A Nearly forgotten director.........

Fans of English films will know the name of Basil Dearden but critically his credit seemed to have run out in the early Sixties. Dearden was born Basil Dear in the town where I live (other film personalities associated with the area are Helen Mirren and Michael Wilding) and he cut his directorial teeth on Will Hay comedies before finding critical success with the police classic THE BLUE LAMP(1950) which was followed by I BELIEVE IN YOU (1952)which tells the story of a probation (parole) officer. Seen today, these films offer an accurate view of post war London. Other films from these period of Dearden's career (the "den" was added to avoid confusion with Basil Dean, a prominent film-maker of thetime) that are of particular interest are THE DEAD OF NIGHT (Dearden contributed the "linking" story) and the lesser known ghost story HALFWAY HOUSE. In the 1950's Dearden made three comedies, the first of which was the little WHO DONE IT? a star vehicle for Benny Hill. Perhaps more interesting are THE GREEN MAN (1956) a sometimes frantic farce about a professional killer starring the wonderful Alastair Sim and THE SMALLEST SHOW ON EARTH (1957) which lovingly recreates one of the old fleapit cinemas and is a must-see film for film enthusiasts. Oddly, it was the next phase of Basil Dearden's career, which while being commerically successfuland critically acclaimed in some quarters seemed to end real interest in his career. Starting with the race-relations thriller SAPPHIRE (1959) and set in London's Notting Hill district, Dearden embarked on a series of films which balanced a social conscience with intriguing thrillers. As mentioned in my review of the heist film THE LEAGUE OF GENTLEMEN Dearden had portrayed one of the supporting characters as both gay and sympathetic (remember that homosexuals at this time were still open to blackmail and imprisonment and often treated in films, if at all, as figures of ridicule) and in VICTIM (1961) he brought this sensitive subject to centre stage with Dirk Bogarde as a married, respectable barrister, who finds himself blackmailed after the death of a former male lover. The film was a controversial hit and while it received some criticism from those who felt that it was not outspoken enough. However it remains an important film and, given the period of its production, a courageous one. ALL NIGHT LONG (1962) was a somewhat pretentious yet entertaining retelling of Shakespear's "Othello" in a modern jazz setting with the ever watchable Patrick McGoohan as an edgy Iago. LIFE FOR RUTH, the same year, featured McGoohan as a doctor faced with a difficult decision when a Jehovah Witness father refuses a blood transfusion for his dangerously ill daughter. Less successful is THE MIND BENDERS (62), a spy thriller with a background of sensory deprivation, starring Dirk Bogarde. So, with so many watchable movies to his credit why did most of Dearden's subsequent films seem have less than interesting subject matter (I make an exception for the 1966 KHARTOUM which was one of the more intelligent epics of the period) ? The reason seem s to me that Dearden got bypassed in the rush of the film production companies to embrace the rise of the "new wave" of young British film-makers like Tony Richardson, Karel Reisz, John Schlesinger who were the darlings of the critical establishment who, maybe, saw Dearden and a throwback to an earlier and more staid period of British cinema (David Lean suffered a similar critical fate although, thankfully, his great contribution to world cinema is now recognised). Dearden does indeed belong to that earlier tradition where storytelling was not pushed into second place by "style". He was no Michael Powell or Alfred Hitchcock (both of whom put equal emphasis on style and content, but he was a very good teller of tales and deserves to be remembered. Basil Dearden was killed in a car crash in 1971. He was married to actress Melissa Stribling.

THE LEAGUE OF GENTLEMEN (1960)

I've totally lost count of how many times I've watched THE LEAGUE OF GENTLEMEN since I first saw it in a cinema back in 1960. Of course, I'm talking about the Basil Dearden directed film starring Jack Hawkins and not the more recent unrelated television series. For me it is one of those films that I turn too again and again when I can't decide what else to watch or I just need cheering up. It's a heist movie in the tradition of such films as RIFIFI , THE KILLING and THE ASHPHALT JUNGLE but very different in mood to any of those. Jack Hawkins plays a disaffected ex-army officer who decides that he is going to rob a bank and to this end gathers around himself a group of life's losers - who all have a talent that he can use for his criminal venture. And what a crew it is! Truly, one of the great strengths of the film is the casting of the gang with a selection of top British character actors : Richard Attenborough, Nigel Patrick, Terence Alexander, Norman Bird, Roger Livesy, Bryan Forbes, Keiron Moore etc. The film is very single-minded in as much as the whole film (except for a flashbacks to the reasons why the various members of the League are happy to turn to crime) is seen entirely from the point of view of the gang from the recruiting and planning, to the execution of the robbery and the final climax - which makes for strong audience identification (I know as a 14 year old watching the film I was very attracted to the idea of robbing a bank!). Each gang member is given a distinct personality - from Terence Alexander's cuckold to Keiron Moore's homosexual - the latter being a particularly interesting characterisation in that, probably for the first time in an English film, a gay character is depicted as masculine with no hint of campness and without any of the weaknesses that films of the time usually assigned to gay characters (usually only hinted at - and played for laughs - if at all) so that when one of the other gang members makes a tasteless remark both audience and the other characters frown upon his crassness. The film opens with a memorable pre-credit sequence featuring Jack Hawkins, immaculately clad in Dinner suit emerging from a manhole in the street. When I worked in London I used to pass this particular manhole (situated in Eastcheap) every day on my way to the station and, of course, bored my friends to death pointing out this little bit of film history. The bank that the gang robbed was also situated in Eastcheap and I still own a small piece of brick that I rescued as a momento when the building was demolished in the 1990s. Tensely directed by Basil Dearden (an almost forgotten figure in British film history who I will be writing about soon) THE LEAGUE OF GENTLEMAN is a classic. Rating ****

From the Waterfront to the Streets of San Francisco on a Streetcar Named Desire....

