Guilt Is My Shadow

Plot

Jamie (Reynolds) is the getaway driver for a robbery, but when the robbery goes wrong he drives off and makes his way by car and then train to a rural village, Welford, in Devon, where his estranged uncle, Kit (Holt), lives alone. Although Kit is not particularly pleased to see Jamie, he allows him to stay for a couple of days.

A couple of days' stopover turns into an indefinite period, as Jamie, all the while sneering at Kit's rural life, gets a job (or is it a partnership?) at the local garage and eats Kit out of house and home. Things get momentarily worse for Kit as Jamie's estranged wife Linda (Sellars) turns up, hoping for reconciliation, but although Kit is wary of another unwanted guest at first, Linda is far more amenable than Jamie, whose attention has been diverted away by Betty (Morris), a single woman in the village whom he starts an affair with.

Jamie is found to be stealing from Kit as well as the garage and when Linda confronts him he assaults her, and she kills him accidentally in an act of self-defence. Kit and Linda decide to hide the body, which draws them even closer together, and after telling the few people that are interested that Jamie has left the farm, life continues as before with Kit and Linda having fallen in love. Linda is still haunted by memories of Jamie however, and the situation becomes worse when Jamie's mother Eva (Avice Landone) arrives unexpectedly to see Jamie.

Linda suffers something akin to a nervous breakdown, and the local doctor called to assist becomes suspicious at Linda's condition and actions, and calls the police. The police arrive and search for Jamie's body but are unable to find it, and are about to leave, when Linda's conscience gets the better of her and she calls them back to the house, presumably to make a complete confession and face the consequences, with Kit by her side.

Locations

An early shot is of the Torbay Express at Paddington and the scene then shifts to a shot of a down express at Coryton's Cove, Dawlish. There follow many scenes shot at Ashburton with Tillingham's garage being located next door to the site of the former Golden Lion hotel. Linda arrives by train at Staverton station where steam engines still run on the preserved South Devon Railway but the shot of her leaving the station jumps back to Ashburton. Recognisable coastal scenes are in Torquay where Thatcher's Rock, Hope's Nose and Long Quarry Point under Wall's Hill all appear in shot.

The internal scenes are not very convincing representations of rural Devon architecture.

Cast

Critical reception

Allmovie wrote, "setting this one apart from other British crime mellers of the era was the decision to film on location in a remote rural community. A passable timefiller when first released, Guilt is My Shadow ended up a staple of American TV in the 1950s and 1960s."