West 11

A minor but very smoothly made example of British film noir. Director Michael Winner, then at the start of his career, had a strong cast (Alfred Lynch, Eric Portman, Diana Dors, Finlay Currie, et al) to inhabit this starkly photographed little crime melodrama set in London bedsit-land, all tacky Notting Hill coffee bars and smoky jazz clubs.

Lynch makes a downbeat but sympathetic protagonist, more thoughtful than the usual type of hero. Portman plays the clipped-moustache ex-military man-turned-swindler to perfection. Dors is just right, too, as a blousy divorcée ("Young enough to still want a husband; old enough not get the one I want").

Winner plays up the salacious sex element a bit, but a tight Keith Waterhouse/Willis Hall script touches on Lynch's Catholic guilt, and Currie's existential search for 'truth', just enough to give the story a modicum of depth. There's also an evocative score by Stanley Black, with Acker Bilk on sax.

Until latterly a neglected, even scorned, cinema sub-genre, these usually low-budget British film noirs, often superbly photographed, were violent by the standards of their day, and showed the rain-washed streets of cities like Newcastle (Payroll), Manchester (Hell Is a City) and Brighton (Jigsaw), as well as London, could be pretty mean, too.

Winner's next film, The System with Oliver Reed, was even better.

While trying to create a stylish British film noir, Michael Winner unwittingly created an existentialism masterpiece! Only those armed with such expectations will feel that their time is not wasted. Those expecting kitchen sink drama or noir will very probably yawn throughout.

As such, acting in this movie serves its purpose and helps open up the world of boredom, hope and individual aspirations and disappointments. Nicely shot, slowly-paced and with a decent period music deployed to show adequately gloomy passtime activities of the W11 youth and pub-goers of the early 60's, the film satisfies all the criteria required for it to fit into the existentialism category.

If anybody actually reads my reviews they will say god he has bought a blu ray of an old British film again.

Yes I have and I really liked this one.

I watched Stranger In The House recently and did not like it much.

But I really liked West 11.

Alfred Lynch plays a dodgy chancer who does not want to work.

He hangs out in pre Beatles/Swinging sixties West London seducing girls and eating in cafes and pubs.

I saw pre Beatles London deliberately because the great soundtrack to this is jazz,characters sit about in jazz clubs.

A year after the film was made I assume the jazz clubs would be struggling for customers and Beat Boom would have been in full swing.

I won't give plot details but I feel this film is a great view of society on the edge of change.

Historians and sociologists write about Kensington/Notting Hill and this film might help their studies.

I know Alfred Lynch best from tv drama Manhunt but mut seek out his other work.

I don't know Kathleen Breck at all.

The cast is full of familiar faces in tiny parts,eg David Hemmings.

I think I saw Anthony Valentine in a party scene.

An forgotten classic of its kind I think.

I bet a lot of people who say they are fans of 1960s British cinema will have never seen this.

I don't recall it ever being on tv.

Maybe it's because I don't much like Alfred Lynch or Michael Winner films generally, but this film dragged terribly. For me, it was only worth watching for the end credit music played beautifully by Mr Acker Bilk, a haunting piece somewhat reminiscent of Bilk's own 'Bitter Harvest' theme. There were some great 'kitchen sink' films made in Britain in the late 50's and early 60's, but this doesn't make the grade.

This low-key British kitchen-sink movie is much better than it's lukewarm reputation might suggest. It's no masterpiece and it's certainly no "Saturday Night and Sunday Morning" or "A Taste of Honey" but it's far from negligible and is worth seeing. It was directed by Michael Winner at a time when he actually made good films and stars the underrated Alfred Lynch as a feckless young man roped into a murder plot by Eric Portman's slimy and possibly bogus ex-army officer. Keith Waterhouse and Willis Hall wrote the above average screenplay and it's superbly shot in its Notting Hill locations by Otto Heller. Others in a fine supporting cast include Diana Dors, Kathleen Harrison and Finlay Currie.