Susan Stranks Movies
David Lean's Madeleine was inspired by a true story that rocked the English legal system to its foundations in the mid-19th century. Told in flashback, the film explains why aristocratic young Scotswoman Madeleine Smith (Ann Todd, then the wife of director Lean) is on trial for murder. The audience is apprised of Madeleine's illicit romance with deceptively charming Frenchman Emile L'Angelier (Ivan Desny), her futile attempts to break off the relationship, her "proper" betrothal to Englishman William Minnoch (Norman Wooland), and the murder by poison of the now-inconvenient L'Angelier. The jury's verdict was as controversial in 1950 as it had been a century earlier. David Lean and scenarists Stanley Haynes and Nicholas Phipps refuse to take sides, permitting the viewers to draw their own conclusions about the notorious Madeleine. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Ann Todd, Norman Wooland, (more)
- 1949
Henry Devere Stacpoole's lyrical novel The Blue Lagoon was rather chastely filmed in 1921. The 1949 remake is a tad more explicit, though it's hardly as racy as the 1980 Brooke Shields version. Two British children, Emmeline (Susan Stranks) and Michael (Peter Jones), are shipwrecked on a tropical island in the company of kindly old salt Paddy Button (Noel Purcell). Eventually, Paddy dies, leaving Emmeline and Michael, now attractively grown up and played by Jean Simmons and Donald Houston, all alone. Their relationship, more along the lines of brother and sister in their youth, blossoms into love, and then passion. Emmeline has a baby, and the two live as common-law husband and wife, content in their solitude..until.. Filmed in lush Technicolor, The Blue Lagoon was considered fairly exotic and somewhat risque back in 1949, though by current standards the film is a model of decorum. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Jean Simmons, Susan Stranks, (more)
