Brighton Rock (US: Young Scarface) is a 1948 British gangsterfilm noir directed by John Boulting and starring Richard Attenborough as violent gang leader Pinkie Brown (reprising his West End role of three years earlier),[5] Rose Brown (Carol Marsh) as the innocent girl he marries, and Ida Arnold (Hermione Baddeley) as an amateur sleuth investigating a murder he committed.[6]
The film was adapted from the 1938 novelBrighton Rock by Graham Greene, and was produced by Roy Boulting through the Boulting brothers' production company Charter Film Productions.
The title comes from the old-fashioned candy "a stick of rock": Ida in the film says that like Brighton rock she doesn't change—as the name Brighton stays written the whole way through.
Plot
In Brighton in 1935, a gangster named Kite is found dead, shortly after a newspaper published a story exposing local rackets and gang wars. Kite's old gang, now led by the psychopathic teenaged hoodlum Pinkie Brown, learns that the reporter who wrote the story, Fred Hale, will be in town for one day for a promotional stunt (similar to the real-life "Lobby Lud" promotion). Fred will play "Kolley Kibber", leaving cards around town that can be redeemed for a monetary prize, with a larger prize for the first person who publicly identifies Fred as Kolley Kibber.
Pinkie and the gang hold Fred responsible for Kite's death. They confront Fred in a local pub, threaten him, and pursue him through the crowded resort town before Pinkie finally murders Fred on the ghost train. While Fred is attempting to elude the gang, he meets brassy, outgoing Ida Arnold, a middle-aged entertainer currently appearing in a local show. Ida takes a liking to Fred and notes that he appears to be afraid. The police think that Fred's death is a heart attack or suicide, but Ida suspects foul play and begins her own amateur investigation.
To establish an alibi for himself, Pinkie sends one of his gang members, Spicer, to distribute Fred's "Kolley Kibber" cards throughout the town, making it look like Fred was going about his business normally. Spicer errs by leaving one card under the tablecloth in a restaurant, creating a risk that the waitress would be able to identify Spicer. Pinkie visits the restaurant and discovers that the sweet, naive young waitress Rose found the card and noticed that it was not Fred who left the card, and is sure she would recognise the person who did, as she has a good memory for faces. Pinkie warns Rose not to speak about the person who left the card, and as part of gaining her confidence, asks her out on a date. Without fully understanding why he has said this, Rose trusts Pinkie and agrees that she will say nothing.
Pinkie is also being pressured by Colleoni, the older and more powerful leader of a rival gang, and owner of the large Cosmopolitan Hotel. He is also pursued by the police, who want him to leave town to avoid further gang warfare. Deciding that Spicer is a liability, Pinkie sends him to the racetrack in hopes that Colleoni's men will kill him there. However, Pinkie is also attacked by Colleoni's men, receiving a long scar on his right cheek, and runs off thinking Spicer is dead. However he is told later that Spicer lived. Pinkie ends up finishing Spicer off himself by pushing him down a stairwell in front of several witnesses.
Rose falls in love with Pinkie, discovering he is also a Catholic, and he decides to marry her so she cannot testify against him. After their wedding, at Rose's request he makes a record of his voice at a fairgrounds booth, on which he says, "What you want me to say is I love you. Well here is the truth. I hate you, you little slut. You make me sick." Rose cherishes the record, wrongly assuming that it contains Pinkie's profession of love, although she does not have a gramophone to play it on and is unaware of its true contents. Ida, who by now suspects Pinkie of killing both Fred and Spicer, poses as Rose's mother to visit her while Pinkie is out and warn her about Pinkie, but Rose is loyal to Pinkie and Ida leaves.
Ida's visit makes Pinkie decide he needs to kill Rose too, and he confides to his last remaining gang member, Dallow, his plan to get Rose to enter a suicide pact with him and kill herself first. Pinkie also tries to destroy the voice recording he made to avoid its becoming evidence after Rose's death, but only succeeds in scratching it. Dallow objects, saying Rose's death is unnecessary because Ida is about to leave Brighton, having been unable to find any convincing evidence against Pinkie. Colleoni has also paid off Pinkie and Dallow to leave town, and they go for a final drink with Rose before departing.
When Ida enters the bar, the paranoid Pinkie decides to carry out his plan for Rose's death, and takes her for a walk on the pier. Pinkie convinces Rose he will soon be hanged and the two of them should commit suicide in order to always stay together. He gives Rose his gun and tries to get her to shoot herself first. Rose is torn between her love for Pinkie and the Catholic prohibition against suicide, and hesitates. Meanwhile, Dallow and Ida, both wishing to protect the innocent Rose, alert police, who rush onto the pier after Pinkie. Upon seeing the police, Rose throws the gun into the water and Pinkie tries to run away, but falls from the pier to his death. A grief-stricken Rose later plays the damaged record of Pinkie's voice, which sticks on Pinkie's words "I love you" without playing the rest.
