The Ringer (1931 film)

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The Ringer
"The Ringer" (1931 film).jpg
Poster with Esmond Knight and Carol Goodner
Directed by Walter Forde
Written by Sidney Gilliat
Angus MacPhail
Robert Stevenson
Based onThe Gaunt Stranger by Edgar Wallace
Produced by Michael Balcon
Starring Patric Curwen
Esmond Knight
John Longden
Carol Goodner
Cinematography Alex Bryce
Edited by Ian Dalrymple
Production
companies
Distributed by Ideal Films
Release date
April 1931
Running time
75 minutes
CountryUnited Kingdom
LanguageEnglish

The Ringer is a 1931 British crime film directed by Walter Forde and starring Patric Curwen, Esmond Knight, John Longden and Carol Goodner. Scotland Yard detectives hunt for a dangerous criminal who has recently returned to England. [1] The film was based on the 1925 Edgar Wallace story The Gaunt Stranger, which is the basis for his play The Ringer. [2] Forde remade the same story in 1938 as The Gaunt Stranger . There was also a silent film of The Ringer in 1928, and a 1952 version starring Donald Wolfit. [3]

Contents

It was made at Beaconsfield Studios in Buckinghamshire by Gainsborough Pictures in a co-production with British Lion Films. [4] The film's sets were designed by the art director Norman G. Arnold. The author's son Bryan Edgar Wallace acted as a production manager.

Cast

Critical reception

The New York Times wrote, "at the Cameo is a picturization of the late Edgar Wallace's play The Ringer. This film, which hails from England, is the sort of melodrama that provides more amusement than excitement"; [5] while in The BFI Companion to Crime, Phil Hardy wrote, "this is the best version of this oft-filmed play...Directed by Forde with a slickness and pace unusual in British films of the period, especially considering the film's stage origins...Hokum, but enjoyable." [6]

Related Research Articles

Sidney Gilliat was an English film director, producer and writer.

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The Ringer is a 1928 British silent crime film directed by Arthur Maude starring Leslie Faber, Annette Benson and Hayford Hobbs. It was based on the 1925 Edgar Wallace novel The Gaunt Stranger. Scotland Yard hunt for a dangerous criminal who has returned to Britain after many years away. A talkie version of The Ringer followed in 1931.

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The Student's Romance is a 1935 British musical film directed by Otto Kanturek and starring Grete Natzler, Patric Knowles and Carol Goodner. It was based on the musical I Lost My Heart in Heidelberg, and was part of a trend of operetta films of the mid-1930s. It was made by British International Pictures at Elstree Studios. The film's sets were designed by the art directors Cedric Dawe and Clarence Elder.

Der Hexer is a 1964 West German black and white mystery film directed by Alfred Vohrer and starring Joachim Fuchsberger. It was part of a very successful series of German films based on the writings of Edgar Wallace and adapted from the 1925 novel titled The Ringer. In 1965, a sequel Neues vom Hexer was released.

References

  1. "The Ringer". BFI. Archived from the original on 13 January 2009.
  2. "Past Masters: EDGAR WALLACE".
  3. "Network ON AIR > Edgar Wallace Presents: The Ringer". Archived from the original on 7 October 2015.
  4. Wood p.73
  5. Mordaunt Hall (2 June 1932). "Movie Review: Sari Maritza, a Continental Film Favorite, in Her First American Picture, a Drama of Soviet Russia". New York Times .
  6. Attenborough, Richard (1997). The BFI Companion to Crime. ISBN   9780520215382.

Bibliography