Postmark for Danger

I briefly mentioned Postmark for Danger just about two years ago, when it aired on TCM instead of the previously-schedule The Secret Fury. Postmark for Danger is back on the TCM schedule this afternoon at 2:30, so you have another chance to catch it.

The plot is a mess, although that isn't apparent at first. Tim Forrester (Robert Beatty) is an artist living in London, who gets the news that his brother Lewis died in a car crash in Italy, with an actress friend in the car with him. That's a shame, but matters get worse when Scotland Yard informs him the case was likely murder. Lewis was an investigative journalist, and was working on a case of international jewel smugglers, so it would make sense to think that they killed him. And then Tim hears that just before he died, Lewis sent him a postcard that's bound to be a vital clue in the case.

It's about here that the movie starts to get convoluted. Lots of movies have Macguffins, and if that's all the postcard were, a plot about Tim trying to get the postcard and people trying to keep the postcard from him could be a moderately enjoyable movie. But in all of this, Tim gets a call from a strange guy who wants him to do a portrait of the guy's daughter. And then a model whom Tim had been wortking with at the beginning of the movie winds up dead in his apartment! And to make things even more complicated, another woman shows up, claiming to be Alison Ford (Terry Moore), who was the woman named as the charred-beyond-recognition body in the car with Lewis back in Italy! Together, the two try to solve the mystery.

It's an interesting premise, but I have to admit that I found the movie less than exciitng. The moviemakers put too much into the movie in too short a time, with the result that the plot it a bit too much of a mess. I also didn't find the characters particularly interesting. Still, being an American, it's nice to see something authentically British and not so well-knwon show up on TCM. I think Postmark for Danger still isn't on DVD, so you're going to have to catch the TCM showing to judge for yourself.