Witness to Murder
| Witness to Murder | |
|---|---|
Theatrical release poster
|
|
| Directed by | Roy Rowland |
| Produced by | Chester Erskine |
| Screenplay by | Chester Erskine Nunnally Johnson |
| Starring |
Barbara Stanwyck George Sanders Gary Merrill |
| Music by | Herschel Burke Gilbert |
| Cinematography | John Alton |
| Edited by | Robert Swink |
|
Production
company |
Chester Erskine Productions
|
| Distributed by | United Artists |
|
Release date
|
|
|
Running time
|
83 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
Witness to Murder is a 1954 suspense film starring Barbara Stanwyck. While the film received moderately positive reviews, it ended up as an also-ran to Alfred Hitchcock's somewhat similar Rear Window, which opened less than a month later. The latter picture was a box-office hit.
Cheryl Draper (Barbara Stanwyck), while looking out her bedroom window, witnesses a young woman being strangled to death. The woman reports the killing to the police, but when the man named Albert Richter (George Sanders) notices detectives arriving downstairs, he moves the body. When the police show up to his door, Richter acts nonchalant, and when no body is found, the police are convinced that the woman saw something in her dreams.
The next day, the man puts the woman's body in a trunk and leaves to disposes of the body. While he is out, Draper notices that the man's apartment is for rent and is given a tour by the building manager (Dick Elliott). She finds torn drapery (which Richter dubiously re-ripped in front of the police) and a pair of women's earrings. Richter returns and sees Draper drive away to the police department with the earrings. He preemptively phones the police and Draper is then accused of robbery. The two confront each other at the police station, but Richter opts not to press charges. However, the scene leaves Police Lt. Lawrence Mathews (Gary Merrill) suspicious.
Mathews goes to Draper's apartment and tells her that Richter is an ex-Nazi who had been "denazified" and is now an unsuccessful author who is marrying a wealthy heiress. The two meet again when the body of an unidentified woman is found in a park. Draper comes off as conspiratorial and Mathews believes she is pretending and obsessing about the case—he believes she is telling the truth that she saw something, but does not think what she saw was reality. She is forcibly admitted to an insane asylum after Richter surreptitiously types threatening messages from Draper to him to frame her as crazy and a threat to his safety.
While Draper is away, Mathews and a fellow policeman go to the apartment building of the deceased woman to see if anyone there recognizes Richter—no one does, and the police have no case. After Draper is released, Richter is at her home and confesses that he killed the girl because she was insignificant to him and he did not want his future wealth to be threatened. However, because she is officially labeled insane by the police and has no credibility, he does not fear admitting anything to her.
...
Wikipedia