The Stranger Left No Card – 1952 | 23 mins | Drama | B&W

Plot Synopsis

Filmed largely in and around Windsor, director Wendy Toye’s relatively unknown short film won the Best Fiction award at the 1953 Cannes Film Festival. Toye delightfully handles the ever darkening story from its almost madcap beginning to the sinister finale. Actor Alan Badel makes his film debut, and he would again link-up with Toye for a segment of Three Cases of Murder (1955).

A weirdly-dressed eccentric (Alan Badel) arrives in a small town by train and instantly endears himself to the local inhabitants who nickname him “Napoleon”. But his charismatic and childlike air conceals a deadly secret motivating him. On the 10th day of his stopover the oddball visitor goes to visit Mr Latham, an upstanding local businessman with a skeleton in his cupboard.