Rent The Woman in Question (1950)

Five Version of the Truth (and One Awful Accent) - The Woman in Question review by griggs

A murder, a seaside fortune-teller, and five conflicting accounts of what really happened — The Woman in Question plays like a Rashomon-style mystery before Rashomon even arrived. It’s a post-war British noir that can’t decide if it’s a police procedural, melodrama, or social satire, but it’s far too curious to be dull.

Jean Kent is terrific as the maybe-innocent, maybe-vicious woman at its centre, giving the story real pulse even when the tone wobbles. I was relieved to learn there’s actually a plot-based excuse for Dirk Bogarde’s dreadful attempt at an American accent — though the film would’ve worked better with a more engaging actor in the detective’s shoes instead of a bland narrator. You can feel the class divide bubbling beneath the dialogue: clipped vowels, hard stares, and that polite post-war tension Britain does so well.

It’s an odd, uneven film — clever, dry, and occasionally brilliant — that never quite finds its footing but never loses your interest either. For all its uncertainty, it remains a brisk, stylish curiosity from a time when British cinema was just learning to loosen its tie.

A superb murder mystery showing various points of view after a murder - very clever - The Woman in Question review by PV

I loved this film, from 1950 and all the better for it. Genuinely tense and exciting and VERY clever - it depicts a murder from various points of view which are shown to be different and is really therefore a study in witness bias. NEVER believe anyone!

The cast is classy. Dirk Bogarde in I think his first ever role doing a dodgy American accent (but that is fine - no spoilers but it fits the plot and backstory of his character). Classy female actors play the sisters and I loved the way they alternated according to which witness point of view was being explored.

Told largely in flashback to various witness accounts - very clever indeed and so well-written and acted.

The boy Alfie was great - not credited here. Played by Bobbie Scroggins (great name!) whose last film appearance as as a page boy in the first Titanic film, a Night to Remember in 1958. I hope his life went well for him. Just see what happens to some child actors/stars like Bobby Driscoll, dead of drugs at 31 (last role was the voice of Disney Peter Pan 1952).

A superb old film back before everything had to be a woke preachy lecture.

4 stars.