The Queen of Spades

Based on a short story by Aleksandr Pushkin and championed by Martin Scorsese (who provides an enthusiastic introduction to this DVD), this obscure 1949 fantasy from a forgotten British filmmaker is a flawed but sublime study in the supernatural. In 19th century Russia, Suvorin (Walbrook giving a hungry, committed performance years ahead of its time) views the popularity of the playing cards as the key to attaining wealth and power, embarking on a quest that will take him to Faustian extremes. Dickinson – the UK’s first professor of film and director of Gaslight and The Arsenal Stadium Mystery – conjures astounding images, his use of sound, shadows and light betraying his kinship with Hitchcock, Renoir and Vertov. Like Jacques Tourneur, he understands the power of the unseen, and there are some genuinely unsettling moments (it wipes the salt covered floor with Paranormal Activity). Even if it meanders and suffers from unremarkable supporting turns, the raw-nerve card game climax more than compensates. [Michael Gillespie]