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(INDISTINCT CHATTER)

2
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(DOG BARKS)

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Made in 1947
and directed by John Boulting,

4
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Brighton Rock remains
one of the true exemplars

5
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of a very British flavour
of film noir.

6
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It is a gripping tale of gangsters,
murder, and cover-up.

7
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A truly bleak report
on the human condition

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and hardly an advert for the sunny
charms of this seaside town.

9
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(DRAMATIC ORCHESTRAL MUSIC)

10
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(SEABIRDS CRY)

11
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Well, it was certainly one of
the most violent British films

12
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I've ever seen.

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One of the darkest British films

14
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I think I've ever seen.

15
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I think it was an example

16
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that Britain actually can do
film noir

17
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as well as the Americans.

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Not as often, but occasionally.

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And this one caused
an awful lot of trouble.

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The Daily Mirror said
that nobody should go and see it,

21
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and the New South Wales
in Australia

22
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banned it entirely.

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(PENSIVE ORCHESTRAL MUSIC)

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It was a film about
a truly unprecedented performance.

25
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The rapacious, cold-eyed hood,
Pinkie Brown,

26
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and the lengths to which
he's willing to go,

27
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offered a truly compelling
and modern study

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of the nature of evil.

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DALLOW: Pinkie,
stick your minces on that.

30
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(SUSPENSEFUL ORCHESTRAL MUSIC)

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REPORTER: 'Every weekend, those
people who can afford the money

32
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'and spare the time, escape from
the great built-up area of London.

33
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'By train and coach,
by car and bicycle,

34
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'they make their way
to the green of the countryside

35
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'and the tang of the sea.

36
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'The worries of the week's work
fade into the freedom of the air,

37
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'if only for a couple of days.'

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(SEABIRDS CRY)

39
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It's a good place for a murder,
Brighton's Palace Pier in 1935.

40
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Amongst the jostling crowds

41
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who have flocked in from London
to take in the sea air,

42
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people are enjoying all the simple
pleasures the resort has to offer.

43
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The shows, the amusement arcades,
the gaudy attractions.

44
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The irony is wicked.

45
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Reporter Fred Hale knows
he's in trouble.

46
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His newspaper article has exposed
a local gang,

47
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and now they are coming for him.

48
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(WOMAN IN BAR LAUGHS)

49
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(INDISTINCT CHATTER)

50
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DALLOW:
Hello, Fred.

51
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I said hello, Fred.

52
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We've been looking for you
for a long time, Fred.

53
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I'm not Fred.
That don't make any difference.

54
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One of Britain's
most celebrated novelists,

55
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Graham Greene's best known story
was published in 1938,

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though set three years before.

57
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Brighton Rock mixed the thrills

58
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of what he would classify
as an entertainment

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with a familiar examination
of sin and morality,

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themes fuelled by the Catholic faith
he had adopted in 1926.

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Few novels capture the anxiety
of British life like this.

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On one level,
it is a crime thriller.

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Below that, it is
an exploration of morality.

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It is also, in a funny sort of way,
a very perverse love story.

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All of these things are
brought together

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in an extraordinary way by Greene

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and he wraps them up in something
that is also a social document.

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You get a feeling of the time,
it's absolutely amazing,

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of 1935, between the wars,

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of what Brighton in particular,

71
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but also Britain was like.

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Graham Greene is not only
one of Britain's finest novelists,

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he's also one of its most successful
contributors to cinema.

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There've been over 42 screenplays
written based on his novels.

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He was a number of things
all at once.

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He was a journalist, he was
a reviewer, he was a novelist,

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he was a screenwriter,
and he was also a spy.

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All of these different facets
all combined

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to make him one of
the finest storytellers

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that you will find
in the English language.

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He has an ability to understand

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different worlds,
different characters

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but also, the pace of his plotting
is absolutely phenomenal.

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In the summer of 1936,
he was working for

85
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a very fashionable but short-lived
magazine called Night And Day,

86
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where he was the literary editor.

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At the same time,
he was writing novels.

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He had produced a thriller entitled
A Gun For Sale, about a hitman,

89
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and he had his eye on the news.

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And a particular story was
filling the British newspapers

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in the summer of 1936.

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And this was
an extraordinary gang outrage

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at the racetrack in Lewes,
in Sussex, not far from Brighton,

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and 30 men descended on two bookies.

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So when Graham Greene wrote his book
Brighton Rock,

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he modelled the gangster
on Darby Sabini and his gang

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who came down
from Clerkenwell in London,

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primarily for the racetrack

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because they were involved in
protection of bookmakers,

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particularly at racetracks.

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The whole great problem
with bookmakers at racetracks,

102
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was involved in legislation

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and which prohibited betting
away from racecourses.

104
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So what happened at the racecourses,
close to the action, was crucial,

105
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and they could make £4,000 or so

106
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from a race meeting at Brighton.

107
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£4,000... well over £200,000
in today's money.

108
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A lot of money involved.

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And the gangs would come down
from London

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and they would "protect",
if you like,

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the bookmakers on their pitches.

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(URGENT ORCHESTRAL MUSIC)

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Reporter Fred Hale, played with
clammy desperation by Alan Wheatley.

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He is tracked from the train station
to the seafront,

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swerving between the banks
of day trippers,

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leaping on buses,
trying to stay alive.

117
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So there you are, Fred.WOMAN: You
said you hadn't got a friend.

118
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That's the trouble,
you can't believe Fred.

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(SHE LAUGHS NERVOUSLY)

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This is my friend Molly.
Hello.

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Pleased to meet you. Come on, Fred,
what about that appointment?

122
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No, I'm not coming.

123
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I don't know him.
My name's not Fred.

124
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Now, take it easy, Fred.

125
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We're all going for a walk, see?

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What I think
the Boultings capture so vividly,

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certainly in the first half
of Brighton Rock,

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is the kind of chaotic nature
of the seaside resort.

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That these people have come
from London...Mm.

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..and they've come to spend money,
they've come to have a good time,

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and they're lax.

132
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They've kind of had too much
to drink and eat

133
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and they're open
to all the local criminality

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00:09:07,280 --> 00:09:09,480
who might want to prey on them.
Oh, yes.

135
00:09:09,520 --> 00:09:12,480
And I think,
especially the opening sequence,

136
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there's something
of the fairground about it.

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You hear the shrill nature
of the rides.

138
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Yeah, yeah.
Everything feels just a bit too much.

139
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What you don't get a sense of is

140
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the actual residents
of Brighton, do you?No.

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You don't really know what
they think about all this,

142
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but you do understand

143
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that the place is not quite
as it should be.Yeah.

144
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'Brighton Rock was hardly
an advert for this seaside resort'.

145
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The council only granted
the production leeway

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to shoot on location
on the promise of a disclaimer

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that declared the crime wave was
a thing of the past.

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00:10:26,280 --> 00:10:29,560
MAN: The sensation of the century!
Come along! Come along!

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00:10:29,600 --> 00:10:32,240
I think I wanna pop back, deary.
But you said you wouldn't leave me!

150
00:10:32,280 --> 00:10:35,560
Only for a minute. I left my hanky
on the seat. That's all, dear.

151
00:10:35,600 --> 00:10:38,840
You can have mine.But that
hasn't got sentimental associations.

152
00:10:38,880 --> 00:10:41,560
Now look here, dear. You get
two tickets and I'll be back.

153
00:10:41,600 --> 00:10:44,160
Make 'em return! (SHE LAUGHS)

154
00:10:53,280 --> 00:10:56,040
The opening sequence
of Brighton Rock is, if anything,

155
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even more riveting
than the opening chapter

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of Graham Greene's original novel.

157
00:11:01,120 --> 00:11:04,600
Then, the screenwriter in question
was Graham Greene.

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00:11:04,640 --> 00:11:07,880
Director John Boulting's editing
is like a racing heartbeat.

