Mute Witness, is a 1994 thriller/horror

Horror film

Horror films seek to elicit a negative emotional reaction from viewers by playing on the audience's most primal fears. They often feature scenes that startle the viewer through the means of macabre and the supernatural, thus frequently overlapping with the fantasy and science fiction genres...

 shot in Moscow, Russia written, directed and produced by Anthony Waller. Although made in 1994, it was not released in the USA until the fall of 1995 (with the UK not seeing it till the following year). Known for having Alec Guinness

Alec Guinness

Sir Alec Guinness, CH, CBE was an English actor. He was featured in several of the Ealing Comedies, including Kind Hearts and Coronets in which he played eight different characters. He later won the Academy Award for Best Actor for his role as Colonel Nicholson in The Bridge on the River Kwai...

 in cameo as a Mystery Guest Star along with a mostly Europe

Europe

Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...

an cast.

An American remake of the film is scheduled for 2011.

Plot

Billy (Marina Zudina), an FX make up artist who does not have the physical ability to speak, is in Moscow working on a low budget slasher film directed by her sister's boyfriend Andy (Evan Richards). On one particular night Billy returns to the set to fetch a piece of equipment for the next day's shoot when she is accidentally locked in the studio. Being unable to speak but having the ability to communicate with her sister Karen (Fay Ripley), Billy makes several telephone calls but is interrupted when she discovers a small film crew working after hours to shoot a cheap porno film. Watching unseen Billy is amused until the performed sex becomes sadistic. When a masked actor pulls out a knife and stabs the actress (Olga Tolstetskaya), Billy reacts and is discovered. She flees pursued by the homicidal film crew.

Billy narrowly escapes and manages to tell her story to her sister and the Police, however the snuff film crew manages to convince the authorities that the onscreen 'murder' was a cinematic special effect. The events however bring forward Larsen (Oleg Yankovsky), an undercover detective who is tracking the activities of the covert film crew and their connection to a shadowy criminal mastermind called The Reaper. The Reaper (Alec Guinness) is a financier of an international underground snuff ring. He tells the criminal film crew that Billy is a witness and must be eliminated thus motivating the snuff film director, his thug assistant and a host of subsidiary criminals to retrieve a missing computer disc from her and dispatch her. As more and more factions get involved in killing and saving Billy the action become wild and fantastic and hard to discern what's real from movie magic.

Cast

Actor / Actress	Character
Alec Guinness Alec Guinness Sir Alec Guinness, CH, CBE was an English actor. He was featured in several of the Ealing Comedies, including Kind Hearts and Coronets in which he played eight different characters. He later won the Academy Award for Best Actor for his role as Colonel Nicholson in The Bridge on the River Kwai...	The Reaper
Fay Ripley Fay Ripley Fay Ripley is an English actress and recipe author. Born in Wimbledon, London, Ripley is a graduate of the Guildhall School of Music and Drama . Her first professional role was in the chorus of a pantomime version of Around the World in 80 Days...	Karen Hughes
Oleg Yankovsky Oleg Yankovsky Oleg Ivanovich Yankovsky was a Soviet/Russian actor who has excelled in psychologically sophisticated roles of modern intellectuals... (as Oleg Jankowskij)	Larsen
Marina Zudina Marina Zudina Marina Vyacheslavovna Zudina is a Russian actress of theatre and cinema. People's Artist of Russia. Meritorious Artist ....  (as Marina Sudina)	Billy Hughes Billy Hughes William Morris "Billy" Hughes, CH, KC, MHR , Australian politician, was the seventh Prime Minister of Australia from 1915 to 1923....
Evan Richards	Andy Clarke
Igor Volkov	Arkadi
Sergei Karlenkov	Lyosha
Nikolai Pastukhov	Janitor
Valeri Barakhtin (as Valeri Barahtin)	Mitja
Sascha Buchman	Alex
Olga Tolstetskaya	Actress
Denis Karasyov	Fake policeman
Igor Ilyin	Fake policeman
Oleg Abramov	Double
Vladimir Salnikov Vladimir Salnikov Vladimir Valeryevich Salnikov is a Russian former swimmer who competed for the USSR and set 12 world records in the 400-meter, 800-meter, and 1,500-meter freestyle. Nicknamed a "monster in the waves", he was the first man to swim under fifteen minutes in the 1500-meter freestyle...	Lab assistant
Konstantin Sitnikov	Angry props manager
Norbert Soentgen	Peeping Tom