Ensofter Overrated and overhyped

Borserie it is finally so absorbing because it plays like a lyrical road odyssey that’s also a detective story.

Catangro After playing with our expectations, this turns out to be a very different sort of film.

Kayden This is a dark and sometimes deeply uncomfortable drama

Spikeopath The Phantom Light is directed by Michael Powell and adapted from the Joan Roy Byford and Evadne Price play The Haunted Light. It stars Gordon Harker, Binnie Hale, Donald Calthrop, Milton Rosmer, Ian Hunter and Herbert Lomas. Cinematography is by Roy Kellino and music by Louis Levy.Harker stars as lighthouse keeper Sam Higgins, who gets more than he bargained for when he takes up employment at the North Stack Lighthouse out on the foggy Welsh coast.Some time before he formed half of the classic film making partnership with Emeric Pressburger, Michael Powell was a 1930s purveyor of the "quota-quickie" British movie. Not many of those films remain in print, thankfully this delightful blend of comedy and suspense is now in home format circulation. Out of Gainsborough Pictures, The Phantom Light harks back to a wonderful time of sincerity in film making, the acting mannerisms are as correct as the dialect (it's so nice to hear the term Michaelmas used), the locale is beautifully realised and maximum dramatic impact is garnered from the minimalist settings (three parts of the film is set in the lighthouse itself). Powell proves to be adept at eking out eerie atmospherics from the story, aided superbly by Roy Kellino's photography, while it's no small triumph to actually blend the comedy with the drama and not hurt the flow of the film.Tan-y-Bwlch and lummee, what a night!It's not perfect by any stretch of the imagination, Hale is annoyingly high pitched and shoe-horned into the fray, though her beautiful legs go up to her armpits and distract the red blooded amongst us, and the actual turn into the suspense realm comes, considering the running time, a bit too late in the story. But the faults are actually minor ones and they don't ultimately affect the enjoyment on offer for the classic film fan. It very much can be seen as a precursor and influence to the great Will Hay pictures, Ask A Policeman & Oh! Mr. Porter, and if you want links away from the thematics and plotting? Which are joyously similar, then Herbert Lomas was in Ask A Policeman and Louis Levy scored both. It doesn't have the slapstick that dominated the Hay movies, here the wit is dry and neatly pitched as polar opposites are thrust together under one lighted roof, but this is more a light hearted thriller than a comedy drama. With excellent locations used (Devon/Wales), and a director taking his early tentative steps to greatness (yes you read right), it's a film that has enough reasons to check it out regardless of story. As it is, it's pretty darn good anyway. And I'll be back to say the same thing after my next viewing at Michaelmas. 7.5/10

Terrell-4 Michael Powell made about 15 quota quickies in seven years during the Thirties. These quota quickies meant two things: First, a lot of second-rate British movies were made. Second, a lot of British filmmakers, like Michael Powell, learned their craft making these things. Poor Sam Higgins (Gordon Harker, a fine, funny character actor who specialized in blokes). He arrives in the tiny Welsh coastal village of Tan-y-bwlch to take charge of the North Stack lighthouse. He gets more than he wanted. Harker learns from the villagers that two previous light keepers disappeared and the man he's going to replace at the lighthouse is still out there, gone barmy. Sam also hears about the ships that have gone up on the rocks…when the light goes out…and a phantom light on the cliffs goes on. By the time Sam gets out to the lighthouse it's pitch black with heavy fog. The mad man he replaced has had to stay put because he's too sick to be moved. It's not long before there are more people in the lighthouse than Sam wants, and not all of them he knows about. The Phantom Light is funny, dark and dangerous, with a wonderful performance by Gordon Harker, all working class shrewdness and exasperation. The movie is stuffed full of the things Michael Powell loved in a movie…a wild countryside with beautifully photographed cliffs, rocky shores and heavy waves; the mysteries of mechanisms; extra time spent with quirkiness; lilting speech; and characters he makes amusing without looking down on them. If you admire Powell & Pressburger's mature films, you might enjoy having this example of Powell's earlier steps. Said Powell much later, "'I said 'yes' to this one right away, and never regretted it. I enjoyed every minute." I did, too.

ptb-8 Very funny British Gainsborough Picture from 1935 with plenty of No-code 'damn' 'ruddy' and 'cor-blimey' -ies along with Binnie Hale's long legs and keen 'how about it' frankness, THE PHANTOM LIGHT is a bookend GHOST TRAIN fog bound mystery set on the shrouded eerie Welsh coast. The photography and settings particularly in the quaint railway scenes in reel one and the village scenes near the end offer the viewer genuine storybook pleasure in that they look completely fake but are not at all. It just happens to naturally all look like some plaster model. Lead actor, music hall star Gordon Harker has some hilarious lines - particularly the closing one: "Lummy! what a night" which would have rocked any Odeon theatre with gales of laughter. Binnie Hale is the Brit Joan Blondell, all perky and silly and ready to cut up her trousers all ready to gad about the lighthouse stairways in hotpants and high heels. Local Welsh eccentricness is on full display with plenty of Popeye style gnarling and eyeball flexing. I thought it was hilarious as (later famous) Director Michael Powell was clearly getting his actors to have fun with their roles. The local policeman is exactly like Constable Plod from the Noddy kids books..all tubby and bug eyed. It is all silly and very funny. The Warner bros pic SHH! THE OCTOPUS of 1935 is a good counterpart from the USA.

Mike Wigley There is certainly more humour than horror in this rather slow moving offering from Michael Powell. The acting is, in general, on the wooden side, although Gordon Harker as Sam Higgins does his best to lift the pace. The plot is predictable after the first 15 minutes, although there are enough twists to keep the interest. I was surprised at the number of people required to run a lighthouse only half a mile offshore, and the apparent number of hiding places on a bare rock, but this is just a detail. Overall, nothing special, but pleasant enough not to be considered a waste of time.