Colibel Terrible acting, screenplay and direction.

BootDigest Such a frustrating disappointment

HeadlinesExotic Boring

Fleur Actress is magnificent and exudes a hypnotic screen presence in this affecting drama.

Panamint This film is now about 80 years old and it refers to a time about 80 years before that. Much of the dialog is kind of Dickensian and all spoken with British accents. Yes its slow developing at first but at least this gives you a good introduction to the characters, much as a novel might do. But it proves again one fact that has been well known for 150 years: Charles Dickens was a heck of a storyteller.One of the foundation stones of mystery film making, "The Mystery of Edwin Drood" still holds up in its mystery elements (murder, cemetery, crypt, fog, etc.)Claude Rains is bravura in a complex role. Sweet-faced Heather Angel, Douglass Montgomery and David Manners provide fresh, youthful energy. All of the performers bring Dickens' vivid characters to life.E.E.Clive gives one of his gem-like performances in a small part. Its a pleasure to let yourself go back in time as you enter the long-lost world of Dickens and this long-lost film making art.

Bonehead-XL Despite being featured in reference books about the Universal Monster movies and included in similarly themed VHS collections, "The Mystery of Edwin Drood" is not a horror movie. Not even kind of. It is, perhaps I should have seen this coming, a stodgy costume drama, through and through. There are the most marginal of marginal horror elements. A murder, a tomb, some drug induced hallucinations, a storm, a creepy shadow cast on a wall. Despite the Victorian setting, the movie totally lacks any foggy English atmosphere.It's not a bad movie, though it is slow paced. Claude Rains gives an excellent performance as Uncle Jasper. The character, as written, could have been an obvious villain, leeringly lusting after a girl twenty years younger then him, an opium addict, so clearly plotting revenge. However, Rains makes him a real person. Though Rosa is disgusted by him (A little unfairly), his love for her is true, his devotion sincere. He shows remorse for his action, especially at the end. His decisions aren't calculated, but rather rich with doubt. Rains' gravelly delivery is used extremely well. The rest of the cast too, notably Douglass Montgomery as the accused boy, who even makes the somewhat absurd old man disguise actually work. The girls seem like very stereotypical Victorian ladies at first but do eventually develop personalities. There's one really cool shot of a paper aging before our eyes, showing the pass of time brilliantly. Otherwise? I can't say I was too horribly interested in this one.

st-shot Dickens unfinished novel is given a plausible outcome in this Universal version of The Mystery of Edwin Drood. Made in the same year as two MGM classics by Dickens, David Copperfield and Tale of Two Cities, it may lack their production values but it does have a hauntingly dark performance from Claude Rains as well as a cart full of Dickens characters splendidly played by some London stage vets.Edwin Drood and Rosa Bud were engaged before they could talk but are more brother and sister than intendeds. His uncle John Jaspers, the Church choirmaster and pillar of the community is obsessed with Rosa, conversely he makes her skin crawl. When Neville Landless, a hot tempered Ceylonese arrives on the scene he falls for Rosa and argues with Edwin over her. The opium addicted Jaspers growing more paranoid by the minute decides to take drastic measures in order to secure Rosa for himself by eliminating his rivals.In the early years of censorship Drood takes on a lot of controversial issues most pointedly opium addiction. Director Stuart Walker manages to ably convey its dilatory presence without mention or the appearance of the pipe by way of the dissipated personage of the raven eyed, mellifluously cold voice of Rains and the delicious harridan performance of opium den mother played by Zeffie Tillbury. Putting ample flesh on the rest of the cast EE Clive, Forester Harvey, Walter Kingsford and Ethel Griffes as Miss Twinkleton ("Crisis is a test of breeding ladies. Remember your Britains".) offer rich Dickens interpretations of comic manners providing Drood a lightness that balances Rains brooding madness. Lacking the pedigree and lushness of an MGM production The Mystery of Edwin Drood does just fine with less.

ackstasis Above all else, it was the promise of a hilariously young Claude Rains that prompted me to watch 'Mystery of Edwin Drood (1935),' a Universal adaptation of Charles Dickens' final, unfinished novel. Rains had, of course, appeared in Whales' 'The Invisible Man (1933)' a few years earlier, but, curiously, it was difficult to get a good look at him in that film, so this was my main opportunity to catch the excellent supporting actor before he was forever condemned to playing grey-haired characters. His role here as John Jasper is completely unforgettable, a riveting portrait of inner torment that communicates so much through every bodily twitch and strained facial expression. Just watch Rains as his character watches the beautiful Rosa through hungry, agonised eyes – the pure anguish rippling through Jasper's body is almost painful to behold, the image of a polluted mind and soul reaching the end of its tether. It's moments like this that made Rains one of the finest actors of Hollywood's golden age."The Mystery of Edwin Drood" is itself one of literature's greatest mysteries. Left unfinished in 1870 after Dickens' death, the story reaches no conclusion, leaving scholars to ponder endlessly about how the author intended to wrap up the novel's events. The murderer of Edwin Drood (if, indeed, he was ever murdered) will thus never been known for sure. Stuart Walker's adaptation attempts to fill in these gaps as best as it can, and this is accomplished quite well, indeed. Despite the high potential for failure, the story does feel as though it's flowing towards its logical conclusion, and John Jasper's guilt ultimately seems the only practical option. Also a product of the screenwriters' imaginations was the identity of Dick Datchery, a wheezing old stranger who arrives in town for a month or two – in the film, he is the incognito Neville Landless, determined to solve the mystery of Drood's disappearance, though Dickens' story reaches no such conclusions. Though we can never know the author's true intentions, these respectful suppositions are probably the best we're ever going to get.Claude Rains is clearly the film's standout performer, giving a edgy and tortured performance as the tormented soul who (in this version) enacts his frustrations through strangulation. David Manners, no stranger to Universal horror regulars, is quite good as the titular murder victim, though his character isn't all that interesting next to his deranged uncle. Douglass Montgomery, with distinctive chiselled facial features, plays the romantic lead with sufficient conviction, and his interpretation of Datchery is enjoyable, as well. I didn't recognise Heather Angel by sight, but she's appeared in several films with which I'm quite familiar – Ford's 'The Informer (1935)' and Hitchcock's 'Lifeboat (1944).' Her performance as Rosa Bud (yeah, I laughed, too) in 'Mystery of Edwin Drood' is perfectly serviceable, given that it demands nothing except that she look beautiful – and she does. For fans of Charles Dickens, fans of Claude Rains, or fans of good old-fashioned storytelling, this little-seen mystery drama is very much worth the effort it takes to track down.