Alec Guinness and Ealing Studios

Posted by Bill Wren

I’ve just made some minor updates to a few reviews I wrote back in 2002. They’re all Alec Guinness movies (five of them), all done at Ealing Studios, and all come from an earlier part of the actor’s career. By the way, they’re all great.

The Alec Guinness Collection

Ealing Studios: 1949 – 1955

The Alec Guinness Collection - Anchor Bay (2002)
The Alec Guinness Collection - Anchor Bay (2002)

For some, Alec Guinness is the guy from Star Wars (Obi-Wan-Kenobi). For others, such as myself, he’s Colonel Nicholson from The Bridge on the River Kwai. But prior to these, and the many other dramatic roles he played brilliantly, Guinness was known as the comic genius of a series of British films made primarily in the 1950s at Ealing Studios. (They have their web site here.)

The Alec Guinness Collection from Anchor Bay brings together 5 of these films, all of them comic gems. (Update: This collection was brought out by Lion’s Gate in 2009 in the U.S. and Canada.)

What is interesting about these films is that Guinness’ performance isn’t that far removed from the kinds of performances he gave in dramatic roles. In other words, he knows that what makes these roles funny lies in playing them straight. It is the situation that makes the roles funny and the supporting casts, which are usually made up of character actors (often playing caricatures rather than characters).

The conceit informing most of the films is the secret life of a quiet, middle-class British man. Generally, the characters Guinness is playing are extremely British and a bit bookish perhaps. They are the sort of man no one would notice, for the most part, or, if noticed, be seen as very proper and respectable.

The Alec Guinness Collection - Lions' Gate (2009)
The Alec Guinness Collection - Lions' Gate (2009)

But each of these characters has a secret life they are living. Sometimes it’s criminal, like the caper in The Lavender Hill Mob; in the case of The Captain’s Paradise, it’s an adulterous relationship. Also in common is the secret life these small, quiet men dream of.

That is at the core of the films — the fantasies of the domesticated, perhaps even socially emasculated, male. The humour comes out of the collision between the reality and the fantasy. It develops out of the character’s attempts to hold on to his fantasy.

In most of the films, the Guinness character ends up facing a comeuppance, the triumph of reality over fantasy. However, this doesn’t always mean the character loses. In fact, even when he does lose there is something in the way the ending is handled that makes us feel he has somehow won.

Brevity and excellent pacing also characterize the films. This, combined with Guinness’ flawless performances, makes the movies work.

The Alec Guinness Collection:

  • Kind Hearts & Coronets
  • Lavender Hill Mob
  • The Man in the White Suit
  • The Captain’s Paradise
  • The Ladykillers

Links:

20 movies: The Big Heat (1953)

Posted by Bill Wren

Depending on your age, you may remember seeing Glenn Ford in movies and on television. I’m thinking roughly of the 1970’s, perhaps late 60’s. He usually had an avuncular quality. He was a nice, friendly older man. He often played fatherly types. For example, in 1978’s Superman: The Movie he played kindly Pa Kent.

So for us, seeing his work from the 1950s comes as a bit of a shock. The actor we see in movies like The Big Heat is anything but Pa Kent.

It’s hard to know where to begin with The Big Heat. It is about as dark as movies get, and that sort of makes sense since it’s directed by Fritz Lang, a man Roger Ebert refers to as, “… one of the cinema’s great architects of evil.”

How does Pa Kent wind up in a Fritz Lang movie? If you see the domestic scenes in the movie, and the contrast between them and the rest of the film, you’ll see why. Lang explores evil, both its extremes and its subtleties. Ford plays his part perfectly, enunciating both sides convincingly and leaving us wondering just what kind of man this really is.

I’m not sure the review below is quite how I think about the movie today. I want to watch it again and possibly revise it. I’m wondering now if Glenn Ford’s Det. Sgt. Dave Bannion might not be the original Dirty Harry.

The Big Heat
directed by Fritz Lang

Now this is what a noir film should be. Good guys, bad guys, and a lot of dubious ground between them. (Mind you, it’s not a noir film in the strictest sense.)

Perspective is everything, I suppose, and perhaps that is why (for me) noir works best in black and white. It’s how I came to know them when I was younger. This doesn’t mean more recent, colour noir movies don’t work (just look at Chinatown and L.A. Confidential), but black and white just seems more appropriate.

Maybe it’s the sense of shadow and gray that comes across. It reflects the heart of these stories, an uncertain, dangerous world where it’s hard to tell who is on your side, or even what side you’re on.

As in Gilda, the casting of Glenn Ford is perfect. He plays these parts well. He’s the hero, but not so heroic as to be unbelievable. In fact, the type of hero he plays here is the same type Clint Eastwood got so much mileage out of for so long. He’s the ambiguous good guy.

Then there’s Gloria Grahame who gives a wonderful performance as Debby, the gangster’s girl.

But where The Big Heat really excells is in casting Lee Marvin, an actor who gives Robert Mitchum a run for his money as one of the meanest s.o.b.’s to appear on screen.

Marvin’s explosive and sadistic temper come across as so natural you would be afraid to meet him anywhere but on the screen.

In many ways, The Big Heat is a template for certain types of films (though it certainly wasn’t the first to use this pattern). This is a revenge story. But watching it from this point, over 50 years after it was made, it’s easy to forget that some of the set-ups and patterns were not established in the way they are now so, while in some ways they appear to have a certain stale, over-used quality, the truth is they were fresh and even alarming in 1953.

For example, there is the set-up scene where the domestic life of the Ford character is shattered. The scene becomes the catalyst for the character’s later actions. This pattern has been used over and over again since (again, particularly by Eastwood).

Regardless whether it’s perceived as new or cliche, it works. From start to finish The Big Heat holds you and carries you through its dark unwinding. To be perfectly true to the noir genre, Ford’s character is not as corrupt as he should be (though his revenge could be considered a form of corruption, I suppose). But this is quibbling. It certainly has the noir feel and that is far more important. Noir is really about atmosphere; it’s about tone.

This one is highly recommended.