Watch They Met in the Dark For Free

I like the storyline of this show,it attract me so much

best movie i've ever seen.

Let me be very fair here, this is not the best movie in my opinion. But, this movie is fun, it has purpose and is very enjoyable to watch.

There are moments in this movie where the great movie it could've been peek out... They're fleeting, here, but they're worth savoring, and they happen often enough to make it worth your while.

Reading the synopsis of They Met In The Dark I was expecting quite a different film. The plot outline made it sound incredibly serious and this was wartime Great Britain.Instead I got a rather lighthearted treatment of the plight of courtmartialed Naval Commander James Mason. Seems as though he was given a Mickey Finn and left with false orders in his pocket that led to his ship being sunk by the Nazis. Now cashiered from the Royal Navy, Mason's looking for answers. So is Joyce Howard who is over from Canada looking for her girlfriend who has disappeared. She finds the girlfriend's corpse with Mason in a mysterious house.After this They Met In The Dark is a variation on what Alfred Hitchcock did much better with The Thirty Nine Steps. In fact the method used by the bad guy spies for transmitting messages involves a theatrical performer. I guess I'm not used to seeing James Mason in material as light as this. He and Howard do have some good chemistry. When he would do Hitchcock in North By Northwest he was not the light leading man there.Not one of Mason's classic films, but something different.

This is an entertaining if uninspired wartime espionage yarn. It contains a fine and energetic performance by James Mason, full of vigour and fully believing in what he is doing. He even manages to deliver convincingly the inane line to Joyce Howard, the heroine, 'I love you', despite the fact that he barely knows her and could not possibly love her. The romantic elements of this story are too ludicrous for comment. This is the third and mercifully the last of the story ideas of Basil Bartlett which were filmed. (His 'Secret Mission' was so terrible it was one of the worst films ever made.) Sir Basil was the stepfather of my friend Annabel. Sorry, Annabel. There is a strong Czech component to the film. The director, Karel Lamac, was a Czech refugee, and apart from Mason, the main performance is by the talented Czech refugee actor, Karel Stepanek, who does extremely well, as usual, and raises the tone considerably. Joyce Howard's fluttery helplessness and bone-headed character may have been typical of women in 1943, but God have mercy on us poor viewers. A spectacular element in this film, which makes it worth seeing, is the incredible harmonica playing by Ronald Chesney, who only appeared in three films and is featured a lot here. Larry Adler eat your heart out (if Larry were still here, that is). Alvar Liddell, the famous wartime radio announcer, makes his first film appearance here, for all of ten seconds. At least Finlay Currie got 20 seconds. Someone savagely cut this film prior to release, as chasms occur in the continuity of fairly mammoth proportions. It is 95 minutes and must have been 110 when the director delivered it. This will keep an undemanding viewer entertained on a rainy afternoon. I had to get the DVD from Germany (where it is known as 'Spionagering'), turn off the dubbed German soundtrack, and listen to the original, which is preserved. The things one does to see these rarities!