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00:11:07,920 --> 00:11:10,240
Events could almost be in real time,

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00:11:10,280 --> 00:11:14,280
as we follow Hale's attempts
to escape his inevitable fate,

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00:11:14,320 --> 00:11:18,800
the gang finally cornering
their terrified quarry on the pier,

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00:11:18,840 --> 00:11:22,600
despite thousands
of oblivious witnesses.

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00:11:22,640 --> 00:11:26,080
MAN: Right, come along! Roll up!
Walk this way! Come along, please.

164
00:11:26,120 --> 00:11:28,480
Come along, please!
Only six seconds of horror!

165
00:11:28,520 --> 00:11:31,280
Come on! Have a basinful
of Dante's Inferno!

166
00:11:31,320 --> 00:11:33,800
Only a tenner a time!
Children half price!

167
00:11:33,840 --> 00:11:36,880
The sensation of the century!
Come along! Come along!

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00:11:38,960 --> 00:11:41,400
(EVIL LAUGHTER)

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00:11:42,960 --> 00:11:46,600
John and Roy Boulting, better known
as the Boulting brothers,

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00:11:46,640 --> 00:11:49,040
deserve to be placed
alongside the likes of

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00:11:49,080 --> 00:11:51,720
David Lean and Carol Reed.

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00:11:51,760 --> 00:11:54,640
Both had made documentaries
during World War II,

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00:11:54,680 --> 00:11:58,640
Roy for the army film unit,
John for the RAF.

174
00:11:58,680 --> 00:12:00,640
Richard Attenborough had appeared

175
00:12:00,680 --> 00:12:03,720
in John's portrait
of a bomber crew, Journey Together.

176
00:12:03,760 --> 00:12:06,960
The Boulting brothers were
socially minded filmmakers,

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00:12:07,000 --> 00:12:09,560
keen to imbue their films
with a message.

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00:12:09,600 --> 00:12:14,040
John and Roy Boulting were a
producer-director pair of brothers.

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00:12:14,080 --> 00:12:15,960
One would produce,
one would direct.

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00:12:16,000 --> 00:12:18,120
It was never entirely clear
which would do which.

181
00:12:18,160 --> 00:12:22,080
It was a very amorphous pairing.
Basically, they would both do both.

182
00:12:22,120 --> 00:12:25,160
They started out,
before the Second World War,

183
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very politically motivated.
John went to Spain

184
00:12:27,720 --> 00:12:30,640
and fought in the International
Brigades against fascism.

185
00:12:30,680 --> 00:12:33,560
And when they joined the military,

186
00:12:33,600 --> 00:12:36,440
John went into
the RAF filmmaking unit,

187
00:12:36,480 --> 00:12:38,600
and Roy went into
the army filmmaking unit,

188
00:12:38,640 --> 00:12:41,360
and they were making
very anti-Nazi films,

189
00:12:41,400 --> 00:12:43,920
some of which were too extreme,
even for the British military.

190
00:12:43,960 --> 00:12:46,920
So, they explored
a particular kind of social realism.

191
00:12:46,960 --> 00:12:48,920
They wanted to tell real stories,

192
00:12:48,960 --> 00:12:52,080
true stories,
in an almost documentary style.

193
00:12:52,120 --> 00:12:54,000
And certainly the films
that they were making

194
00:12:54,040 --> 00:12:56,360
during the Second World War
were like that.

195
00:12:56,400 --> 00:12:59,240
John Boulting came across
Richard Attenborough, for instance,

196
00:12:59,280 --> 00:13:01,600
when he was making
a film about a bomber,

197
00:13:01,640 --> 00:13:05,040
really following
a bomber's night out over Europe.

198
00:13:05,080 --> 00:13:08,120
And Richard Attenborough was
the star of that,

199
00:13:08,160 --> 00:13:10,560
but it was half documentary,
half drama.

200
00:13:10,600 --> 00:13:13,320
So, during the Second World War,
they forged a particular approach

201
00:13:13,360 --> 00:13:16,760
to filmmaking, which was to show
the real life of real people.

202
00:13:16,800 --> 00:13:18,640
When they came out of
the Second World War,

203
00:13:18,680 --> 00:13:21,200
they set up a film company together,
intending to tell

204
00:13:21,240 --> 00:13:24,880
that kind of story,
to achieve a kind of social realism.

205
00:13:24,920 --> 00:13:28,920
But at the same time,
tell thrilling stories,

206
00:13:28,960 --> 00:13:32,200
stories of political corruption,
stories of crime,

207
00:13:32,240 --> 00:13:35,040
and show the underbelly
of Britain, if you like.

208
00:13:36,160 --> 00:13:39,240
(PEOPLE SCREAM)

209
00:13:41,840 --> 00:13:44,160
(HE YELLS)

210
00:13:44,200 --> 00:13:47,560
(MANIACAL CACKLING)

211
00:13:56,840 --> 00:13:58,960
MAN: Only a tenner a go!
Children half price!

212
00:13:59,000 --> 00:14:01,320
The kiddies love it! Come along!
Come along!(GIRL SOBS)

213
00:14:01,360 --> 00:14:03,360
Roll up! Roll up!

214
00:14:04,320 --> 00:14:07,800
Come along! Come along!
Dante's Inferno! This way!

215
00:14:07,840 --> 00:14:10,400
Roll up, this way!
Walk up, walk up, walk up!

216
00:14:10,440 --> 00:14:12,280
John Boulting, the director,

217
00:14:12,320 --> 00:14:15,680
he brings a really interesting style
to the film,

218
00:14:15,720 --> 00:14:17,560
which you could call British noir.

219
00:14:17,600 --> 00:14:19,480
Cos on the one hand,
it's very realistic.

220
00:14:19,520 --> 00:14:21,400
It's almost documentary-like...
Yes.

221
00:14:21,440 --> 00:14:24,520
..in its coverage of Brighton
and holidaymakers.

222
00:14:24,560 --> 00:14:26,560
At the same time,
it's very stylised.

223
00:14:26,600 --> 00:14:28,520
It's an exceptional film.

224
00:14:28,560 --> 00:14:32,320
And when I first saw it,
I was quite shocked by it...

225
00:14:32,360 --> 00:14:35,000
and I didn't realise how good it
was,

226
00:14:35,040 --> 00:14:37,280
until years later, I saw it again.

227
00:14:37,320 --> 00:14:39,680
I've seen it three times,
I think, now.

228
00:14:39,720 --> 00:14:42,320
Each time it's got better
and better.

229
00:14:42,360 --> 00:14:45,200
I really think
it's an outstanding film.

230
00:14:45,240 --> 00:14:47,640
I think a lot
of critics did at the time.

231
00:14:47,680 --> 00:14:50,040
Yeah.They thought it was
exciting and good,

232
00:14:50,080 --> 00:14:53,680
but there was
a lot of opposition to it.

233
00:14:53,720 --> 00:14:57,880
They thought, "Ooh, we can't be as
violent as the Americans," you know?

234
00:14:57,920 --> 00:15:01,600
Do you think Graham Greene has
something cinematic in his writing?

235
00:15:01,640 --> 00:15:03,520
Oh, I think so.

236
00:15:03,560 --> 00:15:08,880
I mean, I don't think he always
likes what's done with his films.

237
00:15:08,920 --> 00:15:11,120
And he didn't like the ending
of this one,

238
00:15:11,160 --> 00:15:14,120
but he's very cinematic
in his writing.

239
00:15:14,160 --> 00:15:17,720
I think
Terence Rattigan helped a lot too.

240
00:15:17,760 --> 00:15:19,640
'The Boulting brothers first turned

241
00:15:19,680 --> 00:15:22,040
'to fashionable playwright,
Terence Rattigan

242
00:15:22,080 --> 00:15:23,920
'to adapt the bestselling novel'.

