The Black Abbot (1934)
0h 56m | PG-13
A gang of crooks uses the legend of a ghost haunting an old dark mansion to help them kidnap a rich man.
Director: George A. Cooper
Studio: Real Art Productions
Genre: Thriller, Mystery
Video: 720p
Cast
John Stuart
as Frank Brooks
Judy Kelly
as Sylvia Hillcrest
Edgar Norfolk
as Brian Heslewood
Richard Cooper
as Lord Jerry Pilkdown
Drusilla Wills
as Mary Hillcrist
Farren Soutar
as John Hillcrist
Reviews
John Stuart doesn't really have much to do in this rather routine, gently comedic, haunted house mystery. His "Brooks" character finds himself trying to identify a phantom that inhabits an old monastery and who has an habit of terrifying - or worse - the other occupants. Those range from the upper class nitwits to the loved-up servants - and he has to get a move on before there is no-one left to help discover who's up to all of this mischief and why? It's all a bit too verbal, and at just under the hour, there is still quite a fair degree of padding too. It's still watchable enough if you like an early example of a British-made thriller that uses the gloominess of the scenario and a minimum of wattage to help present the thinnest of stories in quite an eerie style.