The Stranger's Hand (Italian: La mano dello straniero) is a 1954 British-Italian thriller drama film directed by Mario Soldati and starring Trevor Howard, Alida Valli and Richard Basehart. An international co-production, it is based on the draft novel with the same name written by Graham Greene.[2] The plot follows the son of a British MI5 agent kidnapped in Venice by agents of Yugoslavia as he searches for his father.
The Stranger's Hand | |
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Directed by | Mario Soldati |
Written by | Giorgio Bassani Guy Elmes |
Based on | The Stranger's Hand by Graham Greene |
Produced by | Angelo Rizzoli Graham Greene Peter Moore John Stafford |
Starring | Trevor Howard Alida Valli Richard Basehart |
Cinematography | Enzo Serafin |
Edited by | Tom Simpson Leslie Hogdson Leo Catozzo |
Music by | Nino Rota Alessandro Cicognini |
Production companies | Milo Film Rizzoli Film Independent Film Producers |
Distributed by | British Lion Films |
Release date | 20 January 1954 |
Running time | 85 minutes |
Countries | Italy United Kingdom |
Language | English |
Budget | £164,200[1] |
The first two chapters of The Stranger's Hand had been entered by Greene anonymously under a pseudonym to a competition in the New Statesman to write a book in the style of Graham Greene – a competition in which Greene was amused to win second prize. Soldati had seen the chapters and persuaded Greene to complete the novella to make the basis for a film. Greene expanded it to 30 pages of a "film story", on which Giorgio Bassani and Guy Elmes completed the screenplay.[3]
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