''Night Was Our Friend'' is a 1951 British

drama film In film and television, drama is a category or genre of narrative fiction (or semi-fiction) intended to be more serious than humorous in tone. Drama of this kind is usually qualified with additional terms that specify its particular super- ...

directed by Michael Anderson and starring

Elizabeth Sellars Elizabeth Macdonald Sellars (6 May 1921 – 30 December 2019) was a Scottish actress. Early life and education Sellars was born in Glasgow, Scotland, the daughter of Stephen Sellars and Jean Sutherland. She appeared on the stage from the age o ...

Michael Gough Francis Michael Gough ( ; 23 November 1916 – 17 March 2011) was a British character actor who made more than 150 film and television appearances. He is known for his roles in the Hammer Horror Films from 1958, with his first role as Sir Arthu ...

and Ronald Howard. The title references a line from

Virgil Publius Vergilius Maro (; traditional dates 15 October 7021 September 19 BC), usually called Virgil or Vergil ( ) in English, was an ancient Roman poet of the Augustan period. He composed three of the most famous poems in Latin literature: th ...

's epic poem ''

The Aeneid The ''Aeneid'' ( ; la, Aenē̆is or ) is a Latin epic poem, written by Virgil between 29 and 19 BC, that tells the legendary story of Aeneas, a Trojan who fled the fall of Troy and travelled to Italy, where he became the ancestor of the ...

''.

Plot

A young woman is acquitted of the murder of her husband, who died in suspicious circumstances. The film then goes into flashback to portray the events leading up to his death. Sally Raynor's

aviator An aircraft pilot or aviator is a person who controls the flight of an aircraft by operating its directional flight controls. Some other aircrew members, such as navigators or flight engineers, are also considered aviators, because they a ...

husband Martin has been missing for two years and is believed dead, during which time she has fallen in love with a local doctor, John Harper, whom she plans to marry. When Martin unexpectedly returns from

Brazil Brazil ( pt, Brasil; ), officially the Federative Republic of Brazil (Portuguese: ), is the largest country in both South America and Latin America. At and with over 217 million people, Brazil is the world's fifth-largest country by area ...

still alive, she decides to give up the doctor and go back to her life with Martin, although their marriage had not been a happy one. Over the next six months his erratic behaviour, brought on by his ordeal, makes Sally believe he is insane. A close friend of the family, Arthur 'Glan' Glanville, also realises this, as does Dr John Harper and the family's housekeeper. Martin's mother also sees his strange behaviour, but chooses to ignore it. On one of his wild nighttime walks, he attacks someone, a man who only survives by chance. Glan finds evidence of this and tells Sally, saying they must immediately get Martin treatment in a mental hospital, to prevent him being sent to jail. Sally asks Martin to agree to treatment, but the thought of losing his freedom, as happened in Brazil, terrifies him, and he begs her to help him by finding another way. Sally plans to kill him with an overdose of sleeping tablets to protect him from society's punishment, but can't go through with it. Instead, he commits suicide, but Sally is charged with his murder. Glan believes she is innocent, but Martin's mother, despite having seen her son attacking Sally, believes she is guilty. Although innocent of his death, Sally is haunted by guilt and, even after a jury clears her of murder, she is hesitant to marry the doctor she loves.

Cast

as Sally Raynor *

as Martin Raynor * Ronald Howard as Dr John Harper *

Marie Ney Marie may refer to: People Name * Marie (given name) * Marie (Japanese given name) * Marie (murder victim), girl who was killed in Florida after being pushed in front of a moving vehicle in 1973 * Marie (died 1759), an enslaved Cree person in Tr ...

as Emily Raynor *

Edward Lexy Edward Lexy (18 February 1897, in London – 31 January 1970, in Dublin) was a British actor. He was born Edward Little. Career He made his London stage début in 1936, and his first film the following year. His film roles were a mixture of s ...

as Arthur Glanville *

Nora Gordon ''Nora Gordon'' (29 November 1893, West Hartlepool, County Durham – 11 May 1970, London) was a British film and television actress. She was married to Leonard Sharp. Her daughter was the actress Dorothy Gordon. She also appeared in a number ...

as Kate *

John Salew John Rylett Salew (1902 (some sources state 1 January 1897)14 September 1961) was an English stage film and TV actor. Salew made the transition from stage to films in 1939, and according to Allmovie, "the manpower shortage during WWII enabled ...

as Mr Lloyd *

Cyril Smith Sir Cyril Richard Smith (28 June 1928 – 3 September 2010) was a prominent British politician who after his death was revealed to have been a prolific serial sex offender against children. A member of the Liberal Party, he was Member of ...

as Rogers the Reporter *

Cecil Bevan Cecil Stuart Reginald Bevan"England and Wales Birth Registration Inde ...

as Clerk of the Court *

Felix Felton Robert Forbes Felton (12 August 1911 – 21 October 1972), known professionally as Felix Felton, was a British film, television, stage and voice actor as well as a radio director, composer and author. Radio work In his earlier years Felton cons ...

as Foreman of the Jury * Linda Gray as Spinster *

Edie Martin Edie Martin (1 January 1880 – 22 February 1964) was a British actress. She was a ubiquitous performer, on stage from 1886, playing generally small parts but in high demand, appearing in scores of British films (although often uncredited). ...

as Old Lady Jury Member *

Roger Maxwell Roger Francis Hamilton Maxwell (born 21 March 1941) is a former New Zealand politician. He was an MP from 1984 to 1999, representing the National Party. Early life Maxwell was born in South Canterbury. He obtained his tertiary education at Li ...

as Colonel *

Michael Pertwee Michael Henry Pertwee (24 April 1916, Kensington, London – 17 April 1991, Camden, London) was an English playwright and screenwriter. Among his credits were episodes of '' The Saint'', ''Danger Man'', ''Alfred Hitchcock Presents'', '' B-And ...

as Young Man

Production

The film was made by ACT Films as a

B Movie A B movie or B film is a low-budget commercial motion picture. In its original usage, during the Golden Age of Hollywood, the term more precisely identified films intended for distribution as the less-publicized bottom half of a double feature ...

intended to be released on the lower-half of a double bill. Based on a play by

the film was made at the Viking Studios in

Kensington Kensington is a district in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea in the West of Central London. The district's commercial heart is Kensington High Street, running on an east–west axis. The north-east is taken up by Kensington Garden ...

.Chibnall & McFarlane p.105 The film's sets were designed by

art director Art director is the title for a variety of similar job functions in theater, advertising, marketing, publishing, fashion, film and television, the Internet, and video games. It is the charge of a sole art director to supervise and unify the vis ...

Duncan Sutherland Duncan Sutherland (1 August 1905 – 1967) was a Scottish-born art director, based in England where he designed the sets for over eighty films and television series between the early 1930s and mid-1960s. Sutherland spent much of the 1940s employ ...

. It was considered above average for a B film, and was shown on the Odeon circuit of cinemas and also given a release in the United States. Anderson went on to be one of the leading British directors of the decade with films such as ''

Around the World in Eighty Days ''Around the World in Eighty Days'' (french: link=no, Le tour du monde en quatre-vingts jours) is an adventure novel by the French writer Jules Verne, first published in French in 1872. In the story, Phileas Fogg of London and his newly employe ...

''.

References

Bibliography

* Chibnall, Steve & McFarlane, Brian. ''The British 'B' Film''. Palgrave MacMillan, 2011.

External links

* {{Michael Anderson 1951 films British drama films 1951 drama films British films based on plays Films set in England Films directed by Michael Anderson 1950s English-language films British black-and-white films 1950s British films