Seven guests, a newly hired secretary and two staff are gathered at a manor house on an isolated island by an unknown absentee host and are killed off one-by-one. They work together to determine who the killer is before it’s too late.
And Then There Were None 1945 HD by René Clair | Barry Fitzgerald & Walter Huston | Agatha Christie’s mystery fiction
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Movie Info
Rene Clair weaves the quintessential spider web with brilliant camera work including unusual but effective angles, snappy dialogue, and magnificent performances by ten impeccably cast artists. The viewer is drawn into the anxiety, claustrophobia, terror, and resignation felt one-by-one by each of the twelve weekend “guests” of Mr. Owen. Any mystery, suspense or thriller fan will be incomplete without seeing this work of absolute genius. This may be the best mystery ever put to film
And Then There Were None is a 1945 film adaptation of Agatha Christie’s best-selling mystery fiction. And Then There Were None is directed by René Clair.
The film changes certain characters’ names and adheres to the ending of the stage play rather than that of the novel.
The cast featured Barry Fitzgerald, Walter Huston, Louis Hayward, Roland Young, June Duprez, Mischa Auer, C. Aubrey Smith, Judith Anderson, Richard Haydn and Queenie Leonard as the people stranded on the island. The film won the Golden Leopard at the Locarno International Film Festival.
Though it was produced by a major studio, 20th Century Fox, the copyright was allowed to lapse and the film is now in the public domain. Several different editions of varying quality have been released to home video formats.
Plot
Eight people, all total strangers to each other, are invited to a small, isolated Indian Island off the coast of Devon, England, by Mr. and Mrs. Owen. They settle in at a mansion tended by two newly hired servants, Thomas and Ethel Rogers, but their hosts are absent. When the guests sit down to dinner, they notice the centerpiece, ten figurines of Indians in a circle. Afterward, Thomas puts on a gramophone record, from which a voice accuses them all of murder:
- General Sir John Mandrake (C. Aubrey Smith), of ordering his wife’s lover, a lieutenant, to his death
- Emily Brent (Judith Anderson), of the death of her young nephew
- Dr. Edward G. Armstrong (Walter Huston), of drunkenness which resulted in a patient dying
- Prince Nikita Starloff (Mischa Auer), of killing a couple
- Vera Claythorne (June Duprez), of murdering her sister’s fiance
- Judge Francis J. Quinncannon (Barry Fitzgerald), of being responsible for the hanging of an innocent man
- Philip Lombard (Louis Hayward), of killing 21 East African tribesmen
- William H. Blore (Roland Young), of perjury, resulting in an innocent man’s death
- Thomas (Richard Haydn) and Ethel Rogers (Queenie Leonard), of the demise of their previous employer, an invalid.
It turns out that none of the ten knows or has even seen “U. N. Owen,” as he signed his instructions to Thomas; they suddenly realize it stands for “unknown.” The guests decide to leave, but Thomas informs them that the boat will not return until Monday, and it is only Friday.
Starloff admits to speeding and running down a couple. Then he takes a drink and dies from poison. The next morning, the guests learn that Mrs. Rogers has died in her sleep. Quinncannon reports that Rogers found one figurine broken after Starloff’s demise. Now another is missing. With two deaths matching the Ten Little Indians nursery rhyme, they search the island for “Mr. Owen” without success. After General Mandrake is stabbed in the back, the judge arrives at the only explanation: Owen must be one of them.
Another day passes. Everyone votes secretly for whom they suspect. Only Rogers receives two votes, and is sent to spend the night in the woodshed. After locking the dining room, they give Rogers the key. The next morning, however, they find him dead, his head split open with an axe. Vera Claythorne persuades Miss Brent to reveal that she had her nephew placed in a ormatory, where he hanged himself. Later that day, Miss Brent’s body is found with a hypodermic needle nearby. Armstrong discovers his is missing. Lombard admits he had a revolver, but it is lost as well.
At dinner, Quinncannon confesses he sentenced an innocent man to death to ruin the defending counsel’s reputation. Armstrong then admits to operating while drunk, with fatal results. Blore grudgingly discloses that he perjured himself to put an innocent man in prison, where he died. Lombard merely states that the accusation against him is true. When it is Claythorne’s turn, she excuses herself to get her coat. The others hear her shriek and rush to her. In the confusion, a single gunshot is heard. They find Vera shaken after being brushed by seaweed hanging from the ceiling, which she mistook for a cold hand. They also spot Lombard’s gun, and Quinncannon apparently dead from a shot to the head.
Claythorne insists she is innocent, but Armstrong contends that only a person who had not committed a crime would want to mete out “justice” and locks her in her room. Later that night, she wakes to find Lombard outside her window. After he gives her his gun, she lets him inside. He persuades her to admit that it was her sister who killed her own fiancé, and Vera helped her cover up the crime and unofficially took the blame, caring for her sister until she died. They hear someone going downstairs. Upon investigation, they realize that Armstrong is missing.
The next morning, Blore is struck while outside by stonework toppled from the floor above. Lombard takes the binoculars beside the body and sees what Blore had — a corpse on the beach. It is Armstrong. Claythorne pulls out the gun, certain that Lombard is the killer. Lombard tells her that his real name is Charles Morley, and that he impersonated his friend to discover if the invitation had anything to do with his friend’s suicide.
Vera fires, and he drops. She returns to the mansion to find Quinncannon very much alive. The judge tells her that all his life he had searched for perfect justice. After learning that he was terminally ill, he concocted this plan. He persuaded Armstrong to fake his (Quinncannon’s) death, supposedly to help catch Owen, then murdered Armstrong. He tells Vera Claythorne that she can either hang herself or be sent to the gallows (as the only possible perpetrator). He drinks poisoned whiskey, but he sees Morley before he dies and realizes that his scheme has been foiled. Vera had missed intentionally. Boat owner Fred Narracott returns to the island, asking the couple if the party is ready to leave, to which they reply, “You get them!”, and run off to the boat.
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