Thread by @selfstyledsiren

For my own amusement and I hope that of others, I'm starting a month-long thread of U.K. film noir for #Noirvember. Why the U.K.? I've watched a lot of British films since lockdown, so why not. Here, an example of what I won’t include (movies that everyone knows).

Some picks may strike you as being more properly designated “noirish” or “not noir at all.” No worries, just know I think they’re good films, and call ‘em whatever the heck you like. (One more that’s too famous for this exercise: IT ALWAYS RAINS ON SUNDAY.) #Noirvember #UKNoir

Today, playing catchup with a Lawrence Huntington double feature: WANTED FOR MURDER (1946), script co-written by Emeric Pressburger. Eric Portman stars as a hangman’s grandson whose urge to strangle women keeps...getting...stronger. The carnival scenes alone are worth the watch.

Next: THE UPTURNED GLASS (1947) James Mason as a neurosurgeon (not a lot of those in noir) who plots revenge on the murderer of the married woman he adored. Opens with Mason lecturing his class about "the sane criminal" and oh lord, THAT VOICE. #Noirvember #UKNoir

Bonus James Mason, because I’m a giver. We’re caught up now, so it's one a day from now on. See you tomorrow.

“I hate men. They're rotten beasts. I wish all the men in the world were dead!” She means it, too: BEDELIA (Lance Comfort, 1946), with Margaret Lockwood in the très fatale title role. Based on a novel by Vera Caspary, who also wrote the novel LAURA.

She doesn’t like men, but Bedelia does like cats—be warned though, she’s not much better with them than with men. Note: The BEDELIAs I’ve seen circulating have the British ending; apparently there was a different, eye-roll of an ending for the U.S. market. #Noirvember

POOL OF LONDON (Basil Dearden, 1951) Melancholy heist tale that draws on the postwar era’s poverty and racism. Earl Cameron is superb as the sailor who falls for Susan Shaw. Unforgettable use of locations. #UKNoir #Noirvember

Great work also by Bonar Colleano, who married Susan Shaw and died far too young. There’s a @KinoLorber blu-ray of POOL OF LONDON, it’s widely available and pretty cheap. If you buy it, you won’t regret it. A four-star film noir in my book.

If you watch UNCLE SILAS (Charles Frank, 1947) and tell me it isn't noir, I won't mind—all I'll hear is that you saw it. This is one gorgeous movie—suspenseful, unsettling, morbidly funny. 18-year-old Jean Simmons is the imperiled orphan, Derrick De Marney the evil uncle…

The great DP Robert Krasker (who did ODD MAN OUT this same year and, in 1949, the indisputably noir THE THIRD MAN) uses geometric shadows and unconventional angles that at times upstage even Katina Paxinou and Her Sinister Ringlets. #UKNoir #Noirvember

UNCLE SILAS, based on the great J. Sheridan Le Fanu's most famous full-length novel, was stuck with the limp who-cares title of THE INHERITANCE for its U.S. release 🙄and if you seek it out, some versions circulate under that name. #UKNoir

STOLEN FACE (Terence Fisher, 1952) Paul Henreid (working in the U.K. due to the blacklist) is a plastic surgeon who gives a bitter, scarred convict the same features as the concert pianist he’s loved and lost; Lizabeth Scott plays both. THEN—he marries the criminal. #wut

Hammer Film and Terence Fisher's pleasingly insane noir—with its muddle-headed lovers, swoony score by Malcolm Arnold, and intimations of VERTIGO—was on the list of British faves that Martin Scorsese gave Edgar Wright at the start of the pandemic. #UKNoir #Noirvember

THE SLEEPING TIGER (Joseph Losey dba “Victor Hanbury,” 1954) First film Losey made in UK exile; 1st of five with Dirk Bogarde. Bogarde as one of his many 1950s criminals. His natural menace had little to do with muscle, it was about his aura of psycho-sadism.
#Noirvember #UKNoir

Lots of daring stylistic flourishes in THE SLEEPING TIGER, as though blacklisted Losey wanted to throw his talent back in the world’s face. Alexis Smith is brilliant as the shrink’s wife who sleeps with Bogarde; she rarely got this level of lust and rage to play with.

