A Cry from the Streets

Given the subject matter, you would think this film would be unbearably frank and gritty or sickeningly sentimental. It us neither. It manages to strike a balance. It does show the 0light of children who don't have stable families, but given it being a 1950s film, it doesn't deal with some disturbing truths. It has a touch of comic relief, as needed,

This film has a top notch cast at their very best.

A fresh-faced young Max Bygraves is charming and appealing in the first of two socially concerned dramas he made (the second being 'Spare the Rod') which touches upon such vexatious contemporary issues as juvenile delinquency, capital punishment and domestic violence. Larry Adler supplies an appropriately wistful harmonica score, and Aussie tyke Colin Petersen surprise, surprise shows a precocious talent for - you guessed it - the harmonica; on which he accompanies Max when he bursts into song in one scene.

Fortunately we don't have hanging anymore, but firearms sadly are hardly the aberration today they're portrayed as here; while it's also a sign of the times that drunken mother Eleanor Summerfield occupies a shabby but extremely spacious London flat that would today be prohibitively expensive for her to live in.

This got a BAFTA nod for Best British Screenplay and you can easily see why. It is a gentle, almost nostalgic, reminder of how different society was in the UK 60 years ago. Barbara Murray ("Ann") is a social worker struggling to look after a collection of kids from a variety of disadvantaged backgrounds. She meets and falls for the kind, gentle, real-life crooner Max Bygraves ("Bill") who has some fairly traumatic baggage of his own, and they both set about trying to bring a little happiness to themselves and to their young charges. This doesn't pull it's punches - not that it is gory, or visually violent - but it does tackle the topics of suicide, child neglect and parental (& official) indifference in quite a forthright (for 1958) fashion. It did remind me a little of my own childhood in Glasgow in the 1970s - kids were packed off "out to play" on spare ground - frequently that bombed out during WWII - on their own for days at a time; surrounded by an environment of cigarettes and alcohol - and although impossible to reconcile with attitudes today; people just didn't know any better and very, very few of us were ever at risk of anything more dangerous than a skint knee. The kids' performances are good as is Mona Washbourne as "Mrs. Daniels".

Barbara Murray is a social worker who tries to find good homes for her children. She's frustrated by some of the foster parents, who are uncaring. Her new friend, Max Bygraves, thinks she should be paying more attention to him, but gradually comes to care about the children too.

It's a sympathetic view of lack of support for children, not only by the system, but also in its portraits of the actual parents. I found it to be a good movie, even though the high-pitched piping of the children annoyed me by the end. Bygraves sings one song, "Gotta Have Rain", with accompaniment by Larry Adler. It charted in the UK, and was a hit for Eydie Gormé in the United States.

there are some new satellite channels in the UK,bad movies and matinée movies, which are showing a lot of old British films from the 40s and 50s.The sort that used to be shown on terrestial channels at 2 am.These are at times rather intriguing,because occasionally i will view a film that i saw in the cinema and think "Did i really pay money to watch this".I suppose that everyone,not least Max Bygraves has probably forgotten that he appeared in a number of films in the 50s.There is little that can be said in favour of this film except how times have changed.When Barbara Murray goes to see a foster mother one of the fostered children is actually encouraged to strike a match to light her cigarette!A child is encouraged to leave a home to go and live with his alcoholic mother.4 young children are let off a bus on their own to go wandering in a wood.If you are interested in the period then it is worth a look,otherwise give it a miss.