Themes
Like the book and like other Greene film adaptations such as The Third Man (1949), the film deals with Roman Catholic doctrines concerning the nature of sin and the basis of morality; damnation, forgiveness and mercy. Rose, and Pinkie (ostensibly), are Catholics, as was Greene; their beliefs are contrasted with Ida's strong but non-religious moral sensibility.[7]
Greene and Terence Rattigan wrote the screenplay for the 1948 film adaptation, produced and directed by John and Roy Boulting, with assistant director Gerald Mitchell. The ironic ending of the film, in which Rose's damaged gramophone record of Pinkie's voice sticks and repeats the words "I love you", was changed against Greene's wishes from his original story, in which Rose is about to hear the entire recording and will realise that Pinkie hated her. This is described by Greene as "The greatest horror of all". The filmmakers believed censors were likely to object to the more tragic original ending. Instructed to lose weight for the film, Richard Attenborough trained with Chelsea F.C.[8]
Much of the filming was done on location in Brighton, although some locations were recreated in the studio. The scenes where Fred is pursued through Brighton were shot with hidden cameras, capturing footage of Brighton residents and tourists engaged in their regular activities, unaware that a movie was being made. The climax of the film takes place at the Palace Pier, which differs from the novel, the end of which takes place in the nearby town of Peacehaven.
The Colleoni gang was modelled after the Sabini racetrack gang of the 1930s, which fought public battles with straight razors in its competition to control crime at racecourses in southern England, including one at Brighton. A former Sabini gang member named Carl Ramon served as technical adviser, including teaching Attenborough how to behave as Pinkie. Ramon also appeared in a non-speaking role as a barman.
Carol Marsh was cast as Rose after responding to a newspaper advertisement for a 16 or 17-year-old girl, "frail, innocent, naive, and tolerably but not excessively pretty." Although the film was her most significant role, in 1997 she said that she "had never seen the film and couldn't bear to."
Release
First screened to the trade and cinema distributors on 25 November 1947, the film held its World Premiere in Brighton on 8 January 1948, followed by a Gala Premiere at the Leicester Square Warner Cinema London on 9 January 1948.[1]
Brighton Rock was described in the trade papers as being a "notable box office attraction" in British cinemas in 1948.[10]
As of 1 April 1950 the film earned distributor's gross receipts of £147,124 in the UK of which £94,902 went to the producer.[3]
Critical reception
At the time of its release, Brighton Rock caused a critical uproar in Britain due to its depictions of crime and violence, with the Daily Mirror critic denouncing the razor-slashing scenes as "horrific" and concluding, "This film must not be shown."[citation needed]
The Monthly Film Bulletin wrote: "Brighton Rock is disappointing and difficult to follow. Those who have not read the book will be completely at sea, and those who have will be irritated at the tricks played with a superb story. One requires a knowledge of race-gang language to understand what the characters are talking about. The photography, especially in the latter half, is good, but there is not enough Brighton to be seen. It is well acted. Richard Attenborough, as Pinkie, is all Pinkie should be, ruthless, craven, sinister and sadistic, and he looks and lives the part. Carol Marsh, a new find, is a restrained Rose, and Hermione Baddeley, as always, is fruity, common and kind."[11]
Some reviewers, as well as author Greene, also objected to the final scene as sentimental and contrary to the original book's darker ending.[citation needed]
It was less successful in the United States (where it was released as Young Scarface) and critics did not consider its violence excessive.[citation needed]
Over time, Brighton Rock has maintained a good reputation, with the Encyclopedia of Film Noir calling it "superb".[citation needed]
A new adaptation of the novel, written and directed by Rowan Joffé, was released in the United Kingdom on 4 February 2010. Joffé changed the setting from the 1930s to the 1960s, during the mods and rockers era.[12][13]
Revival
The original film had a run at Film Forum in New York City 19–26 June 2009, and The New York Times previewed the revival, saying "both [Greene's] Catholicism and his movie-friendliness are in full cry in John Boulting's terrific 1947 gangster picture."[14]
John Edward Boulting and Roy Alfred Clarence Boulting, known collectively as the Boulting brothers, were English filmmakers and identical twins who became known for their series of satirical comedies in the 1950s and 1960s. They produced many of their films through their own production company, Charter Film Productions, which they founded in 1937.
Brighton Rock is a novel by Graham Greene, published in 1938 and later adapted for film and theatre. The novel is a murder thriller set in 1930s Brighton. The first of Greene's works to explore Catholic themes and moral issues, its treatment of class privilege and the problem of evil is paradoxical and ambivalent.