243
00:15:23,960 --> 00:15:28,240
They knew they would have to tread
carefully with the British censor,

244
00:15:28,280 --> 00:15:32,040
with what was a dark, violent story,

245
00:15:32,080 --> 00:15:34,240
where the villain was
the protagonist,

246
00:15:34,280 --> 00:15:37,800
and featuring one of the bleakest
endings ever put in print.

247
00:15:37,840 --> 00:15:43,440
But Rattigan's racier tone
and happy ending felt contrived,

248
00:15:43,480 --> 00:15:46,360
so they returned to the source,
Greene himself,

249
00:15:46,400 --> 00:15:48,400
to rewrite the script.

250
00:15:48,440 --> 00:15:52,040
Greene would daringly keep
to the spirit of his own novel.

251
00:15:52,080 --> 00:15:55,840
Sharply dressed gangsters
wielding coshes and razors,

252
00:15:55,880 --> 00:15:59,560
the seething undercurrent
of sin and guilt,

253
00:15:59,600 --> 00:16:02,520
and the cruel manipulation
of a waitress

254
00:16:02,560 --> 00:16:04,800
by the pathological Pinkie.

255
00:16:04,840 --> 00:16:06,920
Greene wrote most of the script,

256
00:16:06,960 --> 00:16:09,680
although it's not
exactly credited to him.

257
00:16:09,720 --> 00:16:11,840
I've reviewed the correspondence,

258
00:16:11,880 --> 00:16:15,200
it's quite clear
that the final version of the script

259
00:16:15,240 --> 00:16:17,520
was largely
Graham Greene's own work.

260
00:16:17,560 --> 00:16:21,560
So, that film is
a collaborative effort.

261
00:16:21,600 --> 00:16:24,920
It's a very strong film,
with the young Richard Attenborough

262
00:16:24,960 --> 00:16:27,120
really excelling as Pinkie.

263
00:16:27,160 --> 00:16:32,960
And, of course, the atmosphere being
very stark, very noir...

264
00:16:33,000 --> 00:16:36,920
and again, a sort of
quiet masterpiece came of it.

265
00:16:36,960 --> 00:16:40,240
Well, the extraordinary thing
about the Boulting brothers is that

266
00:16:40,280 --> 00:16:43,880
one thinks of them
as social realist filmmakers

267
00:16:43,920 --> 00:16:47,720
who made social realist comedies
or satires.

268
00:16:47,760 --> 00:16:51,240
And so, it's rather sobering
to be reminded of the fact

269
00:16:51,280 --> 00:16:55,080
that they made Brighton Rock,
which is certainly not a comedy.

270
00:16:55,120 --> 00:16:58,720
In fact, Brighton Rock might be
considered to be

271
00:16:58,760 --> 00:17:03,720
the first and greatest
of British film noir.

272
00:17:03,760 --> 00:17:05,680
Certainly,
it has never been superseded,

273
00:17:05,720 --> 00:17:10,520
and its influence is
still being felt decades later.

274
00:17:10,560 --> 00:17:14,359
They were experienced, they had
already established themselves

275
00:17:14,400 --> 00:17:18,640
as proper filmmakers
with a social conscience.

276
00:17:18,680 --> 00:17:21,599
They were very, very keen
to make films

277
00:17:21,640 --> 00:17:25,720
that had some
almost documentary meaning to them.

278
00:17:25,760 --> 00:17:28,119
They were interested in society.
They were interested in

279
00:17:28,160 --> 00:17:31,360
actually exposing
the ills of society,

280
00:17:31,400 --> 00:17:35,280
as well as looking at
the different classes.

281
00:17:35,320 --> 00:17:37,920
They had a certain commitment,
a social commitment,

282
00:17:37,960 --> 00:17:39,800
and this was both of them together.

283
00:17:39,840 --> 00:17:42,640
They were
an extraordinary double act.

284
00:17:42,680 --> 00:17:45,840
It's a film
that's very sharp tongued

285
00:17:45,880 --> 00:17:50,520
and difficult to comprehend,
really...Yes, yeah.

286
00:17:50,560 --> 00:17:53,000
..as a crime feature.

287
00:17:53,040 --> 00:17:56,520
And it brought a lot of other films,
you know,

288
00:17:56,560 --> 00:18:00,400
which we now know.
Get Carter and stuff like that,

289
00:18:00,440 --> 00:18:04,440
which definitely were probably
influenced by Brighton Rock.

290
00:18:04,480 --> 00:18:06,600
Yeah, the whole
British gangster genre.

291
00:18:06,640 --> 00:18:09,400
Come on lady, try your skill.
Don't be afraid, don't be bashful.

292
00:18:09,440 --> 00:18:12,280
Got the time on you, Bill?
You can see the clock, can't you?

293
00:18:12,320 --> 00:18:15,160
I don't stand for phony alibis, see?

294
00:18:15,200 --> 00:18:17,600
That's alright, Bill,
I only wanted to know.

295
00:18:21,640 --> 00:18:23,640
Quarter past one.

296
00:18:25,280 --> 00:18:28,880
(GUNSHOTS)

297
00:18:30,120 --> 00:18:35,720
The intimidation
that was imposed by these gangs

298
00:18:35,760 --> 00:18:37,600
was really serious.

299
00:18:37,640 --> 00:18:41,640
People would be
absolutely frightened to report

300
00:18:41,680 --> 00:18:44,120
what had happened to the police.

301
00:18:44,160 --> 00:18:46,720
And to some extent,
they were justified

302
00:18:46,760 --> 00:18:50,960
because very often
the courts would allow

303
00:18:51,000 --> 00:18:53,920
prisoners who got charged
to be out on bail.

304
00:18:53,960 --> 00:18:57,200
When they were out on bail,
there was intimidation

305
00:18:57,240 --> 00:19:00,000
and bribery
that was going to undermine

306
00:19:00,040 --> 00:19:02,520
the criminal justice system.

307
00:19:02,560 --> 00:19:06,240
And very often, the punishments,

308
00:19:06,280 --> 00:19:10,080
when people were convicted,
were only relatively minor.

309
00:19:10,120 --> 00:19:12,920
So this was going on,
whilst on the seafront

310
00:19:12,960 --> 00:19:14,960
the families were coming down
from London

311
00:19:15,000 --> 00:19:17,600
for very brief periods of escape

312
00:19:17,640 --> 00:19:20,720
from the slum conditions
they were in,

313
00:19:20,760 --> 00:19:23,840
looking to just have a few moments
on the beach with their picnic.

314
00:19:23,880 --> 00:19:26,720
So you've got
these very contrasting worlds.

315
00:19:26,760 --> 00:19:29,880
Brighton had long since stopped
being a fashionable resort

316
00:19:29,920 --> 00:19:32,560
where you saw the wealthy go

317
00:19:32,600 --> 00:19:35,240
to entertain themselves, as it
had been when it first started out.

318
00:19:35,280 --> 00:19:37,960
This was kind of a seedy town.
It was the town where you'd go

319
00:19:38,000 --> 00:19:41,400
and you knew that the hotel clerk
wouldn't ask if you were married.

320
00:19:41,440 --> 00:19:44,160
You could sign in as Mr and Mrs
Smith and have a dirty weekend away.

321
00:19:44,200 --> 00:19:46,440
It was well known for this.
This was a running joke,

322
00:19:46,480 --> 00:19:49,080
that Brighton would be
where you went to have your affair.

323
00:19:49,120 --> 00:19:53,120
So it was a very seedy,
and yet, ostensibly attractive,

324
00:19:53,160 --> 00:19:55,000
regency seaside resort.

325
00:19:55,040 --> 00:19:57,160
So Graham Greene,
and indeed the film,

326
00:19:57,200 --> 00:20:00,640
play on these
three versions of Brighton.

327
00:20:00,680 --> 00:20:03,760
The very stylish
Hotel Cosmopolitan in the film.

328
00:20:04,600 --> 00:20:07,800
The fun-loving families
on the beach.