DP for NEVER LET GO (1960) was the great Christopher Challis; thank god, neither he nor director John Guillermin got the era's memo to light movies like TV. One of Richard Todd’s best; he's a cosmetics salesman who pursues his stolen Ford well past the point of madness. #UKNoir

It isn't just Richard Todd's salesman who wants to take down crime boss Meadows (Sellers). So does Jackie (Carol White), a teenage runaway who refuses to be broken by Meadows's abuse. I have a lot of love for White in this film; it could be a stock role, she makes it much more.

NEVER LET GO is famous as a unique instance of Peter Sellers (here with Adam Faith) playing a deadly serious and violent role. Sellers's thieving, sociopathic London villain seems—seems—indestructible. By the way, don't forget to vote. #Noirvember

DEAR MURDERER (Arthur Crabtree, 1947) is based on one of those mystery plays the British do so well. Two things make it feel noir—the marriage at the heart of the plot, a real tale of two vipers, and the ice-cold, creepy murder that sets things in motion. #UKNoir #Noirvember

The pleasures of DEAR MURDERER aren't so much visual (although it has a pleasing, upper-crust look). The fun is in the witty script and in stars Eric Portman, Dennis Price, and most of all Greta Gynt with whom I’m slightly obsessed. So far I’d say this is her best role. #UKNoir

The city is Manchester: HELL IS A CITY (Val Guest, 1960). Cop Harry Martineau (Stanley Baker) tracks Don Starling (John Crawford), a violent, remorseless prison escapee. The sooty location work can’t be praised enough; DP was Hammer Films regular Arthur Grant. #UKNoir #Noirvember

The plot of HELL IS A CITY is pretty standard procedural, much enhanced by a British New Wave refusal to pretty up characters or setting. Superb supporting cast includes Donald Pleasance as a bookie with the sniffles and Billie Whitelaw as his unfaithful—yet understandable—wife.

HELL IS A CITY is one of the best-known films on this list, but I couldn’t leave it off, even if the whining from Martineau’s wife drove me up a wall. Here's a great collection of on-location stills from filming (be warned, they reveal some plot points). theguardian.com/film/gallery/2…

PleasEnce, damn it. Sorry about that, Donald.

More film noir tales of my British Actress Obsessions—I have many, so many: Hy Hazell in PAPER ORCHID (Roy Ward Baker, 1947). Val Guest’s script is set on Fleet Street, among reporters who could win a round or two of the press-room card game in HIS GIRL FRIDAY. #Noirvember

Hy Hazell plays Stella, a popular columnist until she offends the snooty new owner; Sid James, beloved from the “Carry On” films, is another reporter. Is it too funny to be noir? I’d say it’s too twisty, cynical and unexpectedly sad not to be at least #UKNoir–adjacent.

Note: Search out Paper Orchid and you'll find it pretty quickly. But unless you have resources I don't, it's gonna look like this. Sorry about that. #UKNoir #Noirvember

All film noir lists should have some good B movies, so here’s WIDE BOY (Ken Hughes, 1952), with Sydney Tafler in the title role. The English slang term seems elastic—let’s just say Tafler is a black marketeer who's so smart it's a disease. #Noirvember (love the tacky little lamp)

Among the virtues of this 67-minute treat: Tafler is great and so is Susan Shaw as his girlfriend; London still had plenty of noir-suitable rubble in 1952; fun plot points like adultery, blackmail, and terrible financial planning. #Noirvember #UKNoir

The main appeal of THE NIGHT WON’T TALK (Daniel Birt, 1952) is its setting, a “La Ronde”–ish world of London artists where everyone loves the wrong person and no one makes a good living. That is, except sculptor Theo (Hy Hazell), the most talented of all.

The title sounds great, but—THE NIGHT WON’T TALK, of course it won't? Never mind. This is a brisk, effective 61 minutes, with an unusual focus on how women fare in “bohemian” milieus (not very well). #UKNoir #Noirvember

CAGE OF GOLD (Basil Dearden, 1950) has Dearden’s signature social themes, with Jean Simmons as a woman whose grifter husband (David Farrar, so slimy he practically slithers) gets her pregnant, abandons her, then blackmails her. #UKNoir #Noirvember

CAGE OF GOLD goes a little bananas in the last act, but I love the cast, including Madeleine Lebeau as a nightclub singer and my main man Herbert Lom as the club owner. The club is La Cage d’Or (aha!) and Ealing DP Douglas Slocombe goes to town with all those shadowy cage bars.

