Alibi

Margaret Lockwood - Helene Ardouin
Hugh Sinclair - Inspector Calas
James Mason - Andre Laurent
Raymond Lovell - Prof. Winkler
Enid Stamp-Taylor - Dany
Hartley Power - Gordon
Jane Carr - Delia

Alibi is a remake of Pierre Chenal’s French noir Alibi, L' (1937). This plodding story of a Parisian physic who murders an American gangster fails to improve on the original due to a lack of directorial pacing and tension.

Set in 1930s France, Prof. Winkler (Raymond Lovell) is a clairvoyant who performs a mindreading cabaret act in the Paris nightclubs. During the night, Winkler visits the flat of down-on-her-luck bar hostess Helene Ardouin (Margaret Lockwood) and offers her 20,000 francs to provide him with an alibi for the evening; she reluctantly accepts. During the night a gangster and former witness in the New York legal case against a renowned mystic, Gordon (Hartley Power), is found murdered, and suspicion falls on Winkler given he was in America at the time of the trial and appeared to spook the deceased during his previous evenings performance. Inspector Calas (Hugh Sinclair) is put on the case, and the following evening encounters a wealthy drunkard, Andre Laurent (James Mason), with a clue to the case; a ring belonging t to dead man. Laurent now sets about attempting to clear his name with the help of Helene.