ann todd be madeleine in this 1950 film direct by david lean . the film also feature norman wooland and ivan desny and andre morrell and elizabeth sellars . the film look at the true story of the famous madeleine smith murder trial in the mid 1800s . pressure by her upper class family to marry and madeleine be in fact secretly intimately involve with a man from a low class and langlier ( desny ) and have agree to marry him . she doesn not want to tell her family and so she urge him to elope with her . langlier be plan on marry into the upper class lifestyle and insists instead that she tell her father ( leslie bank ) about their relationship . she can not and and believe that all langlier want be her money all along and she break off with him and request the return of her letter to him . she then agree to marry william minnoch ( wooland ) and who have be court her . langlier doesn not return her letter and and after she purchase arsenic and he die of arsenic poison and have become ill at her house once before . madeleine be arrest for murder . the film seem to follow the case quite accurately and but it pretty cut and dry . there be some marvelous scene the two dancing in the moonlight be one and a an increasingly wild dance go on inside . the structure of the courtroom be interesting and a i have never see a prisoner walk upstairs into the dock from what be almost a trap door in the floor . the view of all the face look down before she start the climb give an idea of what it like to be put on trial . ann todd be a good actress and though an internalized one who come off a rather cold . she be marry to lean and which may be the reason for her casting . at the time of the murder and madeleine father be displease that she wasn not marry and complain that she have meet many men but none of them have work out . she be twenty when she take up with langlier and 22 when she break it off . todd be 41 at the time this film be make . she be not carefully photograph and look her age way too old for this role . andre morrell be excellent a madeleine attorney . the rest of the performance be very good and with bank a strong and intimidate father and desny hinting at the slime that below the surface of langlier . norman wooland give a charming and concerned performance a madeleine suitor and minnoch . lean opinion of what happen be make very clear in the last moment of the film . someone say the story need hitchcock hand and but he be not successful with the paradine case . there something about these story that be very detached and unemotional . maybe hitchcock could have crack it while this early effort by david lean doesn not quite make it .