Bertrand Tavernier greatly admired NOOSE (Edmond T. Gréville, 1948). Another so-called spiv film about a group of racketeers including Joseph Calleia and Nigel Patrick (who Tavernier says “steals the film”). #UKNoir #Noirvember

Carole Landis has the lead as a fashion reporter (love it) who works to expose the criminal gang. Sadly, she died in July 1948, before the film was released. U.S. audiences wouldn’t see it (as THE SILK NOOSE) until 1950. Tavernier on Edmond Gréville: filmcomment.com/blog/edmond-gr…

Boasting the Dave Kehr Seal of Approval: THE GOOD DIE YOUNG (Lewis Gilbert, 1954), a heist tale with a drop-dead cast: Stanley Baker, Laurence Harvey, Richard Basehard, John Ireland, Joan Collins, Susan Shaw, AND Gloria Grahame. #UKNoir #Noirvember

For once the pre-heist machinations have enormous interest, and the robbery is thrilling—the job starts at Heathrow Airport and spills into the streets of London as it all goes wrong. (Don’t “spoiler” me, this is noir. What heist ever goes right?) #UKNoir #Noirvember

A blackmailing secretary is shot dead in THE VOICE OF MERRILL (aka Murder Will Out, John Gilling, 1952). Three men—an eminent playwright (James Robertson Justice), a publisher (Henry Kendall) and a struggling writer (Edward Underdown)—have motives but no alibis.

The playwright’s wife (Valerie Hobson, at the peak of her chilly patrician beauty) and the struggling writer fall in love. The plot brings in marital hatred, revenge, embezzlement, and of course Scotland Yard (Garry Marsh). The fadeout is deliciously noir. #Noirvember

A minor gem, made as a B but so fun it moved to the top of bills. The barbed dialogue is a major plus. The wife picks her maiden name, Merrill, for a necessary pseudonym. Her husband asks why, she says, “I tried to think of something I associate with happiness, Jonathan.” #UKNoir

APPOINTMENT WITH CRIME (John Harlow, 1946) Nothing glamorous about these jewel thieves. You'll never look at a storefront security gate the same way again. (Below, William Hartnell and Joyce Howard) #UKNoir #Noirvember

No matter what brews amidst the brouhaha at Twitter HQ, I'll be out here giving the people what they really want—more Herbert Lom content. #AppointmentWithCrime #UKNoir #Noirvember

YIELD TO THE NIGHT (J. Lee Thompson, 1956) The socko opening murder gives way to Death Row, flashback scenes alternating with Mary Hilton's (Diana Dors) last week on earth. Guess which plotline is more chilling. #UKNoir #Noirvember

I love this grim movie, and Diana Dors and Yvonne Mitchell in this movie, and I never miss an opportunity for praise. Bonus: possibly the most obvious fragrance product placement in film history. Me and this movie were meant to be. My 2011 blog post: selfstyledsiren.blogspot.com/2011/12/new-ye…

GOOD TIME GIRL (David MacDonald, 1948): Downbeat, well-made film about the ruination of an abused teenager (played by 26-year-old Jean Kent). Last half-hour is the best—sort of GUN CRAZY, but no guns because England. #UKNoir #Noirvember

I swear half the actors in the UK film industry show up in this movie. Standouts: 16-year-old Diana Dors as a rebellious girl in the framing story; Jill Balcon (Daniel Day-Lewis’s mother) as a tough reform-school teen; Peter Glenville as "Absolute Rotter" (his name's Jimmy).

