Good start, but then it gets ruined

The first must-see film of the year.

One of the most extraordinary films you will see this year. Take that as you want.

It is encouraging that the film ends so strongly.Otherwise, it wouldn't have been a particularly memorable film

They Drive By Night - 1938 UKEmyln Williams is a minor crook who is getting out of Prison after doing an 18 month bit. The warden gives him his, One Pound and 6 pay, and then Williams is shown the Prison gates. Outside, there is a large crowd. There is going to be a hanging in the Prison in just a few minutes. A man, Simon Lack, approaches Williams and asks if he knew the condemned. Williams shakes his head and asks Lack the same question. "He is my brother". Answers Lack. Just then the 9 0'clock bell starts to toll. The hanging is over. Williams now heads into London and back to his old stomping grounds. He stops at the café of a friend, Ronald Shiner. Williams asks if his girl, Alice, is still around. Shiner says, "yes, still at the same place". Shiner then ask Williams if he is going to stay clean or get mixed up with the same bunch? Williams just smiles and heads out.Williams buys a small bunch of flowers and heads for his girl Alice's flat. He sneaks in to surprise her. A surprise is in order, but it is Williams who gets the buzz. He finds the woman dead in her bed. Williams quickly wipes down any fingerprints he might have left, grabs the flowers and exits. He beats the feet down the stairs but has the bad luck to run into the landlady. One look at William's face is enough to tell her something is wrong. Williams flees the building and bolts down the street. The landlady has a quick look upstairs and starts screaming. Williams parks his rear in an all day cinema to hide and calm down. Should he go to the Police? He just got out of jail! They will never believe him he decides. He will wait here till dark. Then he will split town. Once it is dark, he exits the theatre and grabs a bus to the end of the line. He will then hike to a trucker's stop and hopefully catch a ride up north. He buys a paper which of course already has his name and description all over the front page. It is pouring rain when Williams hits the trucker stop. He asks around for a ride. Driver, Alan Jeayes, offers to take him up to Manchester if that will help. One of the other drivers Jack Vyvian, starts to look at the description in the paper, then at Williams. He comes over to Williams and Jeayes, Vyvian shows Jeayes the newspaper and points at Williams. And so starts this superb UK thriller. The film features plenty of twists and turns and some outstanding photography. Well worth watching if you can find it. (B/W)

"They Drive By Night" (not to be confused with the Bogart) had a rare showing in a New York theater in 2009, as part of a series on British film noir. The only reason the theater screening matters is because of crowd reaction. And the reaction to this film, especially the final sequences, was absolutely joyous.The movie is at least 2/3rds over before one of the main characters appears, the former schoolmaster Walter Hoover, played by the unbelievably urbane, stick-figure-thin Ernest Thesiger. The camera starts on his hands, so you only see what he's doing-- pasting newspaper clippings about lurid murders into a scrapbook-- but when his face is finally revealed, the whole audience seemed to sit a bit straighter, and we stayed that way through the end, reacting with open delight to this character's every movement, his every phrase.I mean to take nothing away from the star of the film, Emlyn Williams (who wrote almost as many films as he starred in), but Ernest Thesiger was capable of turning a lousy movie into a watchable one, and a good movie into an unforgettable one. This is definitely the latter.

This is a somewhat "lost" film from England in the late thirties. It definitely does have Hitchcokian overtones as a young con just released from prison goes to visit a girl he knew, only to find her dead, and himself accused of the crime. The bulk of the film follows this young man as he tries to hide from the police by traveling North on a lorry(truck). From there he meets a female of his acquaintance, convinces her of his innocence, and they both embark on a quest to find the real killer. The film has a nice, tight directorial style that creates lots of suspenseful moments. The script is also pretty good. The biggest key to the film's success is the acting. Emlyn Williams does a good job in the lead, but acting honors easily go to Ernest Thesiger playing a highbrow, effeminate, erudite former teacher and student of psychology with a deadly secret. Thesiger's character acting is a joy to behold as he talks about the power of killing in one moment and then in another talks to pussycats in a baby voice. He is so wonderful with these kinds of quirky characterizations(a must-see in The Bride of Frankenstein). A good, old-fashioned suspense story.

Nice crime thriller that almost seems like a lost Hitchcock film. Moody lighting contributes to the noirish atmoshpere. Ernest Thesiger turns in one of his creepiest performances.