329
00:20:07,840 --> 00:20:09,760
And behind the scenes,
in the alleyways

330
00:20:09,800 --> 00:20:12,080
and on the racecourses,
the gangsters and the thugs,

331
00:20:12,120 --> 00:20:13,960
who are up to
all sorts of mischief.

332
00:20:15,560 --> 00:20:17,920
Brown? Brown?

333
00:20:17,960 --> 00:20:20,760
The inspector wants a word round
at the station. Right, come along.

334
00:20:20,800 --> 00:20:23,160
Next time tell him
to send a sergeant for me.

335
00:20:23,200 --> 00:20:26,400
Perhaps he'll come himself
next time, old man.Very funny.

336
00:20:31,440 --> 00:20:35,000
Brighton had its own police force,
Brighton Borough Police Force.

337
00:20:35,040 --> 00:20:36,880
It had its own chief constable

338
00:20:36,920 --> 00:20:42,600
and probably about 200 officers,
something like that.

339
00:20:42,640 --> 00:20:47,280
Very much concerned with
looking after their local problems

340
00:20:47,320 --> 00:20:49,600
and probably, the police force,

341
00:20:49,640 --> 00:20:53,680
rather too comfortable and cosy
with some of the businesses.

342
00:20:53,720 --> 00:20:58,480
In 1953, not long after
the end of the Second World War,

343
00:20:58,520 --> 00:21:02,200
the chief constable was
prosecuted for corruption,

344
00:21:02,240 --> 00:21:04,280
with a couple
of his senior officers.

345
00:21:04,320 --> 00:21:09,080
And corruption, in a sense,
spread to some parts

346
00:21:09,120 --> 00:21:12,680
of the Brighton Police
from the racecourse

347
00:21:12,720 --> 00:21:18,320
or from elements from London
and criminal elements elsewhere.

348
00:21:18,360 --> 00:21:23,840
It rather lost its reputation
and certainly had a seedy side,

349
00:21:23,880 --> 00:21:27,240
which I think
Graham Greene latched onto

350
00:21:27,280 --> 00:21:30,400
when he was writing Brighton Rock.

351
00:21:30,440 --> 00:21:33,560
Here, take your ruddy prize and hop
it. What do you want, chocolates?

352
00:21:33,600 --> 00:21:37,040
I don't eat chocolates.
Cigarettes?Don't smoke.

353
00:21:38,800 --> 00:21:40,880
Here, give me the doll,
the one with the yellow hair.

354
00:21:46,720 --> 00:21:48,720
Reminds me of church, Bill.

355
00:22:00,280 --> 00:22:03,080
MAN: There was no need to do it,
Pinkie, no need at all.

356
00:22:04,440 --> 00:22:06,280
What made you do it?

357
00:22:06,320 --> 00:22:08,800
You put a rope around our necks,
that's what you've done.

358
00:22:08,840 --> 00:22:11,320
Poor devil,
he didn't stand a chance.

359
00:22:12,480 --> 00:22:14,480
Wasn't necessary.

360
00:22:15,360 --> 00:22:17,680
I can't swallow this muck.
Let me have a drink, Pinkie.

361
00:22:17,720 --> 00:22:19,640
Not today. Go on, eat.

362
00:22:19,680 --> 00:22:22,840
I'll be as sick a dog.
Oh, be sick, then.

363
00:22:22,880 --> 00:22:25,560
Are the cards alright, Dallow?
We gave the cards to Spicer.

364
00:22:25,600 --> 00:22:28,520
Did you put 'em out alright?
Course I put 'em out.

365
00:22:28,560 --> 00:22:31,360
I don't see why you're
so worried about the cards.

366
00:22:31,400 --> 00:22:33,920
You don't see much, do ya?

367
00:22:33,960 --> 00:22:35,920
They're an alibi, aren't they?

368
00:22:35,960 --> 00:22:38,960
They prove he kept to his programme
and died after two.

369
00:22:41,480 --> 00:22:45,720
(SEABIRDS CRY)

370
00:22:50,200 --> 00:22:53,360
In the '30s, Brighton was
an exotic, raffish place,

371
00:22:53,400 --> 00:22:55,720
at least on the surface.

372
00:22:55,760 --> 00:22:58,680
As the film progresses,
the resort is revealed

373
00:22:58,720 --> 00:23:01,480
as a dank, unlikable place.

374
00:23:01,520 --> 00:23:04,840
A labyrinth of backstreets
and run-down boarding houses,

375
00:23:04,880 --> 00:23:07,640
including the one
the gang use as a base.

376
00:23:07,680 --> 00:23:10,840
The film is shot with a mix
of documentary realism

377
00:23:10,880 --> 00:23:12,800
and dramatic lighting and framing

378
00:23:12,840 --> 00:23:15,320
that epitomised film noir.

379
00:23:15,360 --> 00:23:17,360
Brighton gets smaller and smaller

380
00:23:17,400 --> 00:23:21,320
as Pinkie becomes entrapped
in his desperate plans.

381
00:23:21,360 --> 00:23:25,400
Brighton started off
as the place where

382
00:23:25,440 --> 00:23:28,920
the future King George IV built
Brighton Pavilion.

383
00:23:28,960 --> 00:23:31,320
That's about 1787.

384
00:23:31,360 --> 00:23:34,320
The racecourse was built around
about the same time.

385
00:23:34,360 --> 00:23:39,240
It was a very desirable place to go,
and a resort.

386
00:23:39,280 --> 00:23:43,040
But gradually,
perhaps through the Victorian times,

387
00:23:43,080 --> 00:23:45,840
when a lot more people came there,

388
00:23:45,880 --> 00:23:48,640
it rather lost its reputation.

389
00:23:48,680 --> 00:23:52,240
I think this sort of period

390
00:23:52,280 --> 00:23:55,640
up to the Second World War
and afterwards,

391
00:23:56,520 --> 00:23:59,080
was a period when,
let's say in America,

392
00:23:59,120 --> 00:24:02,040
Al Capone was operating in Chicago.

393
00:24:02,080 --> 00:24:06,280
There was a feeling
that gangsters and protection

394
00:24:06,320 --> 00:24:09,840
was perhaps
a natural order of things.

395
00:24:09,880 --> 00:24:15,200
The police were sort of demoralised,
underpaid, understaffed.

396
00:24:15,240 --> 00:24:19,120
A lot of problems arising from
the war in one way or another.

397
00:24:19,160 --> 00:24:24,000
A lot of firearms left over
from people bringing guns back

398
00:24:24,040 --> 00:24:28,120
from their wartime service,
and a lot of violence.

399
00:24:28,160 --> 00:24:31,240
So I think communities were
generally unsettled

400
00:24:32,240 --> 00:24:36,080
and the legislation
to do with prevention of crime

401
00:24:36,120 --> 00:24:39,240
wasn't as it is today.

402
00:24:39,280 --> 00:24:43,360
What's fascinating about the way
Brighton Rock is actually filmed

403
00:24:43,400 --> 00:24:47,080
is that it uses several
different kinds of techniques.

404
00:24:47,120 --> 00:24:49,920
Filmed on location,
first of all, filmed in Brighton.

405
00:24:49,960 --> 00:24:53,440
The opening sequence is a chase.

406
00:24:53,480 --> 00:24:57,920
Boulting actually placed cameras,
hidden cameras,

407
00:24:57,960 --> 00:25:00,400
all over the route
that he was going to take.

408
00:25:00,440 --> 00:25:04,840
So, all the people who are
milling around are real people.

409
00:25:04,880 --> 00:25:08,480
They're real tourists. They didn't
know they were being filmed.

410
00:25:08,520 --> 00:25:12,760
This gives it an incredible sense
of almost semi-documentary feel,

411
00:25:12,800 --> 00:25:14,800
it's cinema verite.