And! (drum roll) there is Herbert Lom, because a mid-century British film with a nightclub needs Herbert Lom as the owner. Behold Lom playing ice-cold fury as only he could. That’s Dennis Price on the left, as the nice-guy piano player.
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Ronald Neame's fun, twisty debut as director, TAKE MY LIFE (1947), has my girl Greta Gynt as an opera singer who turns detective to prove her husband (Hugh Williams) didn't kill his ex (Rosalie Crutchley), a violinist in the orchestra. #UKNoir #Noirvember

I love this movie's cast. Gynt was peerless (rib-nudge) at playing divas, but in TAKE MY LIFE, she's a good egg for all that. Marius Goring broods stylishly. Guy Green, who won the Oscar for his incredible work on Great Expectations (1946), was the cinematographer. #Noirvember

Two with John Mills, a key actor in British film noir. First, THE OCTOBER MAN (Roy Ward Baker, 1947), based on an Eric Ambler novel. Mills plays Jim, a brain-injured, amnesiac man who’s accused of murder; Joan Greenwood is the woman he loves.

THE OCTOBER MAN has one of the more high-strung suspense plots of the era, as you fear what the already traumatized and suicidal Jim may do. Erwin Hillier, who did exquisite B&W cinematography for The Archers, was DP. #UKNoir #Noirvember

Perhaps an even better John Mills noir is THE LONG MEMORY (1953), directed by the gifted and tragic Robert Hamer. Here Mills’s character has the opposite problem: He remembers everything that’s been done to him, and wants revenge. #UKNoir #Noirvember

Like a number of other movies on this list, THE LONG MEMORY makes incredible use of its locations. From the lonely opening in the marshlands to the looming dockside shadows, this film's deep sense of loss and loneliness stays with you. #UKNoir #Noirvember

James Kenney is Roy "Walshy" Walsh, the main COSH BOY in Lewis Gilbert’s 1953 film. Brando and Dean's rebels had their reasons, but Walshy is “an enemy of society at 16,” a kid who needs to be stamped out like his ever-present cigarettes. #UKNoir #Noirvember

Despite the concessions to UK censorship of the time (“ruddy,” not “bloody”) COSH BOY goes into some topics that 1953 Hollywood rarely touched: teen sex, abortion. Joan Collins is good as the beautiful girl who lives to regret getting involved with Walshy. #UKNoir #Noirvember

Thanksgiving chez Siren had her wrapped up in friends and family, so she’s a little behind with the #UKNoir list. Two today, two tomorrow…

“Everybody wants to belong to the future. No one wants to belong to the past. Except me”: And me, as long as they gave me co-screenwriter and star Edana Romney’s costumes in CORRIDOR OF MIRRORS (Terence Young, 1948), a noir-infused tale of romantic obsession across the centuries.

The catch is, I have seen too many Eric Portman movies not to know that when Portman shows up as a man who has created his own past, and says he wants the perfect woman to join him, you should run like hell. Which Romney does…at first. #UKNoir #Noirvember

THE SNORKEL (Guy Green, 1958) is a noir from Hammer Films and possibly the most suspenseful entry on this list. Includes a dreamy Italian-villa setting, a fiendish serial killer (Peter van Eyck), a bravura opening murder … #UKNoir #Noirvember

… one of those smarter-than-all-the-adults-put-together teen heroines I can never resist (Mandy Miller), and a climactic showdown that almost swerves from noir straight into horror. Hugely enjoyable. #UKNoir #Noirvember

CLOUDBURST (Francis Searle, 1951) stars Robert Preston, a long way from River City, as a Canadian veteran scouring the country for the couple who killed his pregnant wife in a hit-and-run. Tough, violent for the time, with a thread of doomed love. #UKNoir
#Noirvember

Dirk Bogarde and director Basil Dearden—here they come again. While THE BLUE LAMP (1950) is a procedural with an almost preachy faith in the police, it also has genuinely shocking moments. #UKNoir #Noirvember

Finally, a harsh little oddball: DAYBREAK (Compton Bennett, 1948). This time, Eric Portman is cast as the public hangman, tormented by his job, yearning for love and a home with Ann Todd. Which the luckless Portman won't get, thanks to Maxwell Reed. #UKNoir #Noirvember

I’ve lost count in this thread — it should be 30, but just in case, I am adding a few bonus choices. THE GREEN COCKATOO (William Cameron Menzies, 1937) #Noirvember

Turn the Key Softly (Jack Lee, 1954)

Time Without Pity (Joseph Losey, 1957)

Pink String and Sealing Wax (Robert Hamer, 1945) God I love Googie Withers. And Robert Hamer.