nickjgunning

Lots of well known faces from the era, but Brian Rix, desperate for laughs doesn't raise a titter here. Posing as a senior officer in two roles doesn't work since he's unconvincing in either. William Hartnell and Cecil Parker do their best, but orchestrated body movements and face gurning night work in stage in pantomime, in film they merely look contrived.

The device of a gang using street musicians as a cover is ripped off from 'The Tiger in the Smoke.' At least it doesn't have the wild and irrelevant jazz track foisted on to most of these pot boilers, presumably efforts by the musicians' union to secure full employment.

There seems to be only a very thin thread knitting the whole thing together with the fiction between the American 'b' movie actor and the cynical Brit cop. Even the cockneys speak in Standard English, mainly in received pronunciation. Watchable but not riveting.

There seems to be great deal of Sloane Square rather than St Giles' Circus about it. That is to say even the sleazy locations looks recently scrubbed, Shepherd's Bush vs Soho.

Sidney Tafler as a spiv is sort of believable, and his blond-stereotype girl, needy drink raddled neighbour are the stock characters of low budget b&w. Even 50/60 years ago the compromising letter by a toff was very stale, the unintended shooting would only have been murder in the commission of a crime but the evidence would not have seemed sound. But the main problems are, first, it sounds like a radio play and that the film is like illustrative clips rather than a continuous narrative- you can almost imagine a linear flow diagram. The blow by blow moral argument, finished off by a sermon like speech from Ronald Howard and a body on board let's you know the end titles are due. For much of the film, the sprocket-holes would be more entertaining.