La colpa del marinaio

The name of the English director Charles Crichton is almost automatically associated by many with 'A Fish Called Wanda', the sparkling comedy from 1988. However, that was practically the last fiction film made by the director who was then 78 years old and was at the end of a career in who had directed more than 50 films in various genres from comedies to thrillers and had also put his name on some memorable creations of British television, including episodes of the cult series 'The Avengers' in the 60s. 36 years before this latest success, Crichton had directed a gem of a black-and-white film called 'Hunted' starring Dirk Bogarde, one of his favorite actors, alongside a six-and-a-half-year-old blond boy who filled the screen, like any child actor of great talent. In one hour and 20 minutes, Crichton has created a believable and humane story and captured, better than any documentary of the era, the image of an England struggling to recover from the destruction and human trauma of war.

Alfred Hitchcock emerged in the English film school, but had crossed the ocean over a decade before 1952. I think that he appreciated and would have signed the first few minutes of 'Hunted' without hesitation. It's an exceptional introduction. A boy of about six runs through the streets of London with a teddy bear in his hand. He carelessly crosses the street and is almost run over by a carriage pulled by two stallions. He continues to run and takes refuge in a building in ruins. There he comes across a man smoking a cigarette next to a corpse. We understand that he had just killed another man. The child freezes and drops the toy from his hands. The man takes his hand and the two leave together - the killer and the only witness to the crime.

Chris, the murderous man, had as motive for his crime the infidelity of his wife, who had taken advantage of the long absences due to his profession as a sailor to cheat on him. Robbie, the little boy, had good reasons to run away from home where he was being abused by his adoptive parents. The dependence between the two turns into a relationship of friendship and mutual support. They are fugitives and cross England from south to north, reaching the sea that may open the gate of salvation for them. All is shot with documentary simplicity and authenticity by Eric Cross, one of the best-known and most prolific cinematographers of English pre- and post-WWII films. Italian neorealism is not far away. Jon Whiteley is amazing as the little boy. Child actors usually charm and conquer through naturalness and sincerity, in his case an extraordinary expressiveness is added. Chris and Robbie's relationship never descends into melodrama. 'Hunted' is a simple and moving film, a beautiful combination of film noir and road movie, a gem in black and white.

Britain just after the second world war must have been a grim place indeed. Still looking like a bomb site, with poor living standards, inadequate social services, stifling conformity and tough policing. Amid this bleak social landscape, Bogarde is a hopeless, alienated character fleeing from the police after a crime of momentary passion. He is joined by a scared and emotionally scarred small boy also on the run from a harsh reality. Their journey together is gruelling yet at the same time strangely aimless, as they focus on escaping the past with little idea of their future.

Like all good road movies, the journey changes the characters, as they are affected, enriched and ultimately redeemed by their own striving and by their personal interaction. Any more detail would spoil this story but you can be guaranteed of a fine reward at the end if you can stick with the grinding progress of this particular odyssey.

Filmed in suitably bleak black and white, there's a slightly too earnest quality about the way this movie strives to put everything in the worst possible perspective – but that's when looked at from the comfortable perspective of half a century later when life is a lot softer for many of us. Go the distance with this one and you'll be a better person for it.

....and "Gloria" (1980) and "Leon" as well...Charles Crichton,whose career spans the second half of the century ("a fish named Wanda"!),is definitely a director to upgrade.

"Hunted" is a small gem ,a suspenseful sensitive story which casts Bogarde as an unlucky murderer on the lam and young John Whiteley as a moving kid.A road movie,from the bleak city to the wild moors of Scotland ,where a special chemistry between the man and the boy literally grows on the audience .

Spoilers.Spoilers. Like all the great storytellers ,Crichton introduces first Bogarde as the "villain " who abducts a cute brat.But further acquaintance shows this:actually both of them are victims of a society that increases the prestige of money ,of Bogarde's boss who sleeps with his wife ,a society that does not care a little bit about its orphans whom it leaves to hateful "parents" .The boy really acts as if he's got nothing to lose.