412
00:25:14,840 --> 00:25:16,680
But later on,

413
00:25:16,720 --> 00:25:20,760
and certainly
as the film moves in more closely

414
00:25:20,800 --> 00:25:24,160
and more insular
into the actual gang,

415
00:25:24,200 --> 00:25:27,720
the house, the rooming house
that they're in

416
00:25:27,760 --> 00:25:33,640
is something that could've been
out of David Lean's Oliver Twist.

417
00:25:33,680 --> 00:25:36,960
It could be Fagin's den, actually.

418
00:25:37,000 --> 00:25:39,600
It is so expressionist.

419
00:25:39,640 --> 00:25:42,840
A rotting, ghastly place.

420
00:25:42,880 --> 00:25:45,760
And all the men in it,
not just the gang,

421
00:25:45,800 --> 00:25:49,000
but also the guy
who lives below them,

422
00:25:49,040 --> 00:25:51,240
who is blind, as it happens,

423
00:25:51,280 --> 00:25:53,600
seem to be part of another world.

424
00:25:53,640 --> 00:25:55,520
Another era, almost.

425
00:25:57,960 --> 00:25:59,800
Which table was it, Spicer?

426
00:25:59,840 --> 00:26:02,160
Right of the door, the one
with the flowers.What flowers?

427
00:26:02,200 --> 00:26:04,040
How do I know what flowers?
Yellow flowers.

428
00:26:06,320 --> 00:26:08,320
Pinkie, don't go.

429
00:26:13,960 --> 00:26:15,880
Brighton Rock is two stories.

430
00:26:15,920 --> 00:26:17,840
It's the story of the gangsters
and their world,

431
00:26:17,880 --> 00:26:21,680
but it's also the story of
sort of an anti-love affair

432
00:26:21,720 --> 00:26:25,640
between Rose,
a very innocent, naive waitress

433
00:26:25,680 --> 00:26:28,200
and Pinkie, the gangster.

434
00:26:28,240 --> 00:26:30,720
Rose is perhaps a witness.

435
00:26:30,760 --> 00:26:32,720
She's not aware
that she's a witness.

436
00:26:32,760 --> 00:26:35,480
She's seen something which could,
if it came to it,

437
00:26:35,520 --> 00:26:38,600
show that the gang had murdered
a newspaper reporter.

438
00:26:38,640 --> 00:26:41,240
And so Pinkie decides
that he's going to

439
00:26:41,280 --> 00:26:44,920
find out what she knows
and try to persuade her

440
00:26:44,960 --> 00:26:48,120
that it's too dangerous for her
to talk to the police,

441
00:26:48,160 --> 00:26:50,720
to talk to anyone about
a particular event on a day where

442
00:26:50,760 --> 00:26:53,800
a gang member came to her restaurant
and left a card on the table.

443
00:26:54,760 --> 00:26:57,400
You'll never guess what
I found here only 10 minutes ago.

444
00:26:57,440 --> 00:27:00,080
One of Kolley Kibber's cards
worth 10 shillings.

445
00:27:00,120 --> 00:27:02,280
The other girls said I was a fool
not to challenge him.

446
00:27:02,320 --> 00:27:04,320
Why didn't you?
I never thought!

447
00:27:04,360 --> 00:27:06,480
It wasn't a bit like his photograph.

448
00:27:06,520 --> 00:27:08,400
Maybe the card had been there
all morning.

449
00:27:08,440 --> 00:27:10,520
Oh, no. I'd just changed
the cloth before he come in

450
00:27:10,560 --> 00:27:12,840
cos the other customer
upset his coffee.

451
00:27:16,800 --> 00:27:18,840
Maybe you just didn't
look at him close.

452
00:27:18,880 --> 00:27:21,280
Oh, I always look at you close.
Customer, I mean.

453
00:27:21,320 --> 00:27:24,280
You see, I'm... I'm new
and I get a bit scared.

454
00:27:24,320 --> 00:27:27,000
I wouldn't want to do
anything to offend.

455
00:27:27,040 --> 00:27:29,200
Like standing here talking
while you want a cup of tea.

456
00:27:29,240 --> 00:27:33,280
Well, that's alright, don't go away.
I like a girl who's friendly.

457
00:27:33,320 --> 00:27:35,320
In every sense of the word,

458
00:27:35,360 --> 00:27:38,560
Pinkie required
a sensational performance.

459
00:27:38,600 --> 00:27:41,480
Attenborough had actually played
the role before

460
00:27:41,520 --> 00:27:45,480
in the 1943 stage production
at London's Garrick Theatre.

461
00:27:45,520 --> 00:27:50,200
However, the Boultings claimed
it was his 1942 film debut

462
00:27:50,240 --> 00:27:53,360
as the callow deserter
from In Which We Serve

463
00:27:53,400 --> 00:27:56,120
that convinced them
he was right for the part.

464
00:27:57,640 --> 00:27:59,640
And it does prove
that Richard Attenborough is

465
00:27:59,680 --> 00:28:02,640
a very good actor,
given the right parts.

466
00:28:02,680 --> 00:28:05,560
He was often given
sort of noble parts

467
00:28:05,600 --> 00:28:08,760
or playing, latterly,
Father Christmas all the time.

468
00:28:08,800 --> 00:28:11,080
Yeah.
But this one, my goodness.

469
00:28:11,120 --> 00:28:15,680
He's extremely good as this
vicious little gangster in Brighton.

470
00:28:15,720 --> 00:28:20,040
And it's so startling,
if you think the film is 1947,

471
00:28:20,080 --> 00:28:24,280
to have a lead character as that...

472
00:28:24,320 --> 00:28:27,400
kind of evil, almost.
Yes, yes.

473
00:28:27,440 --> 00:28:30,160
You don't root for the lead man.
He's the killer in the story.

474
00:28:30,200 --> 00:28:33,160
No. I mean, it's better than...

475
00:28:33,200 --> 00:28:36,920
anything James Cagney did,
in that way.

476
00:28:36,960 --> 00:28:39,600
He really was evil, wasn't he?

477
00:28:40,840 --> 00:28:42,840
Sit down.

478
00:28:44,440 --> 00:28:46,560
Look, I, uh...

479
00:28:46,600 --> 00:28:48,760
I like you, Rose,

480
00:28:48,800 --> 00:28:50,800
and I wanna warn you, see?

481
00:28:51,880 --> 00:28:55,560
This fella, Fred Hale,
got mixed up in things.What things?

482
00:28:55,600 --> 00:28:57,600
Don't matter what things.

483
00:28:58,400 --> 00:29:02,320
Look, you forget all about
the fellow who left the card.

484
00:29:02,360 --> 00:29:04,760
He's dead. You've got the money.

485
00:29:05,640 --> 00:29:07,920
Alright. Anything you say.

486
00:29:10,400 --> 00:29:12,400
You can call me Pinkie if you like.

487
00:29:12,440 --> 00:29:14,280
That's what my friends call me.

488
00:29:14,320 --> 00:29:16,760
(THUNDER CRACKS)

489
00:29:16,800 --> 00:29:18,800
Pinkie.

490
00:29:18,840 --> 00:29:22,480
Pinkie is very young.
He's in his late teens.

491
00:29:22,520 --> 00:29:25,000
He's an unlikely leader
for this group.

492
00:29:25,040 --> 00:29:29,040
The leader of the gang, Kite,
has been betrayed.

493
00:29:29,080 --> 00:29:31,920
And so leadership has fallen,

494
00:29:31,960 --> 00:29:34,480
almost by default

495
00:29:34,520 --> 00:29:39,720
to the fiercest and most intelligent
of the followers in this small gang.

496
00:29:39,760 --> 00:29:43,240
But he's facing very long odds

497
00:29:43,280 --> 00:29:46,120
against much more powerful
gang leaders,

498
00:29:46,160 --> 00:29:50,640
not least among them Colleoni,
the man who was modelled on Sabini.

