Road rage… Hell Drivers (1957)

I haven’t seen this film since a black and white Saturday in the seventies and it deserves its reputation as one of the best dramas of the period. Yes, the film is sped up to make some of the truck driving look even more dangerous than it probably was but on the bigger modern screen this is still a white knuckle ride as your foot reflexively pushes down hard on the imaginary brake at the base of your living room chair with every manic swing round an impossible corner or reckless overtake into on-coming traffic. 

Cy Endfield’s cutting is masterful of course and the editing of John D. Guthridge, pulling back and forth from the road, the monstrous trucks and the sweated reactions of one of the finest ensembles of actors you’ll find. Indeed, it’s not so much the speed of vehicles that scare you but the display of desperation and mad determination on the brows of Stanley Baker, Patrick McGoohan and Herbert Lom. This is Britain’s answer to Clouzot’s Wages of Fear with the dynamite being in men’s hearts and minds, post-war austerity of the soul.

Stanley Baker

 

Baker is brilliant as Tom Yately, just out of prison for an unspecified crime but aiming to follow the straight and narrow if he can only get a chance. He has the right mix of quite shame in his past with a modest, yet fierce belief in his own worth; such a likeable actor and one of the icons of post-War British cinema. None of the characters in Hell Drivers is entirely innocent and it’s a tough film with a dark heart. Tom finds his way to Hawletts, a haulage contractor ruthlessly run by Mr Cartley (William Hartnell), which makes money by moving as much gravel across from quarry to building site as possible with the mathematics of the daily deliveries being unrelenting: each driver needs to make at least twelve ten-ton, twenty-mile round trips a day or lose his job. The trucks are parrot-nosed Dodge 100 "Kew" vehicles not designed for comfort or even safety at the speeds the top drivers take them. 

Cartley's secretary Lucy (Prestatyn’s finest Peggy Cummins in jeans!) has an instant spark with Joe who’s heard from a pal about a vacancy – caused, as we learn, by the death of a driver – and he soon learns the ropes after a near miss on his first trip out in truck no. 13, with head mechanic Ed (the excellent Wilfrid Lawson). It doesn’t get any easier as Joe soon comes up against the driver’s top dog, "Red" Redman (Patrick McGoohan), the fastest and most reckless who has truck no. 1. McGoohan has screen presence to match Baker’s and is at his most febrile here, as out of control as the Dodge’s with a performance that veers towards the barrier of believability but stays just inside the double yellow line of sincerity.

Peggy Cummins

Herbert Lom’s Gino, driver of truck no. 3, provides a counterbalance, an Italian who remained after the war and who is both religious and honest. Gino loves Lucy, and sweetly calls her his “girl” even though we suspect she is only marking time with him as she soon proves with her advances to Tom; see, no-one is innocent.

The rest of the team is a roll-call of character-acting excellence, everyone of whom would have long careers; Dusty, no. 22 (Sid James), Tinker, truck 11 (Alfie Bass), Scottie, no. 7 (Gordon Jackson) and, sorry mate but the Scottie nickname was already taken, Johnny, no. 19 (someone called Sean Connery). We also have the stunningly stunning Jill Ireland as a waitress in the Pull Inn café where the boys congregate for breakfast and after a hard day’s truck. 

Tom soon gets with the flow and sets himself the target of beating Red’s record and winning the gold cigarette case for anyone who can better his 18 runs in a day. But the game is rigged as Red cheats by cutting across country and does everything he can to hamper the competition by fair means or foul. This is a tough film and you know not everyone will make it through…

What a carry on Mr Bond?

Tom goes to see his mother (Beatrice Varley) and brother Jimmy (David McCallum) to give them some of his hard-earned cash, but he’s still in disgrace with her not just for his crime but the fact he involved Jimmy who is now permanently on crutches as a result. It leaves you thinking what would have made the otherwise decent Tom so desperate for money that he’d risk both her sons in the crime. There’s something in this film that touches on working class choices and also exploitation as Hawletts turns out to be a crooked enterprise, with Cartley and Red colluding to cream off the pay for more drivers than they actually employ. They’re driving the men into the ground to make up for the missing headcount. 

