NekoHomey Purely Joyful Movie!

Neive Bellamy Excellent and certainly provocative... If nothing else, the film is a real conversation starter.

Verity Robins Great movie. Not sure what people expected but I found it highly entertaining.

Cristal The movie really just wants to entertain people.

lemon_magic I admit,the movie drags a bit in spots for my tastes (I tend to go for slapstick, Monty Python whimsy, and high powered action), but "Queen Of Spades" was a very well done tale of destiny and doom. The nature of the story lends itself to a much shorter "Tales From The Crypt/"Dead of Night" anthology feature if needed (in fact, I can see that it has been done this way), but the heft and quality of the direction, acting and set designs have filled out the potentially "sketchy" parts into something compelling.The protagonist, especially as played by the actor, is an unsympathetic and unappealing mix of coldness, ambition, ruthlessness and envy...and yet you can't entirely blame him, as Life seems to have dealt him a pretty harsh hand. And whatever his faults and schemes, it turns out that his seeming scheme to seduce the ingénue is really a cover for the chance to beg or force a magical secret out of the girl's aunt. (So he's a scoundrel, but not a cad".) When things go wrong, it's not really his fault (although he is directly responsible for at least one death, it's more manslaughter than murder).So watching him get his comeuppance is not a particularly comfortable process - most of us can see a little of ourselves in the character as he is depicted here, and we can easily imagine ourselves in the same predicament if Fate were to single us out to doom us with our own character flaws. We agreed that for a film made in 1949, the movie felt much "older", and I, for one, completely forgot that I was watching a bunch of Brits portraying 19th century era Russians until the credits rolled. And that the movie managed to be really creepy when it wanted to be.Not for every taste, but worth your time if you like Pushkin, Russians, British cinema or slow-burn tales of the supernatural.

rabrenner Poor, ambitious, bitter army captain Anton Walbrook plots to learn the secret to winning at faro so he can amass a fortune and take his revenge on those who look down on him. Will he achieve his goal, or will he lose his soul? What do you think? Stately British adaptation of Pushkin supernatural short story. Restrained by today's standards, but still manages to deliver the goods, with a riveting showdown over a deck of cards. Imagine THE EARINGS OF MADAM DE…with Satanic elements and you'll have some idea.Warning: There are some gypsy and Jewish characterizations that may be consistent with the story but may make modern audiences uncomfortable. I also noticed what appears to be a continuity goof: the fierce dog that is brought upstairs is not the same breed as the dog that later runs out the front door.

Spondonman I've seen this now probably 10 times or more over the decades – it's an out and out genuine British film classic, and still only Thorold Dickinson and Anton Walbrook's second best to Gaslight made 10 years before. The stories themselves had similarities, Walbrook in both playing an avaricious amoral character using a weak-willed woman to meet his own despicable ends. The production values in both were high lending a richly dark and brooding b&w atmosphere on nitrate film stock to compliment the inventive camera-work.Relatively poor Captain in the Royal Engineers jealous of the wealthy Cavalry officers around him dreams of making his fortune at faro, and eventually gets his way at the price of his precious soul. How he does it is a spooky tale involving an ancient irritating Countess played by the perfect Edith Evans and his attempt to get her to acquiesce to his demands. Who can forget the funeral scene when Walbrook is wondering how the dead can give up their secrets! Everyone acted their hearts out, Ronald Howard nicely restrained to Walbrook's occasional lapses into melodrama. Auric's music is spot on and as graceful as ever, we even get a preview of Orpheus in here to which he composed the music for the following year. The game of faro as depicted here always struck me as particularly boring, but I suppose it was as good a way as any for someone to lose money fast. The secret of winning money at cards is not to play for money at all and to keep your money. I simply can't understand why anyone would watch this for the full 90 minutes hating almost every minute and then waste more of their time telling us!An utterly marvellous film, a UK post-War Wonder which will survive all comments positive and negative.

DrMMGilchrist *Possible semi-spoilers, but as the story has been around for over 150 years, these may not surprise many...* 1806 Sankt-Peterburg: Herman Suvorin (Anton Walbrook) approaches middle-age as a bitterly disappointed man. Outranked by young bucks in more fashionable regiments – men from aristocratic families who can afford to waste money on gambling, drinking and wenching – he envies the meritocratic rise of Napoleon. When he learns that old Countess Ranevskaya (Edith Evans) – the grandmother of one of the officers he envies – allegedly sold her soul to the Devil in exchange for learning an infallible way of winning at Faro, he sees a chance of advancement. But how can he, a mere Captain of Engineers, and a commoner, get access to the old lady's household to learn her secret? The Countess has a pretty, downtrodden young companion Lizaveta (Yvonne Mitchell) – sure to be easily beguiled by his attentions...However, Andrei (Ronald Howard), an aristocratic officer and friend of the Countess's grandson, begins to see through Herman's schemes. Can Liza be saved from seduction? And can Herman himself escape the curse of the cards? 'The Queen of Spades' is a magnificent black-and-white chiller from the golden age of British film. Made on a post-war shoestring budget, it nevertheless conjures powerfully the atmosphere of early 19C Peterburg: the gaming houses, the palaces and street-life. Indeed, it brings out the story's powerful prefigurings of Gogol' and Dostoevskii, and its ambiguities. Are there really supernatural forces at work, or is it all in the anti-hero's obsessed mind? - Either interpretation is possible.Anton Walbrook is brilliant as Herman, although it takes a little while to get used to seeing him without his moustache, which would not have been appropriate to this period setting! While he excelled at playing wise, noble heroes for the Archers (Peter in '49th Parallel', Theo von Kretschmar-Schuldorff in 'The Life & Death of Colonel Blimp', and - most magnificently - Boris Lermontov in 'The Red Shoes'), for Thorold Dickinson both in 'Gaslight' and 'The Queen of Spades' he provided fine studies in scheming ambition, subtle menace and deception. Herman is in some respects a natural successor to his earlier performance (as Adolf Wohlbrück) as another tragic, tormented gambler - Balduin in 'Der Student von Prag' (1935). Herman's bitterness and frustration, his duplicities, his rising hysteria, and the pathos of his final scene are rendered with the conviction and skill which make him one of *the* all-time great film stars (sadly under-appreciated nowadays, while many less gifted actors have cult followings). However reprehensible Herman's behaviour, it is impossible not to feel some pity for him as his military bearing crumples, and the devastation of his breakdown is conveyed in his eyes.Yvonne Mitchell is poignant as Lizaveta, and Ronald Howard displays some of his father Leslie's sensitive charm as Andrei. Edith Evans, as the Countess, acquits herself well playing a woman some decades her senior: spoilt, vain (still dressing in the high wigs and panniers of thirty years before), bullying - and beneath the show, pathetic and terrified.As a Pushkin adaptation, I would rate this film as highly as Martha Fiennes' 'Onegin'. As a subtle thriller, it shows what can be done on a low budget with imagination, intelligence and a quality cast. It's a lesson in fine craftsmanship - as small (in budget and length) and intricately fashioned as a Fabergé ornament.