Detective Inspector Campbell (Gordon Jackson) looks into the murder of a teacher at a girls school where there are a number of suspects, including her colleagues and the married man she had been seeing.
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One of the teachers at Miss Halstead's boarding school is found murdered and Detective Inspector Campbell and Sergeant Harvey from Scotland Yard lead the investigation, Is the killer one of the teachers? Is it one of the pupils? Is it someone from outside the school? It's a fair mystery story that moves along steadily until the poignant ending. It portrays well the pettiness and pressure of a closed human environment.We get to know the teachers, particularly Miss Shepherd who helps a lot with the investigation. Not a fast moving film but a nice study of a certain place and time. It's well directed on a low budget. The scene of the finding of the body is very well handled.Gordon Jackson is solid as D.I Campbell and even better is the beauteous Barbara Murray as Miss Shepherd. There are sparks between those two characters that are entertaining. The rest of the cast are suitable for their roles. The motive for the murder is not a usual one which makes it more interesting. Strangely the ubiquitous Sam Kydd as Sergeant Harvey is uncredited by the film even though he has a large role.Stephen Clarkson only directed a few films which is a shame as he did a good job with this one.
The Police are called to an all Girl's school, when a teacher is found dead, said teacher is a deplorable individual, upsetting each and every one of her colleagues, and also guilty of being heavy handed with her pupils. Suspicion is cast on her colleagues, the staff room is a place full of suspects, the police suspect music teacher Miss Shepherd, who takes it upon herself to find the miscreant,I'm very much a fan of 50's British B movies, and an even bigger fan of whodunits, this goes some way towards satisfying the demands. I thought the film began in very good fashion, the premise was interesting, and Miss Shepherd made an interesting amateur sleuth, the film looks nice, it's well filmed, if a little clunky. Some of the dialogue is a little flat, and the attitudes towards women seem more like 600 years old then 60, but the film's main stumbling block is the ending, it felt like suspense built for 57 minutes, they ran out of time and had to come up with an ending quickly, it was a shame, as the first three quarters of the film I really enjoyed.Solid performances all round, I don't think you'd say anyone dazzles, Gordon Jackson's Inspector Campbell is probably the most well rounded character. Enjoyable enough, 6/10
DEATH GOES TO SCHOOL is a low rent British murder mystery that provides a neat counterpoint to the more popular hilarity of the ST. TRINIANS movies, which were just taking off during the decade. The production company was the little-known Independent Artists, who knocked out a few quota quickies before moving into TV production in the 1960s. The excellent NIGHT OF THE EAGLE is undoubtedly their best (and well-known) production.This story is a typical murder mystery with a couple of sleuths in an all-girl school, hot on the trail of a murderer who took down the headmistress by strangulation with a scarf. All they have is a footprint to go on, but they soon uncover a hotbed of hatred and false identity, and they must piece together the clues to discover the one responsible.The film features a leading role for a youthful Gordon Jackson as the no-nonsense detective and the ubiquitous Sam Kydd (who's uncredited for some reason) as his right hand man. The characterisation is slim, and the denouement is rather unremarkable, but the plot remains focused throughout. The all-girl school setting is a good one that Hammer would later use in the likes of LUST FOR A VAMPIRE in the 1970s. This film was shot at the attractive Merton Park Studios in Wimbledon, later the setting for the obscure Michael Gough horror, THE CORPSE.
Synopsis: An unpopular teacher at an all girls school is found strangled behind the sports pavilion with another teacher's scarf around her throat. An inspector from Scotland Yard and his sergeant arrive to investigate. One of the teachers provides him with the clues that lead to the murderer (another member of staff) but when presented with the evidence that will lead to her discovery the murderer takes an overdose of sleeping tablets and dies.Nicely photographed but talky and dull and, apart from a few MOS exteriors (arriving and departing shots), stays firmly in the same few sets. This film was made in the days when everyone in British movies talked with perfect diction and faultless grammar - indeed in this film characters actually correct each other's grammar. Not a long vowel sound to be heard. Everyone is so po-faced and brittle it hurts. The actors do their thing in the solid, constipated, stiff upper lip, style required at the time.The plot is thin, the characters have no emotional depth but above all it is marred by a weird narrative structure. Parts of the story are voiced over by one of the teachers as she does her own investigation but most of the time the camera follows the Scotland Yard men - it doesn't work....and it beggars belief that a Scotland Yard inspector would arrive at a crime scene, enquire whether anything has been disturbed, then light a cigarette and drop the match on the floor.