Safira, a Mulher Sem Alma

Excellent film, directed by Basil Dearden, who directed Dead of Night and Victim, two marvelous movies.

Sapphire takes place in the '50s - the film was released in 1959 - in England. A young woman is found dead in a park. It turns out her name is Sapphire Robbins, and she was engaged to a young man, David Harris (Paul Massie). The autopsy shows that she was three months' pregnant, and David admits that he was the father.

When Sapphire's brother (Earl Cameron) shows up, the superintendent in charge of the case (Nigel Patrick) is surprised that he's black. Sapphire was passing. The detective wonders if the Harris family knew - - and when they knew it.

David had won a scholarship and was to go off to school - could he be saddled with a wife and child? His father (Bernard Miles) is very protective of him, and his sister (Yvonne Mitchell) is somewhat abrasive.

This is the story of underlying prejudice and assumptions about black people that were pervasive at the time, particularly when this film was made. Notting Hill race riots took place in 1958. These prejudices are expressed by the inspector on the case (Michael Craig), especially the myths of black sexuality.

Dearden liked to tackle these tough subjects, which he does very well, showing it as an underlying constant. Landladies have "white" houses, black friends dropped by Sapphire when she found out she could pass seem to understand her dropping them.

The scene at the Tulips Club is the best in the film, with pulsating bongos and wild dancing. The camera veers all over the room, showing twirling skirts, legs, black people dancing with women who appear to be white. There a man tells the superintendent no matter how white a woman is, you can tell she is actually black because she can't resist the sound of the bongos.

Very strong acting throughout, particularly by stage actress Yvonne Mitchell. One thing that shows that Dearden knew what he was doing -- people's reaction to death. When the woman in the park discovers the body, she doesn't scream. And when David learns of the death of Sapphire, he seems shell-shocked and numb. Sapphire's brother seems very calm, finally breaking down and asking, "How could anyone do this?" All very realistic, all not over the top.

A must see - it is available on Netflix and on Amazon instant video.

I was amazed by the shocking brutality of the racism in this film. In America, we are rarely presented with such casual racism; in films of the 50s, race is practically never dealt with in films, as Todd Haynes "remake" of Douglas Sirk's All That Heaven Allows tries to make up for. And current films about the 50s present such two dimensional characters that it is easy to tell the racist villains from the open-minded heroes. In Sapphire, filmed in Britain in the 1950s, one of the most interesting characters is Michael Craig's detective, supposedly our hero, but constantly making racist remarks. His comments are always countered by the more reasonable older inspector, but this allows his gradual transformation throughout the film. Although some of the film is a bit heavy-handed, ultimately the message is sadly still relevant. 4 out of 5.

So who killed Sapphire. That's the movie's plot; however, the underlying theme is racial prejudice, a generally touchy topic at the time, even for British films. As I recall, the movie got more coverage than usual for a foreign release, at least in the LA area. The lovely Sapphire may look White, but genetically she's half-Black. Her troubles start when she "passes for White" in a London society still riven by prejudice. Engaged to the son of a reputable White family, her racial make-up causes rifts within the circle once her heritage is known. Naturally, the suspects start off with the family of her intended.

The twin threads of race and murder are skillfully woven into a difficult screenplay that nevertheless compels attention from start to finish. Credit a highly efficient performance from Nigel Patrick for holding together the disparate elements as his chief investigator works his way through London's many precincts. I like the way the screenplay portrays levels of racial dislike from both Whites and Blacks without getting too judgmental. Also, it looks like the exteriors were shot on location without any prettifying. Some of the neighborhoods in fact amount to about the last word in urban decay. Happily, director Deardon keeps things moving in unobtrusive fashion right down to the rather surprising finish. Anyway, the 90-some minutes amount to a topically compelling package that deserved its initial hoopla and still does.

SAPPHIRE (UK 1959) takes a honest and brutally realistic approach to racism: it exists in everyone, white, black or of mixed race. Sadly, that continues to be the case today even if now intermarriage is more acceptable and no longer prevents people renting accommodation, joining creches or schools, and it is less visibly frowned upon.

Director Basil Dearden had already distinguished himself with social comment films as THE BLUE LAMP (UK 1950), in which Dirk Bogarde plays an unrepentant criminal hunted by police in postwar London, THE SQUARE RING (UK 1953), which does not pull any punches analyzing the brutality of boxing and of the people in it, and VIOLENT PLAYGROUND (UK 1958), an ongoing duel between police and an arsonist.

Pity that six decades later racism remains a problem everywhere, and the movie industry, and life in general, continues to try to address that problem with the mendacity of political correctness.

SAPPHIRE does well to show how limited we, the human race, are in dealing with that issue. Even policemen like Learoyd (Michael Craig) are racist at heart, so there is an institutional side to the problem, too.

Direction is very good, although it allows characterization to go over the top in some cases; color photography is outstanding; screenplay is concise and objective; and acting reflects the high competence for which British filmmaking of the 1940s-1960s period was famous for, although I thought Yvonne Mitchell a little bit too unnecessarily hysterical in the key scene in which Sapphire's dark-skinned brother handles a child's doll.

Nigel Patrick's acting is particularly praiseworthy. Detective Hazard (odd surname, nothing hazardous about his character or actions) is an extremely professional, restrained, and experienced policeman standing as the emotional stabilizer in a film of many social and racial angles. He is seldom critical, he just wants justice done regardless of who must pay.

In light of mankind's above mentioned limitations, I suppose that, however incomplete, the pursuit of justice is the best, most practical solution to the continuing problem of racism in today's society, and it is to this film's credit that it highlights it at a time when the UK was beginning to receive a large number of people of other races from its former colonies.

In some ways, SAPPHIRE is well ahead of its time, and it remains very much up to date today.

At first glance, SAPPHIRE seems to be your usual police procedural murder mystery thriller, with the superintendent and his supporting inspector (both played with bullish charm by Nigel Patrick and Michael Craig) investigating the discovery of a murdered girl in the local park. Indeed, their investigations initially take them down the usual alleyways as they explore the girl's social group, her relationship with a local lad, and some less-than-salubrious locations she was involved with.

However, where SAPPHIRE becomes something much, much more is in its context: race relations in Britain, circa 1959. It turns out that Sapphire herself was actually of mixed race, despite looking white. The discovery of her racial origins underpins the whole story and it's up to Patrick and Craig to unpin the build up to her brutal death. This is a shocking film, exploring the ugly face of racism in its matter-of-fact hatred of blacks and their creed. There's something grippingly realistic about it which makes it all the better film.

The supporting cast is very well picked. Nobody does shifty better than Paul Massie, the primary murder suspect. Earl Cameron is the model of race and refinement as the dead girl's brother. Yvonne Mitchell is superbly twitchy and Bernard Miles convincingly bigoted. Robert Adams supplies the one moment of true humour with his great cameo as Horace Big Cigar. As a film, SAPPHIRE is never less than thoroughly impressive, working well as a piece of social history as well as a fine detective story.