1914 - 2009
R.I.P

REKOPIS ZNALEZIONY W SARAGOSSIE/ The Saragossa Manuscript (1965)

During the Napoleonic Wars in Spain a French officer is captured but not before he discovers a strange book. With the help of one of his captors he begins to read the book which it turns out tells the story of his captor's grandfather. What follows is a strange tale of ghosts, mysterious women, haunted inns, cabalists, castles, brigands and inquisitors. I can only imagine that this delightful film was a big influence on director Terry Gilliam for it effortlessly conjures up the sort of magical world that Gilliam strained at in BARON MUNCHAUSEN and THE BROTHERS GRIMM. It seems that the film was greatly admired by both Jerry Garcia and the great Luis Bunuel (at times it reminds one of the work of both Bunuel and his friend Salvador Dali). The film is in two parts (this is the full 3hr version not the two hour version that was in circulation in America. The first part takes as into the strange gothic world mentioned above (the whole story could be turned into a tale of vampires with only the slightest of effort) while part two starts with out hero being taken to the castle of a sinister cabalist. I had a slight problem with the second half and found it outstayed its welcome (which is probably why a shorter version was in circulation), perhaps because the magic of the first half is replaced by a plot which takes us away from the promise of the sinister cabalist and his castle into a tale of romance and marital deception which seems more like a sequel to THE BARBER OF SEVILLE. It is mildly amusing but simply too long and it is a relief when, for the climax, we are whisked back to the demonic world of the first half of the film. The structure of the film (which I assume comes from the original novel by Jan Potocki) is fascinating - virtually every major character in the films begins to tell his own story which we then see, so the film is stories within stories within stories - all of which adds to the surrealist nature of the work. Directed by Wojcrech Has, the films stars the famous Polish actor Zbigniew Cybulski who had made such a dramatic impact on the film world as the star of Andrzej Wadja's ASHES AND DIAMONDS. Two years after appearing in THE SARAGOSSA MANUSCRIPT Cybulski would die tragically after slipping and falling beneath the wheels of a train he was running to catch. Despite my minor qualms about the second half this is a wonderful and fascinating movie. Rating ****

THE LUCKY GHOST (1942)

This is a fascinating historical curiosity - an example of the "Race" films that were made during the 1930s and 1940's specifically for black audiences. These low budget films aped all the major Hollywood genres from comedies and musicals to horror films and even Westerns. The film under review (directed by William Beaudine) is one of a couple of attempts to team Flournoy Miller with Mantan Moreland, here as two down at heel types who come into money and win a haunted casino because of their dexterity with dice. The film, while it has its share of rolling eyes, is generally lacking in to many of the racial stereotypes we see in in films aimed mainly at white audiences. Perhaps the most interesting aspect of the film is watching Mantan Moreland carry the film virtually single-handed. Moreland was a familiar face in mainstream "white" productions and was a talented performer. Here he works his butt off, giving the material much more than it really deserved. Rating **

Look who is 73 today......

Have to admit that I am a HUGE Kris Kristofferson fan. Perhaps more for the music than the movies, although he's done a few great ones (including my all-time favourite Western) alongside those that paid the rent. I've been there since the first album back in the 70's and I've bought every one since. It's about time for a new album Kris........happy birthday.

TO HELL AND BACK (1955)

Reel Life 1955 : Audie Murphy recieves a medal for outstanding valour in TO HELL AND BACK

I've waited years to see this. Somehow this biopic of war hero/actor Audie Murphy has always eluded me. I've always been a fan of Murphy's films - mostly easy going Westerns - so a film based on his wartime exploits held some attraction for me but we kept missing each other over the years.Finally, I found this widescreen VHS copy in a box outside a charity shop - price 20p! Was I at all disappointed ? Well, no, I never really expected the film to be a masterpiece (it is, after all, directed by the anonymous Jesse Hibbs) but I liked it a lot, even if it somewhat plays down the incredible exploits that earned Murphy every American medal for bravery right up to the Congressional Medal of Honor, plus several French ones as well (see picture below). Murphy does a pretty good job of playing himself (this was his sixteenth film) and is ably supported by Charles Drake, Jack, Kelly, Marshal Thompson, Paul Picerni and David Janssen. A remake would be welcome showing something of Murphy's off-screen problems - then again, maybe not, as we're always too eager to show the downside of heroes and if nothing else Audie Murphy was a hero. Rating ***

Real Life 1945 : Audie Murphy recieves a French Medal for outstanding valour