Never Let Go

Never Let Go, a movie rarely shown in the U.S. (and perhaps elsewhere), is well worth your time, especially if you are a Peter Sellers fan. The plot is reminiscent of The Bicycle Thief, though this movie will not be confused with Italian Neo-Realism. Under John Guillermin's direction, this drama moves from a nervy look at the underworld to a climax comparable to a western's showdown on a deserted dirt street. Richard Todd plays a cosmetics salesman barely doing well enough to make a living, in part due to his milquetoast-type personality. When his car is stolen, his life takes a serious downturn--he cannot work without it. His quest to get his car back drives the plot till the movie's end. Unlike The Bicycle Thief, however, much of the focus scene-by-scene is on the thief, played here by the late, great Peter Sellers.

Sellers's performance is overwhelming, completely over the top. The best comparison I can make is to Dennis Hopper's memorable performance in Lynch's Blue Velvet. As the movie progresses, his manic behavior becomes infectious: there was a palpable sense of the hysteric in the theater where I saw this movie, the audience just waiting to explode with laughter or shock with each move that Sellers made. This can be see as a distraction, and for a moment here or there it is, but by the end, the performance works very well, making the Todd character's growing determination to reclaim his car a point of tension--it will lead to direct confrontation with a maniac. Inexplicably, there is a sugary last scene tacked on to the end of this film, but it is easily forgiven. Ask your local art film house if it can show this movie--if so, it will be a memorable experience.

"Never Let Go" is a British noir from 1960. It was controversial because of the language and violence, which today's viewers won't even notice.

John Cummings (Richard Todd) is a salesman for a cosmetics firm who isn't doing well. He is told he pushes too hard; that he's not like the "new" types of salesmen coming in. Obviously nervous and desperate to keep his job, John has the look and aura of a loser, and his employer knows it.

Hoping to help his work, Cummings buys a Ford Anglia from Lionel Meadows (Peter Sellers), a crook. Cummings doesn't insure the car and when it's stolen, he's in trouble. His sales kit was in it, he now can't get around, and he'll be paying for it for years with nothing to show for it.

Though he's told he needs to let it go, Cummings won't. He launches his own investigation and runs into violence and the seamier side of London.

The outstanding thing about this film is the performance of Peter Sellers as a vicious criminal, violent, vile, with no empathy. He is outstanding. It's said that people who excel in comedy can do drama, but the reverse isn't always true, and Sellers proves the point here. He's amazing and doesn't hold back, giving a full-out performance.

And he flopped. Why? His fans didn't like the change in image, and neither did the critics. He never did drama again. I am reminded of Tyrone Power's excellent performance in Nightmare Alley that so freaked out Darryl Zanuck that he gave it no publicity and withdrew it from release. In that case, though, the critics liked it, and it finally achieved a cult status. But it goes to show how strong images were back in the day and how uncomfortable people were if you tried to do something else.

This is a gritty, depressing movie about a man who needs to get his car back in order to prove to himself and his wife that he's not a loser, and that he refuses to take what fate gives him. The street thugs show him no mercy, the police aren't interested, and his marriage is in jeopardy. Cummings realizes that no matter the price, he must win -- for himself. The finale is fantastic.

Richard Todd does a wonderful job in an emotional role and shows a wide range. He was one of the many British actors who came to fame around the same time: Stewart Granger, Richard Burton, Dirk Bogarde, Laurence Harvey, Terrence Stamp, etc. Whether it was poor choices in films or what, as good an actor as he was, he never reached the full film star potential that seemed unlimited after "The Hasty Heart."

The photography is top quality noir: offbeat angles, with the use of shadows throughout. The music was that typical '50s music one hears in '50s films, loud and jazzy, the type of thing you always here as someone approaches a cheap club in a sleazy part of town.

A good film, tough and no-holds barred in the noir tradition.

Never Let Go is directed by John Guillermin who also co-writes the story with producer Peter de Sarigny. Alun Falconer adapts to screenplay with music by John Barry and cinematography by Christopher Challis. It stars Peter Sellers, Richard Todd, Elizabeth Sellars, Adam Faith and Carol White.

