The Queen of Spades is fine as a short story or a half-hour TV episode of a show similar to Inner Sanctum or Tales From the Crypt. But as a film of well over an hour, it fails from tedium. It is overly long, and suffers from obvious comparisons to Crime and Punishment. British actors portraying Russians is also a bit problematic. Anton Walbrook gives it his best shot, and is convincing, but he cannot solve the time problem (perhaps he could have sold his soul to the devil to make the half hour episode instead of this tedious film). I cannot recommend it for the average viewer, as it bogs down fairly quickly with its rather obvious plot. The other characters are relatively shallow, and it is odd that the film has a rating of 7 by a large number of viewers. I think, upon further reflection, they might be better off watching a film written by Dostoevsky, rather than this imitiation.
Review of The Queen of Spades
