"The Man in the Barn" is a 10-minute black-and-white short film from 1937, so this one is already over 80 years old and despite being made by French filmmaker Jacques Tourneur, this is an American production based on a script by Morgan Cox. If you knew from the title already that this is about the man who killed President Lincoln, then props to you and your history knowledge. But it is enough as well if you hear the name John Wilkes Booth and can put him into context. As this is what this brief movie is about, not about Lincoln. According to history, JWB died briefly after the presdenticide in a burning barn surrounded by police forces who burned it down when he refused to leave the little shack. But here we have a man who says at his deathbed that he is actually JWB and afterward the film elaborates on possible scenarion how he could have gotten away with his life if he was not dying from the fire in the barn. If that was even him. At the end, there is a little conclusion. Well, this film is not a solution, but rather gives an insight into what happened back then and what could have been. I liked it most of the time. Not a great watch or somewhat historically defining by any means, but a solid little add-on feature if you plan on watching Spielberg's Lincoln starring Daniel Day-Lewis and still don't have enough of the subject despite the massive running time afterward. Narrator here is Carey Wilson by the way, who scored his one and only Oscar nomination as a screen writer around the time this was released. All in all, a thumbs-up from me. One of the better live action films from the 1930s, even if still far behind the Golden Age of Animation, but yeah the historical references sure help in making this little movie seem more relevant.
Review of The Man in the Barn
