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All those British crime films once deemed undesirable for the National Image are beginning to get the attention they deserve. This story of a single day in a working class section of London has plenty of criminal activity but blends it in with the everyday crimes of desperation and boredom. The Sandigate girls are flirting with trouble but Googie Withers’ Rose Sandigate has gone much further: she’s hiding an escaped fugitive who was once her lover in the vain hope of recapturing her lost youth. Director Robert Hamer examines a dozen distinctive characters on the edge of respectability, in one of the most original ‘Brit noirs’ we’ve seen to date.

It Always Rains on Sunday

Blu-ray

Kl Studio Classics

1947 / B&w / 1:37 Academy / 92 min. / Street Date November 5, 2019 / available through Kino Lorber / 24.95

Starring: Googie Withers, John McCallum, Jack Warner, Edward Chapman, Susan Shaw, Patricia Plunkett, Nigel Stock, David Lines, Sydney Tafler,...

It’s the granddaddy of British cop dramas of the modern era. The most popular English picture of 1950 introduced PC George Dixon, a warm-hearted constable who would become a staple on BBC TV for 21 years. T.E.B. Clarke’s screenplay of a murder manhunt is stocked with actors American fans know well — Dirk Bogarde, Bernard Lee — and some we should know better — Jack Warner, Robert Flemyng, Dora Bryan. The show was made by the top craftsmen of Ealing Studios, and its fast pace and Brit sensibility will definitely impress. And remember — the Bobbies on the beat don’t even carry guns.

The Blue Lamp

Blu-ray

Kl Studio Classics

1950 / B&w / 1:37 Academy / 85 min. / Street Date June 1, 2021 / available through Kino Lorber / 24.95

Starring: Jack Warner, Jimmy Hanley, Dirk Bogarde, Robert Flemyng, Bernard Lee, Peggy Evans, Patric Doonan, Bruce Seton, Meredith Edwards, Dora Bryan, Gladys Henson, Tessie O’Shea, Betty Ann Davies, Jennifer Jayne, Sam Kydd,...

Lust-filled treachery in the steaming tropics! He dared to love a cannibal empress! Taglines like that suggest that it wasn’t easy to sell Carol Reed’s phenomenally good adaptation of Joseph Conrad’s classic, a tale of human self-degradation and malevolence in the tropics. Long difficult to see, it’s finally here to dazzle a generation that might appreciate its superb performances. Forget Lord Jim and Colonel Kurtz. Trevor Howard’s back-stabbing Peter Willems shows us the price of total betrayal: permanent banishment from humanity.

Outcast of the Islands

Blu-ray

Kl Studio Classics

1951 / B&w / 1:37 flat / 100 93 min. / Street Date April 29, 2020 / available through Kino Lorber / 29.95

Starring: Trevor Howard, Ralph Richardson, Robert Morley, Wendy Hiller, Aissa, George Coulouris, Tamine, Wilfrid Hyde-White, Peter Illing, Betty Ann Davies, Frederick Valk, A.V. Bramble, Marne Maitland, James Kenney, Annabel Morley.

Cinematography: Edward Scaife, John Wilcox

Production Design: Vincent Korda

Second Unit Director: Guy Hamilton...

By Lee Pfeiffer

The British Film Institute (BFI) deserves praise for continuing to invest in restorations of worthy, but largely forgotten, British films from bygone eras. Case in point: the 1953 crime drama "Cosh Boy" (absurdly re-titled "The Slasher" for American release in order to make it appear to be a "B" horror movie.) Incidentally, a "cosh" is old British slang for a blackjack used by thugs to strike victims over the head. The low-budget B&W production is typical of the film output in post-wwii Britain. Britain was on the winning side but after initial jubilation the reality of living in an almost bankrupt nation set in. Rationing was strict, much of the country was in ruins and crime and juvenile delinquency began to rise. "The Slasher", co-written and directed by Lewis Gilbert, touches on these problems by examining how the delinquency problem was exacerbated in part by the loss...

He’s mean, he’s nasty, he carries a razor and he’s dating your sister! Cosh Boy was front & center in 1953 debates about ‘what’s wrong with the British cinema.’ It holds up well, if not as PC social comment, then as solid exploitation fare, with our verminous hero putting the moves on tough-but-vulnerable local girl Joan Collins. The entire cast will want to stand in line to get revenge against Roy Walsh, the punk who steals from his own mum and lets his criminal gang do the dirty work. Take it from me, he’s a dirty rat.

The Slasher (Cosh Boy)

Blu-ray

Kl Studio Classics

1953 / B&w / 1:37 Academy / 75 min. / Street Date January 7, 2019 / available through Kino Lorber / 19.95

Starring: James Kenney, Joan Collins, Betty Ann Davies, Robert Ayres, Hermione Baddeley, Hermione Gingold, Nancy Roberts, Laurence Naismith, Ian Whittaker, Stanley Escane, Michael McKeag, Sean Lynch, Johnny Briggs, Nosher Powell.