Hungry Hill

"Hungry Hill" is an Irish area where some 19th century families bicker over copper mining. Some good-looking sets and costumes make this film look like a grand production is going to unfold, but don't get your hopes up. The characters and story lines are introduced in a most unappealing manner. The structure is dull, even though it's adapted with personal help by reliable author Daphne du Maurier (of "Rebecca" fame). It's likely the original novel had more life.

Probably the most engaging part is played by lovely Margaret Lockwood (as Fanny Rose). There is some fun in watching Ms. Lockwood's sprightly courtship with Dennis Price (as "Greyhound" John Brodrick) - and, she ages into one youthfully beautiful old lady. Early on, the young and radiant Jean Simmons (as Jane) is a brief attraction. Lockwood and "grown-up" son Dermot Walsh (as "Wild" Johnnie Brodrick) have some good dramatic confrontations, later in the running time.

***** Hungry Hill (1/7/47) Brian Desmond Hurst ~ Margaret Lockwood, Dermot Walsh, Dennis Price, Cecil Parker

"Hungry Hill," based on a novel by Daphne DuMaurier, concerns a 50-plus year family feud between copper mine owners, the Brodricks, and the people who work for them, the Donovans.

The film stars Margaret Lockwood as Fanny Rosa, who marries Dennis Price, known as "Greyhound John Brodrick" because he breeds greyhounds. His father (Cecil Parker) is Copper John. A very young and lovely Jean Simmons has a small role as Price's sister.

Fanny and Greyhound John have several children, one of whom is Henry (Michael Dennison), who becomes a wild child when he grows up. As someone else mentioned, Dennison is very much like James Mason. We get to see Lockwood as a flirtatious young woman, a settled married one, and finally, an elderly widow.

The film is somewhat slow, but though it is in black and white, you can see the beauty and luxury of the 19th century costumes.

For some reason the characters were hard to connect to, with the possible exception of Lockwood. She is the thread who goes throughout the film, and we see some real character development. It's a very good performance.

This film was recently shown as part of the BBCs season of British films.It is a costume drama which seemed to be a staple diet of cinema going in the 1940s.the cast is fairly distinguished including Margaaret Lockwood,Dennis Price,Michael Dennison and Dermot Walsh.They seem to be playing the type of parts which had become their métier during this period.The problem is that there is no dynamism either about the acting or writing to give the film that spark.Perhaps it needed a mean and moody Mason to bring the film to life.I have to say that at times i found the film to be rather dull and tepid.There were lots of sequences to do with mines but this was already a bit of a cliché by the time this film was released.

Daphne DuMaurier helped adapt one of her lesser known novels, Hungry Hill to the big screen in 1947. Possibly the problem is that it is one of his lesser known novels and was not that good a read to begin with.

Hungry Hill is where a copper mine is started by Cecil Parker the head of the Brodrick clan and Parker's his usual arrogant self once again on the screen. This piece of property the other family, the Donovans, feel the Brodricks cheated them out of way back when so this was an ongoing feud when the viewer enters the picture. When the mine opens the head of the Donovans, Arthur Sinclair, pronounces a curse on the Brodricks.

The Brodricks due seem like a cursed clan, but the curse also seems to ring down on the Donovans as well over the three generations that this tale is told.

The primary characters are Margaret Lockwood who marries into the Brodricks and Dennis Price who becomes a lawyer and tries not to have anything to do with the mine. They raise a new generation of Brodricks who have their own problems with the Donovans, especially young Dermot Walsh.

Cecil Parker being the fatuous oaf he is turns out to be a great businessman, but that's about all he is. He makes mistakes in the raising of both his son and grandson that really are the cause of a lot of the issues.

Jean Simmons has a brief role as Dennis Price's sister who I wish we had seen more of. She's in at the beginning and then we're told she marries an army man and is now in India. Smart girl, she showed sense in getting away from the Hungry Hill curse.

Hungry Hill moves at way too slow a pace. It's like a British version of The Magnificent Ambersons, the director's vision of Ambersons that is. Maybe it needed someone like Orson Welles at the helm.

A film adaptation of a (lesser-known) Daphne Du Maurier novel, HUNGRY HILL offers an interesting, yet mostly bleak look at social divide. This costume drama juxtaposes the bourgeois copper mine owners the Brodricks with the working family the Donovans, paralleling their lives and constant feuding over a 50 year-period.

Margaret Lockwood gets first billing as Fanny Rose, who marries into the wealthy Brodrick family. Miss Lockwood gets one of the better parts on offer here, her character arc changing from a wilful coquette to a bright young married, and then finally to an elderly widowed woman looking back on life. Dennis Price plays her husband, who wishes to reconcile with the Donovan clan. Cecil Parker is memorable as the head of the family, whilst a young and lovely Jean Simmons appears briefly as Jane, younger sister of Price.

The bleakness of the source material does not give the film much to work with, and the film is often talky and mundane in many stretches. The production values, while adequate enough, do not really enhance the work. It's just not great drama.

Perhaps the most interesting part of the film is seeing young Michael Dennison do a fairly credible job in the sort of role that either James Mason (bound for America) or Stewart Granger would have performed with aplomb back in the early 40's. He plays spoiled Henry Brodrick, son of Lockwood and Price, who re-ignites the tension between the two families after a brief stalemate. Dennison seems to be channelling the Mason we saw in Gainsborough melodramas such as THE MAN IN GREY and FANNY BY GASLIGHT in his venom-spitting scenes. His character is really quite hateful, yet his indulgence in such vices as drinking, gambling, women and even murder provide a bit of spark to the proceedings.

5/10.