Wednesday, August 05, 2020

Movie review - "The Runaway Bus" (1954) **1/2

The title promises pace at least, which writer-director Val Guest normally excelled in, but the budget wasn't high enough for that so the bus breaks down in fog.

This is heavily influenced by The Ghost Train which Guest wrote for Arthur Askey - shenanigans in a deserted location with a group of strangers thrown together, some of whom are bad, some of whom are red herrings, and a comic in the middle of it all.

Here the comic is Frankie Howerd, who is fine. The support cast also includes Margaret Rutherford (splendid), George Colouris, and Petula Clarke - plus Belinda Lee in her first role I believe. She's a little amateurish but is great fun and spirited as a young woman hooked on detective novels. I wish her part had been bigger and less time devoted to boring policemen and handsome lunks who turn out to be undercover agents.

The support cast and intelligence of the script - it does try to tell a story - helped this one for me.

No comments: