Marcel Aymé's adaptation has clarity and power; the director, Pierre Chenal, uses the controversial but interesting technique of conveying the characters' disassociation from their environment by a slight distortion in the settings. As Raskolnikov, Pierre Blanchar is older, more eccentric than one expects: he emphasizes the tortured isolation, the near madness, of the character. It is in Harry Baur's performance as Inspector Porfiry that the film achieves its stature; Graham Greene long ago described the performance as “the finest in the cinema this year, with his tortoise movements, his streak of cruelty, his terrible good humor” - it is one of the great performances of any year.