Admirable sequence :In a bedroom they share for one night,Bogarde begins a bedtime story for his protégé:it's a fairy tale ,a story of a giant.But little by little ,the story becomes HIS own story :what a smart way of letting us know about the hero's past!During this sequence ,which takes place halfway through the film,we see the boy SMILE for the first time.His face is so beaming we are on the verge of tears .He will laugh later ,in his pal's mean brother's house ,during the meal.When Bogarde sails away with his "hostage" ,he makes the story he told come true . End of spoilers .end of spoilers

Bogarde's rendering is a real tour de force and many consider this part

his first important one:tense,distraught,anguished,he runs the whole gamut of emotions.Matching him every step of the way is Whiteley's performance :in the three examples I mention at the beginning of my comment ,which I admire (with the exception of Besson's) ,the young actors cannot hold a candle to him.Instant karma:he won a special AA the following year,and was given the main part in Lang's "Moonfleet" in 1954.He was to meet again Bogarde in "Spanish gardener".

Crichton had often been labeled "for the whole family".But they totally missed the point:"hunted" is not a rosy work,its open ending does not settle the things ,but increases our fear of what will become of our two so endearing heroes.His directing is now nervous -the first sequences when the heroes do not stop running -,now intimate -all the scenes where the two characters hang on to each other,now poetic -the seagulls which accompany the triumphant voyage .A wonderful use of nature (not unlike Charles Laughton's "the night of the hunter") and its wildlife where the runaways take refuge.

Wonderful movie.

A hardened criminal gets back in touch with his humanity after caring for a vulnerable boy while both are on the run.

If you didn't love Dirk Bogarde before seeing this film, you will after.

Hunted (AKA: The Stranger In Between) is directed by Charles Crichton and co-written by Jack Whittingham and Michael McCarthy. It stars Dirk Bogarde, Jon Whiteley, Elizabeth Sellars and Kay Walsh. Music is by Hubert Clifford and cinematography by Eric Cross.

Story finds Bogarde and Whiteley as man and boy on the run for differing reasons. Bogarde's Chris Lloyd is a fugitive, Whiteley's Robbie a orphan being mistreated in his adoptive home. The odd couple, fleeing authority, but heading where?

Haunting yet beautiful, firm but tender, Hunted is a terrific piece of Brit film noir that holds you in its grip from beginning to end. Film unfolds as being about two lost souls traversing the British lands, from a ravaged London in the beginning to a Scottish harbour at the end. Initially suspicious of each other, with the adult inconvenienced by his child companion, the relationship will develop as their respective demons surface. Who is the more frightened of the two? What hope is there for them? Fate has brought them together, but fate can often deal a deadly hand, what hand has been dealt Chris and Robbie? It's this question that hangs heavy in the tense story, ensuring our attention at all times.

As the journey takes them out of the city, into the country and finally out to the sea shore, we are treated to no end of visual smarts. Imagery is a big part of Hunted's worth to the film noir enthusiast, be it monuments or various building structures, Crichton (Dead of Night) and Cross (The Mystery of the Marie Celeste) ensure that the simmering narrative is well served by locations and items that surround our two protagonists. Shadowed balustrade, spiral staircase, murky street lights, dingy basement, low lighted farm houses, barns, haystacks, railway sidings, medieval relic structure, and on it goes, all given a forbidding sheen by the makers, backed significantly, too, by Clifford's music swells and low rumble peters.

Some means and motivations are purposely left grey, which means we get more dramatic/emotional impact for certain passages of dialogue, such as a bedtime story sequence that grips the heart considerably. The acting is first rate from Bogarde (Victim) and Whiteley (Moonfleet), very believable is their relationship (they would also make The Spanish Gardner together in 56), with Bogarde never better as he shifts seamlessly from a man of fiery rage and panic, to a tender soul reaching out in the shadows, desperately searching for redemption.

Now available on DVD with a very good print, Hunted is yearning to be seen by more people. It deserves it, a real treat, both thematically and visually, one of the best new discoveries for me in 2012. 9/10