Tuesday 17 March 2020

Unforgiven (1948, released 1949 George King)

Blackpool. Chemist Douglass Montgomery (The Way to the Stars) is unhappily married to Patricia Burke, falls for spunky fairground worker Hazel Court (who we admire for joining in a scrap early on with some vivacity). The wife won't give him a divorce, is running around with Garry Marsh (who we just saw in I See a Dark Stranger); a young Kenneth Griffith has his own score to settle (it was by no means his debut).

Also familiar: Ronald Shiner (cheeky chappie assistant; the 1938 They Drive By Night), Eliot Makeham (Court's father; Doctor in the House, The Yellow Balloon, Trio, the organist in A Canterbury Tale, Storm in a Teacup, Rome Express), Frederick Leister (doctor of chemistry; Quartet, On the Night of the Fire), Andrew Cuickshank (inspector; the 1959 39 Steps), Michael Medwin (cabbie; The Duchess, Twenty Thousand Streets Under the Sky, O Lucky Man!, The Sandwich Man, The Longest Day, Doctor at Large, Trio), Peggy Ann Clifford (fair worker; Brothers in Law, Kinds Hearts and Coronets) and Peter Jones. Phew!

Don't really know King, writers Katherine Strueby and Val Valentine, photographer Hone Glendinning nor composer George Melachrino.

It's not bad, has a slightly lacklustre ending atop the Tower; we were surprised by the (reasonably) happy ending. It's quite bold in a way American films weren't then allowed to be, i.e. it's quite clear he's sleeping with her. And the scene with Montgomery in close up and the fairground wheels going on in dissolve is quite an effective turmoil image - though unlikely to be anything new.

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