THE CAT AND THE CANARY

UK, 1979, 93 minutes, Colour.
Carol Lynley, Honor Blackman, Edward Fox, Michael Callan, Wendy Hiller, Olivia Hussey, Betatrex Lehman, Daniel Massey, Peter McEnery?, Wilfred Hyde White.
Directed by Radley Metzger.

The Cat and the Canary was a Bob Hope- Paulette Goddard vehicle of 1939 and joins the many thrillers of that period remade with nostalgic taste and star casts in the '70s. Writer-director Bradley Metzger (usually maker of visually stylish soft-core pornography features) sticks to the Agatha Christie formula plus old dark house and maniacs lurking, for an eccentric will-reading and subsequent disappearances and deaths. Carol Lynley has the central role but the basically English cast enjoyed themselves wandering corridors and incessantly coming and going and disappearing – especially Wendy Hiller, the genial legal adviser and an almost mummified housekeeper, Betatrex Lehman. Wilfred Hyde- White oozes sinister joviality and Edward Fox sneers sadistically. Undemanding, literally old-fashioned entertainment.

1. The old play and the star vehicle of the '30s for Bob Hope and Paulette Goddard the basis for a nostalgic remake of the '70s?

2. The origins of the film on the stage, the continual movement, the house itself, the various devices of the old haunted house and the castle with secret passages? Scares, mystery? The weather, storms, thunder and lighting? The contribution of the musical score for atmosphere?

3. The conventions of murder mysteries and audience delight in the puzzle, the scares of the haunted house, the homicidal maniac and storms? The blend of these conventions?

4. The prologue and the atmosphere of 1904, British aristocracy and genteel living, the symbol of the cat making the canary afraid, the boy killing the canary? Decor, the manor, costumes, the references to similar films?

5. The transition to 1934 and its atmosphere, the manor. the change of decor but the sense of period? The build-up to the reading of the will and the assembling of the guests? Mrs Crosby and her role as guardian of the will - and the humorous burying of it in a coffin preserved with ice? Mrs Pleasant and her sinister and aged look? The device of having the will on film and its being preserved for twenty years? The device of revealing the information at a meal and with a second part - leaving the way open for tensions and murders?

6. The assembling of the guests and the devices used to introduce them.. the impressions they made on the audience, on one another? The establishing of tensions and rivalries?

7. The peculiarities of the will, the device of having Cyrus West on film and with Mrs Pleasant serving him? The repetition of the same meal and menu? The anticipation of the moves of the guests? The personality of Cyrus West, his madness, conditions? Wilfrid Hyde-Whyte's jovial and sinister style? The revelation of the will and setting the scene for tensions to follow?

8. Annabel as heroine - an attractive heroine, winning over the others, the capacity for greed? The listening to the information especially about the necklace? The glint of madness - hereditary? The beginnings of her fears, the encounter with Mrs Crosby and her disappearance, the discovery of the passages, the encounter with the monster? Charlie and Harry and their attentions? Paul and his being courteously the hero? The encounter with Susan and her pressurising of Annabel? Her ultimately being captured and tortured by Charlie? The rescue at the end and the happy ending - with a touch of greed and a repetition of the West eccentricities?

9. Susan and her hunting background, her snarling manner, her trying to terrorise Annabel and make her mad and so forfeit the inheritance? Her curiosity and death? The liaison with Cicely and her being kept? The lesbian overtones?

10. Harry as a sneering villain? His arrogance, expectations, rivalry with Charlie, the background of the malpractice? His being a suspicious character?

11. Charlie and his reputation, the overtones of the Red Baron, his being a fop? How suspicious was he? The revelation that he was the villain, his murderous intent, his deceptions? His killing of the canary in the prologue? The liaison with Hendricks and their plan for terrorising the group? The torture sequences, the ugliness of the deaths?