Brighton Rock

Amazing brutal, surprising, rivetting.

I rated this once before but Im continuously asked to review it so here goes for a 2nd time. Attenborough is truly scary in this story. Unemotional thug who abhors feelings of any kind. Carol Marsh is absolutely outstanding as the naive waitress.

You will also be very tempted to fall for the very cute hard-boiled psychopath, and sometimes thats ok. However, that warm-hearted streak of hope may be better spent on rescuing a puppy or a new pair of shoes. A somewhat hilarious intensity will mount...will he, wont he? The world may never know. Neither will she! Awesome.

Brighton Rock, (1947) is a classic 92-minute black and white film noir adaptation of outstanding British author Graham Greenes classic, early career, downbeat novel of the same name,

If you like classic gangster-psychology films like Little Caesar and The Public Enemy, you will probably enjoy this original film adaptation of Graham Greenes novel set in crumbling 1930s Brighton. The recent remake transplanted the story to the 60s and changed quite a few more details; I think this original is better, and it regularly makes lists of top British films as well. The main character is a psychopathic teenage gangster named Pinkie (played by a very young Richard Attenborough), and he is truly menacing to the point where he can practically scare people to death. When a newspaperman on assignment to Brighton runs afoul of Pinkies mob and later turns up dead, a blowzy boardwalk performer, Ida (Hermione Baddeley) is convinced that Pinkie killed him and sets out to prove it and see justice done. Meanwhile, Pinkie is romancing a very young and naive waitress, Rose, who also happens to be a witness, and Ida becomes concerned with protecting her as well. Rose, of course, is the classic good girl who thinks she can help save a very bad guy just by loving him enough, and even if she cant save him, shes willing to go to the ends of the earth and die trying. Will Rose wise up and escape in one piece? Will Pinkie have a last-minute redemption through the power of love? Will Ida succeed in getting the cops to take an interest before Rose and/or herself end up dead? Oddly, theres not as much suspense to all of this as youd expect, even if you havent read Greenes book and dont know how its going to turn out (although if you have read the book, the films ending differs from it slightly - just enough to be interesting in its own right). Perhaps the lack of thrills is partly due to liberal use of Catholic symbology of heaven, hell (represented by fire), death, and other holy allusions (another witness is a blind man being led by a little girl) signifying that in the end, everybody is bound to get the reward they deserve, and the only question is how theyre going to get there. Its still a good, solid, well-made and well-acted film, and the emphasis on Roses Catholicism is in keeping with Greenes work. Also wonderful to see Baddeley in a long meaty role, sort of like a younger brash Jessica Fletcher, rather than her usual character roles as a maid or neighbor or whatnot. She was one heck of an actress. Its too bad that in her era, there werent tons of leading roles for chubby fortyish ladies. Overall, I recommend this version. Its so awesome, I have no idea why someone felt a need to remake it. About my only complaint is that the characters accents and slang can be a little hard for Americans to understand - you need to know that a blower means the telephone, for instance. But not too far removed from similarly slang-ridden US vintage gangster films.

A brilliant noir film, far superior to the 2010 remake, although it softened elements from the even better novel.

The new version of this film was much much better. This is too old fashioned a production. Hammy and cornball compared to the new film version. Julian Wasser

I had to watch this after reading Lynn Truss’s vastly entertaining novel, “A Shot in the Dark,” which refers to this movie and the book upon which it is based. I’m not usually a fan of movies about punk gangs, but I did enjoy this, especially the performance of Hermione Baddeley playing the sort of female character never allowed in American movies. She’s middle-aged, loud, determined and smart as can be. She’s a force to be reckoned with. Carol Marsh is also good as the naïve and trusting Rose, the opposite of Baddeley’s character. Richard Attenborough shifts his eyes, half closes them and opens them widely, which passes for great acting among some people.

Excellent example of the noire genre. Close to the original book, although the book captures much more of each characters inner conflict. Still, this abbreviated film form is more accessible for those too busy or lazy to read the book.

My favourite movie, I watch it over and over and over ~ its a film noir, that does not fail!!!