The Inspector Calls

It is a rare thing for a motion picture to do much heavy moralizing, beyond a fervent stand for general virtue. It is even more rare for a picture to be moral and interesting. J. B. Priestly's The Inspector Calls is both.

The picture's recently radical theme, that man has a responsibility for other men, and must answer, eventually, to his conscience for deeds of thoughtless cruelty, is couched in terms of a rather good mystery story, with proper touches of comedy and suspense. In a series of flashbacks five people are forced to admit the role they had in driving a girl to suicide.

Alastair Sim plays Inspector Poole, the man whose mysterious power drags the recognition of their own guilt from the reluctant people. Poole's mystic qualities are clearer when it becomes obvious that he is really the group's collective conscience. In this role, Sim is neither better nor worse than he has been in all his films that I have seen. In fact, his playing is most always the same from picture to picture, Sim being a sort of one man acting convention in the manner of such set characters as Charles Laughton and Robert Newton. He is always superb, cast always in roles that are suited to his acting style.

Although the main body of the picture flows along without undue surprise, the final fifteen minutes are the very best of Priestly with mystery, paradox and suspense. In all, it is a most worthy picture.

With The Inspector Calls is a gay and roguish comedy, Always a Bride. Besides being very funny, with some wonderful character sketches, this is a fine recruiting film for the confidence game, representing the crooks engaged in it as particularly enchanting, and the life itself no mean whirl of the most sumptuous luxuries that the Riviera can offer, including the Monte Carlo jail with its beautiful sea-view and famous chef.