It's intriguing but there's really not enough here for a feature film - it would have been better as an episode of an anthology series. The Lady Vanishes improved on this by having the missing person being a spy and therefore important, with people willing to kill them. There were life and death stakes. Here no one wants to kill Simmons they just want her out of town. Also there are silly bits like tracking down a maid who served her brother - only to see her blow up in a balloon accident before she's got the chance to talk to her. And there is a lack of subplots to pad out the running time.
To make matters worse, the filmmakers miss opportunities by underplaying the romance between Simmons and Dirk Bogarde, who is a visiting British painter. Doesn't he have a girlfriend at the beginning (Honor Blackman) who he just kind of drops? There is a thinly-disguised strain of xenophobia through the movie - no foreigners are to be trusted - whereas The Lady Vanishes was more complex because Brits were in on the plot too.
Still there are some pleasures: Simmons is likeable solving the mystery, young Bogarde is a dashing hero, the cast is full of recognisable faces (e.g. Felix Aylmer) and the art direction pleases.
NB Why don't we see Tomlinson's face at the end? Is he full of disease and looking foul?
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