499
00:29:50,680 --> 00:29:55,640
Very, very few writers
had ever managed to achieve

500
00:29:55,680 --> 00:30:00,800
the sheer glacial,
psychopathic character

501
00:30:00,840 --> 00:30:04,120
that Pinkie emerged as.

502
00:30:04,160 --> 00:30:07,640
And certainly, very few actors had
actually ever done it before,

503
00:30:07,680 --> 00:30:10,480
because Richard Attenborough's
Pinkie Brown is

504
00:30:10,520 --> 00:30:15,240
one of the landmarks
of cinematic villainy.

505
00:30:15,280 --> 00:30:18,080
It is an extraordinary performance,
however you look at it.

506
00:30:18,120 --> 00:30:21,880
He is supposedly

507
00:30:21,920 --> 00:30:24,320
a man of Catholic faith.

508
00:30:24,360 --> 00:30:28,200
He is supposedly psychotic,

509
00:30:28,240 --> 00:30:30,400
and yet none of this is obvious.

510
00:30:30,440 --> 00:30:35,600
It's all embedded in the way
he looks, behaves,

511
00:30:35,640 --> 00:30:37,800
and above all, talks.

512
00:30:37,840 --> 00:30:40,440
There's something unknowable
about Pinkie

513
00:30:40,480 --> 00:30:43,160
and there's even less knowable
about him

514
00:30:43,200 --> 00:30:45,040
in the film
than there is in the book.

515
00:30:45,080 --> 00:30:47,520
Pinkie was his greatest challenge.

516
00:30:47,560 --> 00:30:51,120
Attenborough was 24,
but convinces you he was 17.

517
00:30:51,160 --> 00:30:53,520
He threw himself into the part,

518
00:30:53,560 --> 00:30:56,960
training with his beloved
Chelsea Football Club to lose weight,

519
00:30:57,000 --> 00:30:59,960
learning to limit
his facial expressions.

520
00:31:00,000 --> 00:31:03,560
But he's not inhuman.
He's desperate to survive.

521
00:31:03,600 --> 00:31:05,720
Greene loved his performance.

522
00:31:05,760 --> 00:31:08,880
How the actor suggests
so much more than we ever learn.

523
00:31:10,360 --> 00:31:13,440
This is a performance
before method acting

524
00:31:13,480 --> 00:31:15,720
has really taken off in Hollywood,

525
00:31:15,760 --> 00:31:18,640
and when cinema acting was coming
from the stage.

526
00:31:18,680 --> 00:31:20,800
And cinema acting was quite big
at that point.

527
00:31:20,840 --> 00:31:23,920
There was
quite large gestures on screen.

528
00:31:23,960 --> 00:31:26,080
Richard Attenborough brings
this stillness,

529
00:31:26,120 --> 00:31:28,840
this absolute rigid stillness
to Pinkie.

530
00:31:28,880 --> 00:31:31,400
Everything is taking place
behind the eyes.

531
00:31:31,440 --> 00:31:34,120
The most he'll do is play with
a piece of string,

532
00:31:34,160 --> 00:31:36,000
making a cat's cradle.

533
00:31:36,040 --> 00:31:39,720
His stillness is terrifying,
and his silence is terrifying.

534
00:31:39,760 --> 00:31:42,760
So when people turn to him
and he says nothing,

535
00:31:42,800 --> 00:31:44,760
that's when you're
most scared of him.

536
00:31:44,800 --> 00:31:47,400
So the presence that
Richard Attenborough brings to this,

537
00:31:47,440 --> 00:31:49,640
it's a new form of acting,
I think, at that point.

538
00:31:49,680 --> 00:31:51,640
I mean, in a way,
he's the first method actor.

539
00:31:51,680 --> 00:31:55,680
He's someone who manages to
internalise the conflicts of Pinkie,

540
00:31:55,720 --> 00:31:58,320
play Pinkie with his heart and soul,

541
00:31:58,360 --> 00:32:00,600
without needing
a theoretical process to get there.

542
00:32:00,640 --> 00:32:02,560
He just knows how to do it.
And this is

543
00:32:02,600 --> 00:32:05,200
an amazing piece
of cinematic performance.

544
00:32:05,240 --> 00:32:07,560
And I think that Attenborough,
as you say,

545
00:32:07,600 --> 00:32:10,440
he's often seen as a cuddly,
kind of "luvvie" character.

546
00:32:10,480 --> 00:32:12,880
Maybe he cultivated that
in his later career.

547
00:32:12,920 --> 00:32:16,280
But that first half of his career,
he was very good at

548
00:32:16,320 --> 00:32:19,320
darker characters,
cowardly characters.Yeah.

549
00:32:19,360 --> 00:32:23,040
The difficult roles, as it were.
None more so than Pinkie.

550
00:32:23,080 --> 00:32:25,640
No, he's an excellent actor,

551
00:32:26,440 --> 00:32:29,120
and when he made his films,

552
00:32:29,160 --> 00:32:31,800
he got very good acting
from everybody.

553
00:32:32,720 --> 00:32:34,720
But Pinkie is a...

554
00:32:36,920 --> 00:32:39,520
well, I don't know,
it's a crime story

555
00:32:39,560 --> 00:32:43,200
which gets absolutely into the place
in which it's set.

556
00:32:43,240 --> 00:32:45,040
Brighton.
Brighton, of course. Yes.

557
00:32:45,080 --> 00:32:47,480
Holiday making, lovely place.

558
00:32:47,520 --> 00:32:50,960
But underneath there is a horrible,

559
00:32:51,000 --> 00:32:53,720
gang-ridden subculture...
Yeah.

560
00:32:53,760 --> 00:32:56,000
..which nobody really knows about.

561
00:32:57,640 --> 00:33:00,400
'This is a Brighton
of shifting moods.

562
00:33:00,440 --> 00:33:03,640
The seaside haven never
feels comfortable.'

563
00:33:03,680 --> 00:33:07,520
It's too hot, too crowded,
or caught in a downpour.

564
00:33:07,560 --> 00:33:11,120
The rides on the pier are shrill
and unsettling.

565
00:33:11,160 --> 00:33:13,480
The local singers off-key.

566
00:33:13,520 --> 00:33:16,560
The sense of food
and drink sickening.

567
00:33:16,600 --> 00:33:20,600
This is the uneasy atmosphere
of Greene-land.

568
00:33:20,640 --> 00:33:24,440
Even when Pinkie parlays
with rival mobster Colleoni

569
00:33:24,480 --> 00:33:27,520
in the classy Cosmopolitan Hotel,

570
00:33:27,560 --> 00:33:30,840
the confusion
and bustle are ever-present.

571
00:33:32,360 --> 00:33:34,480
You think my mob's too small
for you?

572
00:33:35,480 --> 00:33:37,480
I employ a great many people.

573
00:33:39,360 --> 00:33:42,280
GREENE: Graham Greene feared that
the film wouldn't be any good.

574
00:33:42,320 --> 00:33:45,560
But when the film was finally
complete and he saw it,

575
00:33:45,600 --> 00:33:49,320
he felt that the directing and
the producing had been very good.

576
00:33:49,360 --> 00:33:52,400
The film work was very good,
the camera work,

577
00:33:52,440 --> 00:33:54,280
and finally,
that Richard Attenborough

578
00:33:54,320 --> 00:33:57,080
had really captured
the essence of Pinkie.

579
00:33:58,320 --> 00:34:01,320
You know an awful lot of things,
don't you?I like to.

580
00:34:01,360 --> 00:34:04,680
(THUNDER CRACKS)

581
00:34:04,720 --> 00:34:07,520
Come on, let's go inside out of
this rain and hear some real music.

582
00:34:15,126 --> 00:34:20,639
(LAID-BACK JAZZ MUSIC PLAYS)

583
00:34:22,639 --> 00:34:24,639
It's lovely here.

584
00:34:25,639 --> 00:34:27,639
You're soft enough, aren't you?

