Trio (1950)

Quartet was a very successful film while the follow up Trio, two years lawyer did not please the critics as much although I recollect it was looked forward to by the aunties. Whereas on checking available film notes I remembered all four stories of Quartet I struggled with Trio which I now associate with an interdepartmental magazine with Social  Services, Health and Education which I co edited for Cheshire County Council some forty years ago.

In the Verger  the  new  vicar played by Michael Horden sacks his Verger (James Hayter because he cannot to read. Together with his landlady who he marries (Kathleen Harrison) he opens the first tobacconist in the area which si a great success and he is so successful that with his wife’s help he opens a chain depositing  the profits  at the local bank. The bank manager, Felix Aylmer  suggests that Hayter moves some of the money into more profitable investments and is shocked to find that the man refuses because he cannot read the relevant documentation. The bank manager poses the question what could Hayter have been done if he had  been able to read to which Hayter makes the point, “ back as the verger;” an important point to be remembered by all those who believe a university education is end and be all.


Wilfred Hyde-White plays Mr Gray in Mr Know It All who finds himself sharing a cabin on an ocean liner with Nigel Patrick at the Know All gem dealer, a nick name given to him by other passengers.

The previously work separated husband (Naughton Wayne) of a woman who wears great looking pearls bets Patrick that the Pearls are fake.  Patrick admits he was wrong and pays up but later the money is returned and W H Whyte learns that in fact the Pearls were real but Patrick lied in order for the couple to save face, with the implication that the woman had been given the jewels while having an affair while the husband was away.

Roland Culver plays a writer in the Sanatorium which contains others, including Jean Simmons, new arrival Michael Rennie a pair of longer stay residents John Laurie and Finlay Currie who are at loggerheads and a man Raymond Huntley who is getting away from his wife, unsuccessfully. The new arrival a major falls in love with Simmonds but the couple are warned that the relationship could prematurely end the life of the major who has  a scandalous background. They  decide  to leave together regardless and given  the death of one of the patients, this has the impact of reconciling Huntley with his wife.