Girl in the Headlines

I imagine this film was made towards the end of 1962, as it was released in June 1963. Directed by the underused and good director Michael Truman ( who made ' Touch and Go' a highly rated comedy but underrated today ) it shows in stark black and white a new era in our troubled social lives. This in my opinion happens every 60 years or so, and we are entering a new one since 2020. ' Girl in the Headlines ' is about the search for the killer of a party ' girl ' and model, and like an unwanted ghost she hovers over the whole film and no one really grieves for her. London and its mainly focused trendy new fashions and lifestyles are just beginning, and this springtime of a new era shows us a gallery of characters each with their secrets and their mainly empty lives. Promiscuity in sexuality, a prurient media and drug filled lives revolve around all of them. Jeremy Brett ( a troubled man himself ) portrays a young man of the times, partly looking backwards, partly towards the future, and his handsome face seems to dread it. Margaret Johnston ( one of the UK's finest actors who was excellent in Truman's ' Touch and Go ' ) plays the dead woman's mother; an enigmatic and lonely figure looking back to a life that has nothing to do with the pop ephemera around her. Natasha Parry ( one of our best actors about to leave the UK for arguably better roles with Peter Brook, again arguably the UK's best director lost to the UK for Paris. ) plays the wife of an artist who abuses her emotionally, and there are hints of bisexuality. Ian Hendry and Ronald Fraser play the detectives and for me both of them paled in acting abilities compared to the three mentioned above. They represent the dying era and its own boredoms but that does not excuse below par acting which sadly dominated the film by them, especially in the last half of the film. I must single out two scenes; one in a ' dead ' house where we see relics of the past of a former Opera singer, and this beautifully filmed sequence is played out in silence to a recoding of Bellini's ' Casta Diva ' from his opera ' Norma. ' This alone deserves the full eight I am giving this film, and shows a magical touch that Michael Truman showed in his direction of ' Touch and Go. ) The second scene is set in a gay club after the murder of a famous actor, and the way the ' suspects ' are led away by the police shows just how these still legally ' criminals ' are abjectly treated. The look on Ian Hendry's face says it all. The club itself appeared to be the ' Gigolo ' in Chelsea below a fashionable restaurant above it and joined to it called ' the Casserole ' and frequented by a lot of the famous people of the time. A good film, patchy in parts, but for all those interested in an era that has just slipped by us well worth watching.

To be honest it would have been pretty awful if it hadn't been for Ian Hendry and Ronald Frasier as the detective and sergeant. A formula we got used to during the 1990s, but it wasn't new. No Hiding Place had the same sort of format.

A young Jane Asher was completely OTT as the daughter and Jeremy Brett showed glimpses of better things to come.

The crime was all a bit implausible and I didn't really know who was doing what and why at the end.

What was the business with the oars? We were never shown the reason why they were important.

It is based on the 1961 novel The Nose on my Face by actor Laurence Payne.

'Britmovie' called the film a "cleverly plotted thriller directed by ex-Ealing editor/producer Michael Truman... Hendry's committed performance and Fraser's underplayed support dominate the film as the two policemen on the case.

Also given the pedestrian title THE MODEL MURDER CASE, this British Neo Noir has a perfectly cast Ian Hendry with Ronald Fraser as cop partners (Inspector and Sergeant) with such terrific chemistry it's a shame there weren't more films, or perhaps a television series where GIRL IN THE HEADLINES would be a merely passable episode albeit filled with fantastic looking sets showcasing pallid wealth... in a mystery thriller that needed not only more thrills but far more action...

A shame too that the titular model, shown all through the opening credits and even the first several minutes (seated dead in someone else's living room), isn't credited anywhere...

Her character is quite something, making this a kind of LAURA where the corpse has a life all its own, albeit not through any flashbacks...

The suspects/her friends though are very similar: a group of big money lowlifes including a flamboyant TV star (James Villiers); a shady nightclub owner (Kieron Moore); a handsome sailor who could be trafficking drugs (Jeremy Brett); the girl's sullen mother (Margaret Johnston); and an even more sullen married couple...

Meanwhile Ian Hendry, who'd wind down his career playing cold-blooded villains, looks square-jawed classy here, befitting the stalwart lead whether in plush interior investigations with his quirky, even snoopier partner, or at home with pretty teenage daughter Jane Asher, whose mom (his wife) is more of a cool older sister...

Again, these primary leads all seem part of something else... bigger, more expanded... and it's too bad they're stuck in one single just-good-enough time-filling thriller...

Everyone... even the dead girl... deserved better: Like in HER case, an actual name!

A slow and fairly ordinary murder mystery story saved only by the appearance and great acting of Jeremy Brett who later in his career most excellently portrayed, Sherlock Holmes.

Unfortunately, missed the first half hour due to misguided decision to see first half of Watford v Brentford. (It won't happen again !) Wonderful and riveting film from the golden age of British noir - this must have been one of the first films Hendry did post Avengers. Portrayal of style and seediness very reminiscent of Raymond Chandler. Beautifully understated acting from Hendry - I wonder if Steve McQueen or Peter Yates saw this ? Would give extra star but for slightly annoying Jane Asher as needy middle class daughter !