GREEN FOR DANGER (1946)

GREEN FOR DANGER is a delightful and subtlety quirky, but still serious whodunit set in a British country hospital during World War II. The war backdrop is especially interesting because throughout the movie V1 flying bombs cruise overhead. You could hear the V1's rocket and right before they hit the rocket would cut off and put it into a steep dive. So that meant when you heard the silence kick in you better get to cover quick! I thought that was a really inventive way to create tension.

The film starts off like a soap opera, with the different romantic dramas of the various nurses and doctors, but then a patient dies as he's being prepped for surgery. The only people present were the six main characters (two doctors and four nurses). An investigation is called for and rumors swirl that it was murder. That night at a party a nurse outright says that it was murder in front of everybody and a few minutes later she's stabbed to death! Scotland Yard sends in Inspector Cockrill to solve the case. He's a droll, quirky older gentleman who thinks he's way smarter than he actually is (he even accidentally causes another death during the course of his investigation!) and whose main means of investigation is keeping all of the suspects extremely agitated.

Not the greatest mystery, but an enjoyable time waster with good performances and a satisfying ending.

THE NIGHT VISITOR (1971)

THE NIGHT VISITOR opens with a nighttime shot of a old frozen seaside fort(?) that's now being used as a insane asylum.  Suddenly a figure comes running across the rocky, snow covered coast.  He's wearing nothing but his underwear and a pair of boots.  It's Max von Sydow and he looks totally miserable.  Half-frozen and bluer than Papa Smurf's penis he scampers through the woods and to an isolated farmhouse.  He breaks in and spies on the residents...then it's time for a little murder and a return trip to the insane asylum wear he breaks back in.  What could the point of all this be?

The first act of THE NIGHT VISITOR was great, filled with mystery and tension, but then you get into the police investigation part (lead by Trevor Howard) and it all falls apart.  The cops have two suspects in the murders: Max and a local doctor (played by Per Oscarsson).  All they have to do is hide a guard outside of Max's cell door and another outside the doctor's house and the case would be solved, but no...instead they let the murders continue and only react afterwards.

The story might've had holes all through it, but the cast was a real treat.  Liv Ullmann and Max von Sydow are two of my favorite actors, so them plus Trevor Howard and Per Oscarsson...well, I was about as happy as a movie lover could be, even with the overly complicated story.