John Cummings (Todd) is a struggling cosmetics salesman who buys a Ford Anglia car from crooked criminal Lionel Meadows (Sellers). When the car is stolen, Cummings, without insurance, finds his job on the line and his marriage facing crisis. Refusing to accept it as just one of those unfortunate things, Cummings starts digging for answers and finds himself in a world of violence, apathy and suicide.

As the classic film noir cycle came to an end, there was still the odd film to filter through post 1958 that deserved to have been better regarded in noir circles. One such film is Britain's biting thriller, Never Let Go. Its history is interesting. Landed with the X Certificate in Britain, a certificate normally afforded blood drenched horror or pornography, the picture garnered some notoriety on account of its brutal violence and frank language. By today's standards it's obviously tame, but transporting oneself back to 1960 it's easy to see why the picture caused a stir. The other notable thing to come with the film's package was the appearance of Peter Sellers in a very rare serious role. In short he plays a vile angry bastard, and plays it brilliantly so, but the critics kicked him for it, and his army of fans were dismayed to see the great comic actor playing fearsome drama. So stung was he by the criticism and fall out, Sellers refused to do serious drama again. And that, on this evidence, is a tragic shame.

What about my car? Out of Beaconsfield Studios, Guillermin's movie is a clinically bleak movie in tone and thematics. Todd's amiable John Cummings is plunged into a downward spiral of violence and helplessness by one turn of fate, that of his car being stolen. As he is buffeted about by young thugs, given the run around by a seemingly unsympathetic police force, starts to lose a grip on his job and dressed down by his adoring wife, Cummings begins to man up and realise he may have to become as bad as his nemesis, Lionel Meadows, to get what he rightly feels is justice. But at what cost to himself and others? The classic noir motif of the doppleganger comes into play for the excellently staged finale, made more telling by the build up where Cummings' "growth" plays opposite Meadows' rod of iron approach as he bullies man, woman and reptiles. Visually, too, it's classic film noir where Challis (Footsteps in the Fog) and Guillermin (Town on Trial) use shadows and darkness to reflect state of minds, while the grand use of off kilter camera angles are used for doors of plot revelation. Layered over the top is a jazzy score by John Barry.

It's not perfect, Sellers' accent takes some getting used to here in London town, Adam Faith is not wholly convincing as a bully boy carjacker and there's a leap of faith needed to accept some parts of the police investigation. But this is still quality drama, it's nasty, seedy and expertly characterised by the principal actors. In this dingy corner of 1960 London, film noir was very much alive and well. 9/10

I've only ever seen this film once, and only recently found out its title! I won't go over the plot here as this has been well covered by other reviewers. Suffice to say that this low-budget British film punches way above its weight and features some great performances, especially that of Peter Sellers who puts in a particularly riveting turn as the car-napper. Richard Todd's performance as the mild mannered salesman was always going to be eclipsed. One thing that struck me at the time was the number of mentions given to Todd's 'Ford Anglia', the car without which he could not survive. So often was the car mentioned that I am still convinced that Ford must have done a bit of sponsorship here! A great, gritty film from the days when we knew how to make them.

As I'm a Peter Sellers fan I discovered this film by chance on DVD... I was totally amazed by the story and the acting. All the cast is TOP, but I was mostly surprised by Peter Sellers -here he's not comical or funny at all, here he's a villain, a gangster. He's so good in the performance that you hate him -as a character, of course!

A salesman is victim of a theft. His car is stolen by a disbanded young who works for a car seller, a criminal who soups up engines for selling them again.

Not only Peter Sellers is excellent, the other great actor is Richard Todd. He's moving in the part of the salesman, obsessed by the search for his car and the will to show his wife (Elizabeth Sellars) he's not a loser. Adam Faith (one of the first rock singers in Britain before the Beatles and the Stones...) is the young thief.

The film has rhythm and is very realistic -for its time it's strong, fight scenes are quite violent. The film is in the wave of "Look back in anger", "Saturday night and Sunday morning". There's rage and a touch of "Free cinema", even if director John Guillermin has a more commercial style and later went to Hollywood for directing blockbusters like "The Blue Max", "The towering Inferno" and "King Kong".

A great classic, by the way.