Livestonth I am only giving this movie a 1 for the great cast, though I can't imagine what any of them were thinking. This movie was horrible

Janae Milner Easily the biggest piece of Right wing non sense propaganda I ever saw.

Mathilde the Guild Although I seem to have had higher expectations than I thought, the movie is super entertaining.

Raymond Sierra The film may be flawed, but its message is not.

clanciai I am not quite happy about this film - it's too much of a cliché patchwork, like a good but nevertheless obvious paraphrase on Hitchcock. There is nothing wrong with Jean Simmons and Trevor Howard, they are both always reliable in any film they played in, and I don't think they worked together in any other film. It all starts very well and interestingly with a failed secret agent stranded at the mercy of his sinister employer who can't tolerate one single mistake, turning his failed agent to cataloging butterflies, just to keep him safely out of the way. Unfortunately for him, a murder occurs in his vicinity, and the one who is obviously totally innocent and incapable of it comes under suspicion because of her rumoured mental instability. Jean Simmons makes this character quite convincing and interesting, demonstrating openly her weakness without blushing, and Trevor appears as the knight in shining armour committing himself to rescuing her by taking her along on a great escape up and down all northern England. It's a spectacular escape indeed, but it obfuscates the more interesting psychology of the relationships turning the film more into a superficial entertainment, with great effects, of course, but when the murderer finally is exposed it all humanly falls flat. It's so obvious that the audience from the beginning has been led astray by being forced to suspect another. Well, well, nevertheless, it's great entertainment, and that at least is something.

Leofwine_draca THE CLOUDED YELLOW is nothing more than a re-staging of Hitch's THE 39 STEPS, although not without merit for this thriller genre of film-making. What I particularly liked about it is how deceptive it starts off: former secret agent Trevor Howard gets a job cataloguing butterflies for some eccentric old country bumpkin, before falling in love with the man's fragile niece (the ubiquitous Jean Simmons) and getting involved in a murder plot.The plot then becomes a chase narrative that takes in numerous locations around the UK: Newcastle, the Lake District, Liverpool, to name but three. I can't remember other British thrillers featuring so many different locations so this must have had a bigger budget than usual for the genre. The story is familiar but things don't get too convoluted, and the suspense remains strong from halfway through until the very end, which is highly satisfying.The cast is full of familiar faces with Andre Morell as the typically gruff secret service chief and Kenneth More as the likable agent giving chase. There are cameos for the ever-present likes of Richard Wattis and Sam Kydd, Geoffrey Keen plays a cop, and Maxwell Reed (Mr Joan Collins) a suave and sinister type. Howard and Simmons aren't my favourite of stars but they acquit themselves well with the material here and THE CLOUDED YELLOW as a whole is a watchable British thriller.

writers_reign It's more than possible than David Cornwell saw this film and kept the idea of a British secret agent getting fired and then taking a dead-end job in mind when he came to write The Spy Who Came In From The Cold a good decade later. Naturally it's not quite straightforward plagiarism, for one thing Trevor Howard really is fired whereas Richard Burton was only pretending; against that both ex-spies take similar jobs, Howard in a private house and Burton in a left-wing private library. That's still not as referential as the Clouded Yellow gets because next comes the one about Sonia Dresdel trying to send Jean Simmons mad - straight out of Gaslight and, for good measure, we get a touch of the 39 Steps as Howard and Simmons take it on the Jesse Owens with the Lake District standing in for Scotland. None of this would matter if there was even a spark of chemistry between Howard and Simmons, alas, a romance between Stalin and Mother Teresa would be more convincing. On the other hand nostalgia buffs will have a field day spotting the likes of Richard Pearson, Sam Kydd, Richard Wattis, Dandy Nichols, Geoffrey Keen and more all fretting and strutting their hour upon the stage. Poor Butterfly indeed.

johne23-1 A delightful little thriller opens with Trevor Howard in his Jag convertible and ends on a dockside in Liverpool. It's all thrills and spills as the ex-spy has to restart his career just as he's getting some serious R & R cataloguing butterflies (how British is that?).Trevor Howard and Jean Simmons frolic from London to Newcastle-upon-Tyne to Liverpool (via Ullswater) - he's just been thrown out of MI5 or something, and she, you guessed it, is on the run, wrongly accused of murder. There's seedy docks, rolling Lake District hills, sheep, country pubs, coppers getting lost, waterfalls, a bunch of amateur cyclists, rooftop chases, and lots of Chinamen (don't ask), and it's all very Hitchcocky and Hannayesque.....and a smashing example of British Noir...