Hermione Ferdinanda Gingold was an English actress known for her sharp-tongued, eccentric character. Her signature drawling, deep voice was a result of nodules on her vocal cords she developed in the 1920s and early 1930s.
I'm All Right Jack is a 1959 British comedy film directed and produced by John and Roy Boulting from a script by Frank Harvey, John Boulting and Alan Hackney based on the 1958 novel Private Life by Alan Hackney.
Hermione Youlanda Ruby Clinton-Baddeley was an English actress of theatre, film and television. She typically played brash, vulgar characters, often referred to as "brassy" or "blowsy". She found her milieu in revue, in which she played from the 1930s to the 1950s, co-starring several times with the English actress Hermione Gingold.
Sheila Beryl Grant Sim, Baroness Attenborough was an English film and theatre actress. She was also the wife of the actor, director and peer Richard Attenborough.
The Brighton Palace Pier, commonly known as Brighton Pier or the Palace Pier, is a Grade II* listed pleasure pier in Brighton, England, located in the city centre opposite the Old Steine. Established in 1899, it was the third pier to be constructed in Brighton after the Royal Suspension Chain Pier and the West Pier, but is now the only one still in operation. It is managed and operated by the Eclectic Bar Group.
Dulcie Winifred Catherine Savage Denison,, known professionally as Dulcie Gray, was a British actress, mystery writer and lepidopterist.
Carol Marsh was an English actress, best known for playing the part of Rose in the 1947 film Brighton Rock.
Richard Bird was an English actor and director of stage and screen. Born George, Bird took the stage name Richard Bird after being nicknamed "Dickie" by his theatre colleagues.
Jet Storm is a 1959 British thriller film directed and co-written by Cy Endfield. Richard Attenborough stars with Stanley Baker, Hermione Baddeley and Diane Cilento. The film is a precursor to the later aviation disaster film genre such as Airport (1970).
Good-Time Girl is a 1948 British film noir-crime drama film directed by David MacDonald and starring Jean Kent, Dennis Price and Herbert Lom. A homeless girl is asked to explain her bad behaviour in the juvenile court, and says she’s run away from home because she’s unhappy there. They explain in detail what happened to the last girl who thought she could cope on her own, and this becomes the main plot.
"Now My Heart Is Full" is a song by British singer Morrissey from his fourth solo album Vauxhall and I. The song's refrain of "Dallow, Spicer, Pinkie, Cubitt" references the gangsters from Graham Greene's 1938 novel Brighton Rock and the film of the same name.
Dancing with Crime is a 1947 British film noir film directed by John Paddy Carstairs, starring Richard Attenborough, Barry K. Barnes and Sheila Sim. A man hunts down the killer of his lifelong friend.
Richard Samuel Attenborough, Baron Attenborough, was an English actor, film director, and producer.
Rag Doll, released in the USA as Young, Willing and Eager, is a 1961 British second feature crime film, directed by Lance Comfort and starring Christina Gregg, Kenneth Griffith, Jess Conrad and Hermione Baddeley.
Brighton Rock is a 2010 British crime film written and directed by Rowan Joffé and loosely based on Graham Greene's 1938 novel of the same name. The film stars Sam Riley, Andrea Riseborough, Andy Serkis, John Hurt, Sean Harris and Helen Mirren.
Hell Is Sold Out is a 1951 British drama film directed by Michael Anderson and starring Mai Zetterling, Herbert Lom and Richard Attenborough. The film is based on the novel of the same name by Maurice Dekobra.
Brothers in Law is a 1957 British comedy film directed by Roy Boulting and starring Richard Attenborough, Ian Carmichael, Terry-Thomas and Jill Adams. The film is one of the Boulting brothers successful series of institutional satires that begun with Private's Progress in 1956. It is an adaptation of the 1955 novel Brothers in Law by Henry Cecil, a comedy set in the legal profession.
Brighton Rock is a 1943 British play by Frank Harvey that ran for a hundred performances at the Garrick Theatre in the West End. Richard Attenborough and Dulcie Gray starred in the original theatrical production, and there had previously been one-week try-outs at the Grand Theatre, Blackpool and Bristol Hippodrome.
↑ "Brighton Rock". British Film Institute Collections Search. Retrieved 19 December 2023.
↑ Jones, Grahame C. (Spring 1969). "Graham Greene and the Legend of Péguy". Comparative Literature. XX1 (2): 138–40. doi:10.2307/1769942. JSTOR1769942.
↑ Tesser, Greg Chelsea FC in the Swinging '60s: Football's First Rock 'n' Roll Club The History Press (1 May 2015)
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