Card sharp: The Queen of Spades
10 April 2012
Thorold Dickenson, a more than able British film-maker and notable teacher largely forgotten now, made this macabre fantasy set in Imperial Russia in 1949.
It is his best film, taken from a Pushkin short story about an impecunious gambler (Anton Walbrook) seeking to wrest the secret of winning at cards from a wicked old countess (Edith Evans).
Imaginative camerawork and suitably eerie sound effects render the film one of the best of its kind made in this country.
Released 26 December.
The Queen Of Spades
Cert: PG
