Meet Mr. Malcolm

While it's commendable of those wonderful people at Odeon Entertainment Group to revive these British B-movies in such pristine editions there should be some critical yardstick to determine that not just any-old-rope gets plonked onto what appears an exciting double bill, at least on the face of it.This is paired with I'm a Stranger, also made at Viking Studios in Kensington before it became a TV studio. Watching these films is akin to listening to the radio, only it happens to be filmed, mainly on the one set - a not very exciting house - and a bit of greenery. Usually reliable actors, such as Nigel Green, are wasted in stock rustic-cop roles. There's a couple who seem to be breaking up but are still in love with each other; the murder of people we don't care about; and lots of talk talk talk but little humour or excitement. It's only 65 minutes but feels like much longer. This is exactly the kind of fodder that gives British cinema of that period a bad name. I'm a Stranger has Greta Gynt playing herself, laughably delaying an important meeting with a Hollywood producer who has offered her £250,000 (in 1952 money) in order to stay in a house to find out who will inherit from a missing will, and has practically nothing to do for two thirds of the film except sit there trying to look interested. James Hayter livens things up in the first twenty minutes, and the 'slithery' Charles Lloyd Pack takes up the slack, if you'll pardon the rhyme, for the rest of the film, but it's still far from rewarding. Even die-hard Brit movie buffs will be hard put to sit through this pair of turkeys.