585
00:34:27,679 --> 00:34:29,760
How old are you?
Seventeen.

586
00:34:29,800 --> 00:34:31,800
So am I.

587
00:34:35,120 --> 00:34:37,679
You ever been in love?
Oh, yes.

588
00:34:37,719 --> 00:34:39,440
You would've. You're green.

589
00:34:40,360 --> 00:34:42,400
You don't know what it's all about.

590
00:34:43,639 --> 00:34:46,040
I've watched it. I know love.

591
00:34:55,159 --> 00:34:57,640
You're a Catholic?
Yes.

592
00:34:57,680 --> 00:35:01,080
Brighton Rock established
Graham Greene

593
00:35:01,120 --> 00:35:03,880
as a vital force
in British filmmaking,

594
00:35:03,920 --> 00:35:07,480
both as a source of stories
and as a screenwriter.

595
00:35:07,520 --> 00:35:10,520
Can any writer boast
three screenplays

596
00:35:10,560 --> 00:35:12,440
in three successive years

597
00:35:12,480 --> 00:35:16,720
as good as Brighton Rock,
The Fallen Idol, and The Third Man?

598
00:35:16,760 --> 00:35:19,440
Indeed, they form
an unofficial trilogy,

599
00:35:19,480 --> 00:35:24,520
sharing themes of guilt, morality,
loyalty, and betrayal.

600
00:35:24,560 --> 00:35:27,200
He has more swagger and eloquence,

601
00:35:27,240 --> 00:35:30,840
but there are definite shades
of Pinkie in the amoral games

602
00:35:30,880 --> 00:35:33,800
of Harry Lime in The Third Man.

603
00:35:33,840 --> 00:35:37,960
You are never quite sure what kind
of story it is you're following.

604
00:35:38,000 --> 00:35:40,240
At the beginning,
it's a murder story.Yeah.

605
00:35:40,280 --> 00:35:43,240
Then it's a kind of
cover-up story about gangs.

606
00:35:43,280 --> 00:35:46,280
Then it becomes a sort of
anti-love story.

607
00:35:46,320 --> 00:35:49,080
This kind of relationship
between Pinkie and Rose,

608
00:35:49,120 --> 00:35:51,760
Carol Marsh and
Richard Attenborough's characters,

609
00:35:51,800 --> 00:35:54,200
becomes the dominant thread.
Yeah.

610
00:35:54,240 --> 00:35:57,760
While the outside of the story,
you have Hermione Baddeley as Ida,

611
00:35:57,800 --> 00:35:59,680
who is almost like an amateur sleuth,

612
00:35:59,720 --> 00:36:01,920
like a Miss Marple kind of character.
Yes.

613
00:36:01,960 --> 00:36:07,400
The blowsy,
musical star or semi-star,

614
00:36:08,400 --> 00:36:12,400
who's determined to find out
exactly what Pinkie is about.

615
00:36:12,440 --> 00:36:14,480
But Pinkie's very interesting cos,

616
00:36:14,520 --> 00:36:17,680
though he's undoubtedly
an evil psychopath,

617
00:36:17,720 --> 00:36:20,400
he knows he is.
Mm.

618
00:36:20,440 --> 00:36:24,240
He sort of wants redemption
in a funny sort of way.

619
00:36:24,280 --> 00:36:26,480
That's very Catholic.
Yes.

620
00:36:26,520 --> 00:36:31,040
* But you know,
that's very Graham Greene, isn't it?

621
00:36:31,080 --> 00:36:35,200
Yeah.
That even though 95% of him

622
00:36:35,240 --> 00:36:37,080
is awful...
Yeah.

623
00:36:37,120 --> 00:36:39,160
..there's 5% of him who knows it

624
00:36:39,200 --> 00:36:42,280
and is trying
to somehow redeem himself.

625
00:36:42,320 --> 00:36:44,200
Yeah.
He never manages it, of course.

626
00:36:45,160 --> 00:36:47,000
Didn't you get my message?

627
00:36:47,040 --> 00:36:49,040
It's my half day.
I was coming to find you, Pinkie.

628
00:36:49,080 --> 00:36:52,480
What message?Well, I phoned you
at Frank's and told him to tell you.

629
00:36:52,520 --> 00:36:54,960
Told who?Sounded like the man
who left the card.

630
00:36:55,000 --> 00:36:57,720
He's dead, you read it in the paper,
didn't you? Dead.

631
00:36:57,760 --> 00:37:01,280
It doesn't matter. What matters is
someone was in asking questions.

632
00:37:01,320 --> 00:37:03,960
A bogey?A woman.
What did she want?

633
00:37:04,000 --> 00:37:06,680
What the man who left
the card looked like.Well?

634
00:37:06,720 --> 00:37:09,360
I didn't tell her a thing.

635
00:37:09,400 --> 00:37:12,640
She is an incredibly naive,
very beautiful,

636
00:37:12,680 --> 00:37:16,400
very wide-eyed,
very impressionable young girl

637
00:37:16,440 --> 00:37:20,720
who hasn't had a boyfriend,
who is bullied at work, really.

638
00:37:20,760 --> 00:37:23,880
She finds her workmates are
always having a go at her.

639
00:37:23,920 --> 00:37:26,680
It's very early in her career.
She really is very naive

640
00:37:26,720 --> 00:37:28,560
and very new to the world.

641
00:37:28,600 --> 00:37:32,800
She is a Catholic. She's very,
very driven by her faith.

642
00:37:32,840 --> 00:37:34,760
She believes wholeheartedly.

643
00:37:34,800 --> 00:37:38,240
And when she meets Pinkie,
who takes her off to the pier

644
00:37:38,280 --> 00:37:41,120
and talks to her,
very clearly telling her

645
00:37:41,160 --> 00:37:43,120
in effect that he has sinned,

646
00:37:43,160 --> 00:37:45,680
but, she discovers,
he is also a Catholic.

647
00:37:47,280 --> 00:37:51,200
Initially, you wonder whether
her faith will, you know,

648
00:37:51,240 --> 00:37:54,000
be sufficient to keep his secret.

649
00:37:54,040 --> 00:37:55,880
But in fact,
the fact that he talks about

650
00:37:55,920 --> 00:37:57,760
how he believes in Catholicism,

651
00:37:57,800 --> 00:37:59,880
"These atheists know nothing,"
he says,

652
00:37:59,920 --> 00:38:02,440
and talks about hellfire
and damnation.

653
00:38:02,480 --> 00:38:04,400
She knows that he's a believer,

654
00:38:04,440 --> 00:38:06,960
and that begins
to propel her towards him.

655
00:38:07,000 --> 00:38:09,440
Now, perhaps conventionally
in a gangster film,

656
00:38:09,480 --> 00:38:12,480
what this would lead to is
the redemption of the gangster.

657
00:38:12,520 --> 00:38:14,720
He finds a truly good woman.

658
00:38:14,760 --> 00:38:18,040
Someone who is prepared to lie
for him, cover up for him,

659
00:38:18,080 --> 00:38:21,600
who is prepared to sacrifice
her innocence to keep him safe,

660
00:38:21,640 --> 00:38:23,640
but Pinkie cannot love her.

661
00:38:23,680 --> 00:38:26,680
In fact, the more she gives to him,
the more he hates her.

662
00:38:26,720 --> 00:38:31,240
And so you watch him descend into
this almost repulsion

663
00:38:31,280 --> 00:38:34,840
for the woman he's going to
eventually ask to marry him,

664
00:38:34,880 --> 00:38:38,520
because a wife can't give evidence
against her husband.

665
00:38:38,560 --> 00:38:42,320
Graham Greene began writing
Brighton Rock as a pure thriller.

666
00:38:42,360 --> 00:38:46,280
After about 50 pages,
he discovered that

667
00:38:46,320 --> 00:38:48,560
the great issue in the book is

668
00:38:48,600 --> 00:38:51,200
sin, redemption
and the mercy of God.

