whisperingtree

Crawford has enjoyed a rather more varied career than is sometime realised by British viewers used to his ultra-popular role in the sit-com 'Some Mothers Do 'Ave 'Em'. This early outing about a daft as a brush youth's search for sex has similarites with the above but a drier and slightly black line creates an amusing little film that looks at British teen-life just before the Beatles. Some good names crop up here and there but it is Crawford who holds our attention.

The rise of the 'angry young man' in British cinema took an interesting twist in this gritty drama. Set initially in Nottingham, Smith and his mate played by a very young James Bolam are nicked for petty theft. Sent to a borstal his athletic prowess is seized on by the Head to be mobilised in the name of the institution. Michael Redgrave's superb creation combines the stiff Britishness with a surpressed and unfulfillable desire to reform and change. This opposition creates a man at odds with his position. On the one hands he trusts and on the other he is petty and weak. Courtney's runner defines the struggle of the period between the decaying class system and the consumer led rise of the working class. His desire to run his own race, to lose because he won't win to justify Redgrave's ideology portrays that essentially English state of mind that it is better to fail than to succeed as long as you have chosen to fail. A wonderful film.

Filmed in Durham, 'Life for Ruth' is a surprisingly effective story about a man who puts his daughters life in the hands of God and ignores the advice of surgeons. Ruth dies and a court case ensues in which the tension of the situation is brought to a head. Well acted by Michael Craig and especially Patrick MacGoohan as a journalist who comes to see both sides of the argument. This is one of those typically British films with dignity that makes use of unusual locations.