three strangers

January 28 movie: Three Strangers. Odd, moody movie starring Sydney Greenstreet, Peter Lorre and Geraldine Fitzgerald as three strangers who make a pact to share a horse race ticket -- I didn't really understand this, it was some English thing, but they have a ticket and if it pays off then they roll it over on the horse race? Whatever! The point is that they make a pledge on a statue of Kuan Yin to share whatever winnings come to them.

All three turn out to be fairly seedy characters, and the movie purports to be a suspense thriller about the various reasons they desperately need the money, but actually it's a somber meditation on human failure. Peter Lorre plays an aimless, drunken petty crook, and ends up being the most sympathetic character almost by default. Also costars Alan Napier as Fitzgerald's estranged husband, and Joan Lorring as Lorre's love interest.