A Blueprint for Murder

Whitney Cameron has lost his brother. Now his brother's daughter Polly dies in hospital and the autopsy finds poison. What remains is Lynn, his brother's wife, and the small boy. Cameron notices something: both deaths had the same symptoms, and the whole estate goes to the children and, after the children, to Lynn. But he has no proof, the court dismisses the case, and Lynn takes the boy aboard a ship for Europe. Cameron boards the same ship. Andrew L. Stone directs the American film; seventy-seven minutes, with Joseph Cotten as Cameron and Jean Peters as Lynn. It turns on a crime that cannot be proved in court; the tension comes not from who did it but from the man being unable to do anything. The last stretch takes place entirely aboard the ship.