After being released from an asylum, Stephen Neale (Ray Milland) goes to a charity event and successfully guesses the weight of a cake ā which leads him into a conspiracy. One of two amazingly entertaining noir thrillers that Fritz Lang directed in 1944 (the other one being The Woman in the Window). A rich Hitchcock feel to this story about spies in wartime England; there’s an innocent man hunted by both Nazis and the authorities and even a MacGuffin in the form of that mysterious cake. Not a long movie, but Lang moves like lightning through it; plenty of action and atmosphere, with a good lead performance. Love the title.
1944-U.S. 85 min. B/W. Produced byĀ Buddy G. DeSylva. Directed byĀ Fritz Lang. Screenplay: Seton I. Miller. Novel: Graham Greene. Cast: Ray Milland (Stephen Neale), Marjorie Reynolds (Carla Hilfe), Carl Esmond (Willi Hilfe), Dan Duryea, Hillary Brooke, Alan Napier.
Trivia: Remade as a miniseries in Italy in 1966.