To begin, "They Met in the Dark" is a mystery that is seamlessly turned into a WWII espionage film, all the while remaining a film about two attractive and courageous people gradually falling in love. Analysts of recent vintage who try to watch the film, I suggest, routinely fail to understand its strengths and make too much of its very few weaknesses. It also confuses them because it is a film directed by a Czech, made with British actors, and yet its style is superior U.S. 1940s narrative of unusual clarity, swiftness of pace and occasional brilliance. The story involves a young naval officer who is cashiered from the service under suspicion of incompetence (James Mason) and who manages to become involved with a young woman (Joyce Howard) who finds a body and has cause to suspect him of having been the murderer. Following parallel paths--she to clear herself of suspicion in the case and he trying to find the truth about how his career came to grief over his botched assignment at sea--he tries to protect her while she is busy eluding him. The clues lead them both to a Dance Academy cum talent agency, which is really a nest of spies, wherein a quintet of villains has been manipulating innocents and finding a way to extract secret information from British naval officers, such as that knowledge those loss wreaked havoc on Mason's life. The last portion of the film, maintaining the light-hearted tone carried out throughout the proceedings, becomes an anti-espionage caper led by Mason and a fellow officer, leading to a very satisfying conclusion. Carl Lamac (as Karel Lamac) directed with a fluid and amazingly adept camera style, handling varying sorts of indoor and outdoor, group and chase, two-shot and nightclub scenes with extreme skill. Marcel Hellman produced, with music by Ben Frankel, outstanding cinematography by Otto Heller, art direction by Norma G. Arnold and period dance arrangements by Philip Bruchel. The screenplay was adapted from the oft-imitated novel "The Vanished Corpse" by Anthony Gilbert. Others involved in the screenplay included Basil Bartlett, Anatole de Grunwald, Victor MacLure, Miles Malleson, and James Seymour. Phyllis Stanley is outstanding as a singer, David Farrar and Edward Rigby are Mason's closest confederates. The evil quintet are portrayed by Ronald Ward, powerful Tom Walls as the leader, capable Karel Stepanek, Eric Mason, and Ronald Chesney, aided by Walter Crisham and Betty Warren. Brefni O'Rourke plays a police Inspector, with Kynaston Reeves, Terence de Marney, Robert Sansom, Patricia Medina and Peggy Dexter in supporting roles. As the young woman caught up in intrigue, Joyce Howard is far better here than she had been in the much darker "The Night Has Eyes"; though she lacks some voltage, she is attractive, and more than adequate. As the hero, James Mason gets to essay a great variety of interesting scenes, all of which he performs with convincing and skillful art throughout. He wins the girl in this one, but only after playing a variety of dramatic, comedic and challenging scenes; and as usual; he is able to sustain his character throughout the proceedings and make everyone around him look better than they do in the film at any other time. Comparing this delightful film to many routine program films of the war years, I suggest any critic worth his salt would have to applaud the success of this often brilliant entertainment. This is the sort of film people with a positive sense of life used to be able to make; I find it to be one within which complex story elements are made clear and scene follows scene with both logic and a continual sense of discovery. This is a very underrated noir adventure with most successful comedy used to advance the plot at every turn. Recommended.

I have just read Patricia Medina Cotten's book entitled "Laid Back In Hollywood" (1998)and was anxious to see the wife of the late Joseph Cotten when she was an actress, preferably in the 1940's when she was at her most glamorous.I chanced upon this title "They Met In the Dark" (1944) after searching through her titles for sale on Imdb.com.I have never seen this film on UK tv, so as I like all of James Mason's films, (his voice is so unique), I obtained a VHS video copy of this film from Blackstar.co.uk. Patricia plays Mary, a manacurist girlfriend of James Mason and appears at the beginning of the film but I was sorry to see her demise in the next reel! The plot sees Mason a naval commander found guilty of negligence in not acting under orders from the high command in the merchant Navy during WWII, and losing one of His Majesty's cargo ships as a result of enemy action.Mason claims he was acting under revised orders but cannot furnish the necessary proof to the court marshall tribunal.He is determined to prove his innocence and is told that if he wishes to see his girlfriend, to meet her at a nearby cottage.Once there, he meets the film's heroine, Joyce Howard, who thinks Mason is the killer as she too has seen the body of Mary upstairs.She rushes off to report the murder but when the police arrive at the cottage and investigate, no body! Joyce is accused of the very serious wartime crime of wasting police time.The plot then moves to Liverpool as there was a card with the inscription, "Child's Theatrical Agency", Liverpool, clutched in the deceased's hand. Mason "palms this off" at the cottage as it lies on the floor, so Joyce Howard cannot even show this as evidence to the police who get even more annoyed with her.The two principal actors have an off and on relationship throughout most of the film as there is mutual suspicion between them.They become involved with fifth columnists who are seeking to obtain vital information for Germany about the departure/destination and time of the next convoy, commanded by its flotilla leader played by David Farrar (who later played the squire, Jack Reddin, in "Gone to Earth" (1950)). I won't provide a spoiler but this is perfect Sunday afternoon watching for those like me who love classic 1940's films, especially James Mason fans who are unfamiliar with this title.I gave it 3/5 stars.