The Ringer is a 1931 British crime film directed by Walter Forde and starring Patric Curwen, Esmond Knight, John Longden and Carol Goodner. It was written by Sidney Gilliat, Angus MacPhail and Robert Stevenson based on the 1925 Edgar Wallace story The Gaunt Stranger, which became a play, The Ringer, in 1929.
Scotland Yard detectives hunt for a dangerous criminal who has recently returned to England.
Forde remade the same story in 1938 as The Gaunt Stranger. There was also a silent film of The Ringer in 1928, and a 1952 version starring Donald Wolfit.
Contents
Cast
Patric Curwen as Dr. Lomond
Esmond Knight as John Lenley
John Longden as Inspector Wembury
Carol Goodner as Cora Ann Milton
Gordon Harker as Samuel Hackett
Franklin Dyall as Maurice Meister
Dorothy Bartlam as Mary Lenley
Henry Hallett as Inspector Bliss
Arthur Stratton as Sgt. Carter
Kathleen Joyce as Gwenda Milton
Eric Stanley as Commissioner
Production
The film was made at Beaconsfield Studios in Buckinghamshire by Gainsborough Pictures in a co-production with British Lion Films. The film's sets were designed by the art director Norman G. Arnold. Bryan Edgar Wallace acted as a production manager.
Critical reception
Film Weekly wrote: "Here is a really capable adaptation of the famous Edgar Wallace play. Walter Forde his entered into the spirit of the original and manipulated thrills and laughter to provide a good entertainment which will please all readers of our most prolific novelist. The story of the mysterious criminal who terrorises a continent is too well known to need repetition, but it loses nothing of its appeal in this workman like talkie. Gordon Harker gives a fine perrformance and stands out of a capable cast."
The New York Times wrote, "This film, which hails from England, is the sort of melodrama that provides more amusement than excitement."
In The BFI Companion to Crime, Phil Hardy wrote, "this is the best version of this oft-filmed play... Directed by Forde with a slickness and pace unusual in British films of the period, especially considering the film's stage origins... Hokum, but enjoyable."