The Crooked Billet
Directed byAdrian Brunel
Written byAngus MacPhail
Produced byMichael Balcon
StarringMadeleine Carroll
Carlyle Blackwell
Miles Mander
Gordon Harker
CinematographyClaude L. McDonnell
Music byLouis Levy
Production
company
Distributed byWoolf & Freedman Film Service
Release date
1929
Running time
82 minutes
CountryUnited Kingdom
LanguagesSound Part-Talkie
English Intertitles

The Crooked Billet is a 1929 British sound part-talkie drama film directed by Adrian Brunel and starring Madeleine Carroll, Carlyle Blackwell and Miles Mander.[1] It was released in both silent and sound versions, as its production came as the industry was shifting over.[2] It was made by Gainsborough Pictures at their Islington Studios. The sound version features some sequences with audible dialogue. The rest of the film featured English intertitles with a synchronized musical score and sound effects.

It was one of the first films to use RCA's synchronized sound system for dialogue.[3]

The plot has been summarized as: "An international spy searches for lost documents hidden in an old inn."[4]

It is listed on the British Film Institute's 75 Most Wanted list of lost films.[4] The fim surfaced in France in december 2021 but the BFI refused to pay the asking price, so the only known 16mm copy is owned by a French individual.

Cast

Reprise

An identically titled film with a similar theme was released in 2017.[5] A sequel was released in 2018,[6] and a third feature is planned.[7]

References

  1. "The Crooked Billet". British Film Institute. Archived from the original on 14 January 2009. Retrieved 3 January 2013.
  2. Burton, Alan (4 April 2016). Historical Dictionary of British Spy Fiction. Lanham, Maryland: Rowman & Littlefield. ISBN 9781442255869.
  3. Low, Rachael, Editor (2013). History of British Film 1918 – 1929. Vol. 4. Routledge. pp. 170, 205, 352. ISBN 9781136206405. {{cite book}}: |first1= has generic name (help); |work= ignored (help)CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  4. 1 2 "The Crooked Billet / BFI Most Wanted". British Film Institute. Archived from the original on 3 August 2012. Retrieved 25 May 2014.
  5. "Crooked Billet (3D)". 8 November 2017. Retrieved 1 January 2019 via IMDb.
  6. "Crooked Billet II (2018)". 16 December 2018. Retrieved 1 January 2019 via IMDb.
  7. "About CROOKED BILLET the Yorkshire Feature Film". Retrieved 1 January 2019.
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