669
00:38:51,240 --> 00:38:54,960
Because Young Pinkie,
who is the villain, or the hero,

670
00:38:55,000 --> 00:38:58,520
the anti-hero of the book,
is a broken-up Catholic.

671
00:38:58,560 --> 00:39:01,160
He was brought up a Catholic
and he believes in hell,

672
00:39:01,200 --> 00:39:03,560
has very little hope of heaven.

673
00:39:03,600 --> 00:39:08,520
Maintains a slight sense that
a deathbed repentance is possible

674
00:39:08,560 --> 00:39:12,280
"between the stirrup and
the ground," a line that's repeated.

675
00:39:12,320 --> 00:39:14,800
An old proverb that
if you fall off a horse,

676
00:39:14,840 --> 00:39:17,320
there can be repentance
between the stirrup and the ground.

677
00:39:17,360 --> 00:39:20,680
The phrase is spoken
at the end by a priest.

678
00:39:20,720 --> 00:39:23,360
"You do not know my child,
nor anyone,

679
00:39:23,400 --> 00:39:25,800
"the appalling strangeness
of the mercy of God".

680
00:39:25,840 --> 00:39:29,480
Both Graham Greene
and the Boulting brothers were

681
00:39:29,520 --> 00:39:33,360
sort of collaborating on something.
Bringing together

682
00:39:33,400 --> 00:39:37,640
various senses and feelings
that they had accumulated

683
00:39:37,680 --> 00:39:39,520
in the course of the war,

684
00:39:39,560 --> 00:39:42,400
and they were
the perfect partnership for this.

685
00:39:42,440 --> 00:39:45,040
They were sort of all putting it
into this melting pot,

686
00:39:45,080 --> 00:39:49,400
in a crucible, so that
it would come out as Brighton Rock.

687
00:39:49,440 --> 00:39:52,840
In Greene's case,
he'd been in the Secret Service,

688
00:39:52,880 --> 00:39:55,440
he'd seen the evil that men can do.

689
00:39:55,480 --> 00:39:59,040
He'd had probably
his own personal experiences

690
00:39:59,080 --> 00:40:03,640
that gave him
a fairly dark view of humanity.

691
00:40:03,680 --> 00:40:07,000
Greene was always struggling with
his sense of faith.

692
00:40:07,040 --> 00:40:09,600
He became a Catholic in 1925,

693
00:40:09,640 --> 00:40:13,160
and although he didn't like to
be thought of as a Catholic writer,

694
00:40:13,200 --> 00:40:16,720
he thought himself as a writer
who happened to be a Catholic.

695
00:40:16,760 --> 00:40:21,920
Nonetheless, Brighton Rock is
certainly the first of his books

696
00:40:21,960 --> 00:40:25,840
that actually dealt seriously with
a crisis of faith

697
00:40:25,880 --> 00:40:30,760
and certainly in a very,
very complex way.

698
00:40:30,800 --> 00:40:34,560
And to actually put that into a film

699
00:40:34,600 --> 00:40:37,440
so that it was
popular entertainment,

700
00:40:37,480 --> 00:40:39,920
and he thought of Brighton Rock
as popular entertainment,

701
00:40:39,960 --> 00:40:41,800
is absolutely extraordinary.

702
00:40:41,840 --> 00:40:45,920
Of course, the Boultings were
exactly the right people to do it

703
00:40:45,960 --> 00:40:49,080
because during the war,
they had been documenting.

704
00:40:49,120 --> 00:40:52,160
They had worked on films

705
00:40:52,200 --> 00:40:54,640
that actually showed
various aspects of war.

706
00:40:54,680 --> 00:40:57,320
They knew evil.
Even before the war,

707
00:40:57,360 --> 00:41:01,120
one of their first films,
Pastor Hall, was an anti-Nazi movie,

708
00:41:01,160 --> 00:41:04,360
so they had that sort of conscience.

709
00:41:06,680 --> 00:41:08,520
Who is Pinkie?

710
00:41:08,560 --> 00:41:12,360
Is he a delinquent
borne of urban depravity?

711
00:41:12,400 --> 00:41:15,120
Is he a killer by his very nature?

712
00:41:15,160 --> 00:41:18,240
Is it written through him
like those sticks of rock?

713
00:41:18,280 --> 00:41:21,520
As Ida says,
"Bite one all the way down,

714
00:41:21,560 --> 00:41:25,680
"you'll still read 'Brighton'.
That's human nature".

715
00:41:25,720 --> 00:41:28,760
The concept of damnation
hangs over the film.

716
00:41:28,800 --> 00:41:31,560
Pinkie is only certain of hell.

717
00:41:31,600 --> 00:41:34,360
"Don't you believe in heaven?"
implores Rose.

718
00:41:34,400 --> 00:41:37,800
"Maybe", he says,
as if it's unimportant.

719
00:41:37,840 --> 00:41:39,920
The bigger question
that Greene asks is

720
00:41:39,960 --> 00:41:45,560
how could a creature as heartless
as Pinkie exist within God's mercy?

721
00:41:45,600 --> 00:41:48,400
I think that Richard Attenborough

722
00:41:48,440 --> 00:41:52,120
has never done better than Pinkie.

723
00:41:52,160 --> 00:41:54,680
Yes.
And it was a risk for him, I think.

724
00:41:54,720 --> 00:41:58,520
And astonishing, I think, if you
think just across the whole film.

725
00:41:58,560 --> 00:42:02,200
And I like to think that in a way,
if you think of even forward to

726
00:42:02,240 --> 00:42:04,240
something like Psycho
and Anthony Perkins

727
00:42:04,280 --> 00:42:06,680
and the kind of roles
that came afterwards.Yeah.

728
00:42:06,720 --> 00:42:08,920
You think, well, it sort of
began with Pinkie,

729
00:42:08,960 --> 00:42:13,800
that idea of a kind of examination
of psychopathology

730
00:42:13,840 --> 00:42:16,880
and that kind of character.
Different ways, but...

731
00:42:16,920 --> 00:42:20,080
Dirk Bogarde in The Blue Lamp.
Yes.

732
00:42:20,120 --> 00:42:23,600
They were all... It was kind of
a style of character that emerged.

733
00:42:23,640 --> 00:42:26,400
Yeah.
And I think it begins with Pinkie.

734
00:42:26,440 --> 00:42:29,200
Yes, I think so.

735
00:42:29,240 --> 00:42:31,120
I think Pinkie is really...

736
00:42:33,400 --> 00:42:36,800
..really a landmark
in British filmmaking.

737
00:42:36,840 --> 00:42:40,560
I believe it is. At the time
it wasn't thought to be.

738
00:42:40,600 --> 00:42:43,560
But I think it is, really.
Yeah, definitely.

739
00:42:43,600 --> 00:42:45,960
I wonder what it was like
watching it...

740
00:42:46,920 --> 00:42:49,800
..in places like Brighton.
That's an interesting question.

741
00:42:49,840 --> 00:42:52,160
What must it have been like
in Brighton at the time

742
00:42:52,200 --> 00:42:54,200
to watch the movie?
Yeah.

743
00:42:54,240 --> 00:42:57,480
After all, Brief Encounter was
roaring with laughter,

744
00:42:57,520 --> 00:43:02,000
sailors roaring with laughter at
the English accents and everything.

745
00:43:02,040 --> 00:43:06,560
I doubt if the Brighton audience was
roaring with laughter.

746
00:43:06,600 --> 00:43:10,760
No, not at all.Think they
must've been rather shocked.

747
00:43:14,960 --> 00:43:17,400
Is anything wrong, Pinkie?

748
00:43:17,440 --> 00:43:19,440
Everything.

749
00:43:19,480 --> 00:43:21,920
Let's go on the pier.

750
00:43:33,120 --> 00:43:35,240
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