The Singer Not the Song

The Rank Organisation presents a thought-provoking film , a Roy Baker production , as one of Britain's most solid stylists and released by Rank film distributors limited . It concerns on Father Michael Keogh (John Mills , his third of several works with Baker) , a priest who has been given welcome by Father Gomez (Leslie French), whom he then replaces to a Mexican village after the Revolution . The village is submitted by Anacleto Comachi (Dirk Bogarde) dressed in dark and usually on horse , with its cowardly residents hiding in the houses . Eventually, the priest assists them in regaining their confidence and defending themselves . Anacleto regularly attacks the village and steal all their supplies . Comachi is twenty nine years old and natural son and was born a countrywoman . Father Michael takes on Anacleto who murders people with alphabetic names , beginning D and going on E, F.. Meanwhile , the rich owner's daughter (Mylene Demengeot) falls in love with Comachi.

From the novel by Audrey Erskine written by Nigel Balchin , this British picture is an interesting drama that carries a genuine charge of intelligence with exciting battle of wits between an upright priest and a nasty outlaw . It deals with people living on the edges of themselves and their resourcefulness , a recurring issue in Roy Baker's work . The picture bears remarkable resemblance to ¨Guns of San Sebastian (1968)¨ by Henry Verneuil also with a priest-though false- played by Anthony Quinn who arrives in village being harassed by an evil enemy played by Charles Bronson . A Cinemascope picture in glimmer color processed by the Rank laboratories (Denham) limited, England and well photographed by Otto Heller B.S.C . Good Production Manager by Denis Holt with nice Production design by Vetchinsky made on location in Torremolinos , Malaga, Spain and at Pinewood Studios, London .

The motion picture is professionally directed in Western style by Roy Baker , though contains up and downs with an amazing final . Baker emerged in post-wars years as one of the best Brit filmmakers and ahead of his time in editing techniques , working even in Hollywood, right from his initial American film titled ¨Inferno¨ with Robert Ryan and as ¨Don't bother to knock¨ with Marilyn Monroe . His movies also achieved some of the most important popular successes of the English cinema in the 50s and 60s, including ¨Morning departure¨ ,¨The one that got away¨ and the better film about Titanic tragedy as ¨A night to remember ¨ and at TV as ¨Sherlock Holmes , The Champions , the Saint , and the Avengers¨ . On his return to the cinema in the 60s billed as Roy Ward baker , he no longer seemed the same filmmaker and indeed directed entirely different kind of subjects , mainly terror movies as ¨Quatermass and the pit¨, ¨Vampire lovers¨, ¨Asylum¨ ¨Legend of seven golden vampires among others¨ . Rating : acceptable and passable

Another of these movies where Dirk Bogarde got lost.Why on earth did he have to get involved in that business?The screenplay has enormous pretensions and suggests homosexual tendencies between the priest and the all dressed-in-black Bogarde as well as a love which blonde Mylène Demongeot feels for the same priest!which is a bit too much!Luis Bunuel could have got away with it,but the director here is not in the same league.The screenplay is incoherent and the three leads are finally unconvincing.The title is absurd (Bogarde likes the singer (the priest?) but not his song(his Christian message?).It was also to be a Rolling Stone song with a nice dulcimer arrangement by Brian JOnes in the mid-sixties.

But here Bogarde's fans can have a look,but be warned:it's the actor,not the movie.

This movie leaves so many various impressions on a viewer, it is impossible to form a final opinion. To begin with, it is a British western, with two great British actors in the leads. Then, there is the actress, looking quite like Bardot. And then, even the atmosphere reminded me of "Et Dieu... crea la femme" in certain scenes (Bogarde called it camp, and you can see why). During certain scenes you are thinking that it will go the way of other movies with similar plot ("Satan never sleeps" is an example), ending in infinite praise of the religion, without measure or sense. But then it turns the other way and surprises you. And in the end you come to see that even some deep religious deeds can be interpreted as acts of latent homosexual love... I know it sound bad but, somehow, unlike modern movies, the topic is introduced subtly. Anyway, you should see it yourself and decide whether you like it or not...

My first (and for a long time) only viewing of this film was way back in the mid-1980s (during the early days of VHS in my neck of the woods) via a tape of a local TV screening my father loaned from a friend of his; even though I was aware of a couple of Italian TV showings over the years, I never managed to catch up with it – until another friend of my father’s alerted me (around Good Friday of last year) that it had been released – and, as it happens, subsequently deleted – on R2 DVD in the UK…which is how I eventually reacquainted myself with it on the day marking the centenary of one of its lead actors, John Mills. The reason I went into such detail about my previous experience with this particular film is because, even though it’s been 23 years since my sole viewing of (what is nowadays perhaps considered) a fairly obscure title, I myself have never forgotten it.

The ‘rejected priest in a godless Mexico’ theme recalls John Ford’s THE FUGITIVE (1947) and Luis Bunuel’s NAZARIN (1959), while the ‘homosexual undertones in a Western setting’ angle is reminiscent of the Howard Hughes/Howard Hawks concoction THE OUTLAW (1943) – with henchman Laurence Naismith’s ambiguous father-son-lover relationship with bandit leader Dirk Bogarde being particularly a throwback to the Thomas Mitchell/Jack Beutel one in the earlier film. Incidentally, THE SINGER NOT THE SONG’s controversial ending plays almost like a male version of that featured in yet another steamy over-the-top Western – DUEL IN THE SUN (1946)! This was the fourth of six collaborations between Mills and director Baker and which also included the latter’s debut, THE October MAN (1947) – a well-regarded thriller I’d love to watch and which, incidentally, has just been released on R2 DVD as part of a “John Mills Centenary Collection”. Bogarde, who himself considered the whole thing “beyond camp”, is almost always completely black-clad and, at one point, even sports cool shades!; here, he was already beginning to bravely delve on screen into his real-life gay side – which would come to full fruition later that same year in Basil Dearden’s VICTIM and other later acclaimed international films.

Nigel Balchin’s complex screenplay is at once fascinating and heavy-going, occasioning a few lulls particularly during the last third of the film’s lengthy 132-minute duration; besides, the ‘alphabet murders’ element to Bogarde’s tyrannical rule – not to mention pretty, pouting Mylene Demongeot’s forbidden love for middle-aged priest Mills – isn’t very convincing. On the other hand, Otto Heller’s spectacular color cinematography and Philip Green’s playfully evocative score, stand out as undeniable assets to the film. Having said that, DD Video’s full-frame presentation would have usually put me off acquiring a title on DVD – but, for the reasons delineated in my introduction, I gladly made an exception in this case.

Roy Ward Baker’s accompanying brief interview is very interesting: he wasn’t keen on doing the film himself but concedes now that it is beautifully-made; he also discloses that, initially, it was supposed to star Richard Burton instead of John Mills (but he was only interested in playing the bandit…except that the role was always intended for Bogarde – this, in fact, turned out to be the last film the latter made under contract to Rank) and that there was a mysterious enmity between the two male stars. I usually enjoy listening to Ward Baker’s Audio Commentaries (on his Hammer flicks) and, while I would have liked one for THE SINGER NOT THE SONG as well, the fact that he is now in his nineties and that he does not have fond memories of the shooting of the picture has understandably put paid to that prospect!

Who thought that it would be a good idea to have the two main male parts played by actors with posh English accents in a film set in Mexico, I saw no trace of an Irish accent from John MIlls that's been mentioned by others. An interesting film let down by poor casting, Dirk's character should have been a lot more butch as he was as threatening as Julian Clary. John's priest should have been a lot younger. Set in the 1960s but in the style of the 1930's, a very odd jumble of a film.