ThiefHott
Too much of everything
Erica Derrick
By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.
Mathilde the Guild
Although I seem to have had higher expectations than I thought, the movie is super entertaining.
Billy Ollie
Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable
Richard Chatten
The Danziger Brothers had a dreadful reputation during the late fifties and early sixties, but this is the first of their quickies that I've seen that truly lives down to their ill repute. It's so stilted it resembles a parody, and nobody seems to have told director Montgomery Tully about the invention of the close up (it was probably shot so quickly he didn't have time for them); even the location sequences are uninteresting.Poor Carol Marsh - so memorable in 'Brighton Rock' and 'Dracula' - is left to founder by her director, and this proved to be her last film. The most suspenseful aspect of the film is whether it's going to opt for the boring option of making handsome Ronald Howard innocent after all; if he'd turned out to be guilty it might have justified the film's existence, but even the title - 'Man Accused' rather than, say 'Man Suspected' - makes it rather obvious how things are going to turn out.However I'll give it an extra star for the fact that it did deliver a few surprises towards the end; plus an observation worthy of a Harry Enfield spoof that the real jewel thief "would never trust a man who drinks or a woman. Too erratic."
howardmorley
My wife and I were entertaining my younger sister for lunch when there was a loud thud onto the downstairs carpet by the front door.It was the very memorable 1961 British "B" film DVD of "House of Mystery" (1961) starring Peter Dyneley which I had been expecting.After my sister had left and while my wife was teaching one of her pupils downstairs, I went upstairs and played the aforesaid DVD and when it was finished I turned on Youtube on my computer and saw "Man Accused" (1959) with Ronald Howard which turned out to be another cracking British cast "B" film from 1959.How I love to see these old films, as for someone like me born in 1946, they remind me of my youth.For example how rewarding to see a vintage MG sport car again! OK they didn't have safety belts but had gull wing mudguards."Man Accused" was showing on YT for only 48 hours so I could not miss it.No I won't provide a spoiler in case another YT viewer wishes to see it.Other users have outlined the plot but it was gratifying to see actor Robert Dorning who often played a stooge to Tony Hancock in his half hour comedy shows on TV in the 1950s.And yes I too did wonder about "Ian Fleming" in the credits but another user above advises it was not the author of the James Bond franchise but another of the same name!Very watchable, I rated it 7/10 being about one hour+ in accordance with "B" move lengths in the 1950s.
filmalamosa
Girl's fiancé is set up as a jewel thief by the real thief. This is a very short very low budget silly little attempt at some mystery or film noir---it doesn't quite cut it.It was a passable way to spend an hour if your time is short.I agree with another reviewer they could have improved the story a lot. The prison escape was so silly, man it must be easy to dupe British police.I thought the nanny did it---so the plot was somewhat successful in twisting things around.Recommend if you only have an hour---I mean it is better than most of the garbage out there---still I have my standards... a 5 at best.
MartinHafer
A rich young lady is about to marry. However, at her engagement party, an insurance investigator announces that he recognizes the fiancé--he's a man who has likely killed two previous fiancées in order to steal their jewels!! She naturally doesn't believe the story but soon the evidence all seems to point to the boyfriend. And, eventually, the police end up arresting the guy for not just robbery but murder. Can there be more to the story than this?! This is a very low budget British film--sort of like a British B-movie due to its production values and short running time (slightly less than an hour). However, unlike what you might expect from a B, it's a pretty good little mystery. In fact, I might have given it a score higher than 6 if the writing had been excellent throughout. However, there were two portions that were very rough. First, when the film began, there was too much exposition. They tried to tell the back story TOO FAST--and it sounded very unnatural. They should have just doled out this information slowly instead of the clumsy conversation at the start. Second, late in the film, a wrongly accused man is EASILY able to convince others to help him escape from jail--and it's remarkably easy. And, he wraps everything up perfectly!! This is so clichéd--and it wasn't necessary. They easily could have had the man in prison convince the authorities to investigate his theory of the real culprit--and arranged for a fake escape so they could monitor this final showdown. Or, they could have simply INVESTIGATED THE CASE and discovered the bad guy and not used these stupid clichés. It's sad, as they really had a dandy film here--but it just got a bit sloppy at times.