is appropriate.This is a pleasant, undemanding little B-movie for all the family. I give it a 7 because it's a well-made, well-written, well-acted low budget film lacking star names. Had it had an A-list budget I'd have given it a 6.

A gently, wryly humorous fairly engrossing who-done-what lacking top names but packed with familiar and able players who'd supported many a British classic. Sam Kydd - was there a British post-war film without him as able seaman, workman, stuttering gang-member or as here,once again, a waiter? Derek Guyler in a neat cameo reminding us of a time before "have-nice-day" came to these shores. Typecast they might have been but familiar because they were the best of their type. I didn't then know the name of Penny Morell but certainly recognised a top performance as the very obliging but drunken secretary. Budget production it might have been but one gets the impression of an esprit de corps of director, cast and crew of professionals working for beer-money but rightly proud nevertheless.

Came across this little known British Thriller when searching the net for similar movies. This is one of a number made by Renown pictures and there are many available to buy from them or Amazon.This is the first one I watched and I liked it very much. The story revolves around a supposed life assurance fraud, possible suicide and maybe murder.Like a lot of similar films of the time it is very short at 66 minutes but that was the least of my worries.There are some great parts played by well known character actors like Patrick flood, Deryck Guyler and Glynn Edwards, however the show is stolen by the marvellous Peter Vaughan as the tight fisted assessor, although as we see later in the film he has good reason for his meanness. I googled him afterwards and see he is still working at nearly 90!An enjoyable hour or so and I look forward to watching more in the series.

A car engulfed in flames plummets to the bottom of a cliff on the Sussex coast. The car belonged to a wealthy businessman called John Dexter but the police can find no trace of a body. The Australian Life insurance company suspect a fraud since only recently, Dexter and his business partner, Graham Turner (Gerald Flood), took out life insurance policies worth £100.000 each. London insurance investigator Ropey Roper (Peter Vaughan) arrives to investigate and with the help of Australian Life insurance man Trevor Bayliss (John Carson) he learns that Dexter had withdrawn a large sum of money from his bank just prior to the crash. In addition, the porter at a nearby railway station recalls seeing a man matching Dexter's description boarding a train on the night of the crash. Meanwhile, Dexter's widow, Janet (Yvonne Romain), has put in a claim for her husband's insurance money. It looks like a straight forward case of insurance fraud - husband fakes death so that wife can collect - but Roper soon suspects something more sinister than that. He learns that Bayliss was once in love with Janet and that it was he who pressured the two men into taking out the policies. He also discovers that Turner was keen to sale the business since he was heavily in debt but Dexter it seems was not. Is the insurance fraud a smokescreen for a cleverly planned murder? A well above average quota quickie whodunit from Butcher's who specialised in low budget programme fillers like this. While the supporting cast only offer serviceable performances, Vaughan offers a charming portrayal of the dogged Roper. On the face of it he is extremely tight fisted with money and isn't above fiddling his expenses either i.e. claiming a three bob plus tip taxi fare even though he made the trip on foot. There is an amusing little scene where he invites the missing man's young secretary over to his hotel for a drink to plug her for information about her bosses. The waiter (Sam Kydd) is amazed since he had been trying in vain to persuade Roper to buy something ever since he arrived when he allows her to be "terribly extravagant" and order a champagne cocktail. Rather reluctantly, Roper has to keep them coming until she tells him enough so that the final pieces of the puzzle fit into place. And when she does he excitedly rushes off leaving the poor girl who is by now rather tipsy to pay the four pounds fifteen and sixpence bill though not because of his mean ways. There is a touching moment in writer-director Jim O' Connolly's script where we finally learn the reasons for Roper's apparently miserly ways. His wife is dying from a terminal illness and he is respecting her wishes to spend her last days at home even though it is putting a huge financial strain on him and regardless of her doctor's advice. "It's not often you meet such a generous nature" the doctor says to the nurse who feels guilty about taking her wages off Roper every week.The film is enlivened with a real sense of place and period thanks to the excellent use of location shooting in Brighton and around the Sussex coast, which is beautifully shot in documentary style black and white by Jack Mills. One can see that a little more care and attention had been paid to this film. We even get a flashback sequence to the night of the crime as Roper explains to the police and the interested parties how he arrived at his conclusions as to the truth of the matter.All in all, Smokescreen can be enjoyed as a pleasant reminder of an era of film-making gone by. There was once a time when little gems like this used to appear on ITV in the wee small hours as time fillers or as "a cure for insomnia" as one of their harshest critics put it. But interest in this particular area of the British film industry seems to be increasing as more and more are finding their way on to DVD for a new generation of fans to enjoy.