The Masters  
The Powell & Pressburger Pages

Dedicated to the work of Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger and all the other people, both actors and technicians who helped them make those wonderful films.

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Submitted by Roger Mellor

The Night of the Party (1934)
"Radio Times" film guide


Director - Michael Powell
Starring - Leslie Banks
Running Time - 60 mins
Country of Origin - UK

A well-preserved and strongly-cast specimen of a typical thirties murder mystery. A press magnate with many enemies seems to have invited them all to the same party. He is shot during a murder game with the lights out and anyone could have done it. The film's surviving interest is as one of the earliest extant works of Michael Powell, still in his twenties at the time. The project offered little artistic challenge, but he directs fluently enough and seems to have cut short the lengthy courtroom denouement in favour of a lively, if implausible, interruption by the guilty party.


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