Having been unable to find a free copy of the last couple of films they've covered, the Internet Archive again came up trumps for this film, that I wanted to watch alongside the "House of Hammer" podcast. Released as "Three Stops to Murder" in the US, the film, from 1953 did enough to keep my attention throughout it's relatively short running time.
Investigator Tom Conway (err... Tom Conway) is called in when his employer has some jewels stolen from the fashion house that they were loaned too. When there is a suggestion that the Jewels previously belonged to a patron of the house and were already stolen, Conway is asked to drop the case by Mr Mercedes (Eric Pohlmann). However, when a model, who has told Conway she had some information for him, dies, he is honour bound to continue to work.
Being able to hold my attention throughout is not something that all these Hammer films have managed, so, the fact that I stayed with this one throughout is testament to how enjoyable it is. A lot of that was probably because it looks like Conway is having a good time with a frothy investigator role, which seems essentially to involve flirting with the models long enough for one of them to tell him what's going on. Nice work if you can get it. No idea why his character is also called Tom Conway though? This is another film directed by Terence Fisher, who directed "The Last Page", "Wings of Danger", "Stolen Face" and "Four-Sided Triangle" for Hammer so far, generally I think I've enjoyed his films, but I'm still wanting to get to the classics Horrors that would follow in a few years. There were a few faces familiar to me from the supporting cast. I have to admit that I didn't spot Roger Delgado, but I did note Richard Wattis, who I recognised from a string of upper-class foil roles, most famously I think in the St Trinian's films.
I would say that it suffers from two problems that many of the Hammer films from this period to, one that the fight scenes are comically bad and also that the ending is so abrupt it's jarring.
On the whole, one of the better efforts I've watched for the podcast though.