The mood changes after a scrap at the local dance when Tom, wary of breaking his parole, makes a getaway before ethe police arrive to settle matters. The other drivers now start to call him coward and to undermine him at every turn, encouraged by Red. Gino swaps trucks with Tom to give him a chance at the record and pays the price… things are getting personal and Tom determines to risk everything to prove himself and to expose the con.

Parrot-nosed Dodge 100 "Kew" trucks

Dusty verdict: Hell Drivers is a classic late-period Brit Noir that manages to entertain whilst making you feel uneasy throughout. Even the lead character has been driven to such extremes that his brother is crippled and his mother won’t forgive him, whilst the rest, even those such as Sid and Alfie, are happy to join in with Tom’s victimisation, following Red’s miss directions.  

All of which gives the film the winning edge of a reality that remains, survival of the fittest against all the odds of a rigged system.  

It’s available on BFI Blu-ray with ten ton of extras and frankly, I wouldn’t hesitate to snap it up!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Nice and sleazy does it... Jungle Street (1960)

This falls into that intriguing sub-genre of Soho strip-joint based dramas along with Beat Girl (released 28^th October 1960) and Expresso Bongo (released 1^st December 1959) and was probably the last to be released. It may lack the authenticity of the former – which used professional strippers – and the wit of the latter – which used Cliff Richard – but it’s noteworthy all the same.

There are some lukewarm reviews on IMDB for the film but it’s a convincing kitchen-sink crime drama with a memorable if occasionally jarring lead performance from David McCallum as the troubled petty crook Terry Collins. As Collins, McCallum never lets the intensity drop as a rebel with no cause but his own and no loyalty to family or friends. The exception to this is dancer Sue, played by McCallum’s then wife, Jill Ireland who I have to say provides the most stunning of catwalks for her moment in the club; she’s got star power to spare, as with her husband, and near infinite legs!

David McCallum

As with the excellent but underused Kenneth Cope, they bring out what there is of the drama and make this low budget Las Vegas a low-impact but compelling watch for a bank holiday afternoon; the showgirls may be faking it but the feeling of supressed violence and desperation is tangible.

All begins with an old man’s late-night bus journey from Notting Hill set to a swinging Harold Geller score. He arrives at his destination and gets fatally knocked out by a blackjack wielded by petty Terry who takes his money and throws his wallet down the drain.

We’ve had the violence so now it’s time for “sex” as we enter the Adam and Eve club presumably down a dark Soho Alley to find smiley Marian Collins introducing a variety of acts starting with “Dimples” (Vanda Hudson) in tight-fitting silver slacks and, initially at least, matching top, as she strips and sings “I’m Only a Girl” to row after row of pale, stale males sucking harder on their cigarettes with every gyration and discarded item of clothing; it’s definitely the singer and not the song.

Jill Ireland and her near infinte legs...

Terry arrives at the club just as a black dancer (Faye Craig) gives the film’s most overtly sexual performance – just as with Pascaline in Beat Girl… the differing moral standards of the age towards “native” dance and expression? He settles down to a short and salty exchange with Joe Lucas (Brian Weske) a lower league but established criminal who none-the-less has more street smarts.

Backstage, star attraction Sue, who is fending off the advances of club owner and gutter entrepreneur, Jacko Fielding (John Chandos) before taking to the stage. Sue’s dance is perhaps more graceful and composed than you’d expect in such a dive but Jill Ireland simply acts her way through it with a range of expressions that conveys much beyond the choreographed physical routine. With the occasional cut-away to an increasingly distracted Terry, she’s defiant, alluring and ultimately in control of the room. You get the feeling there could have been a much deeper story here.

But. Not today… what we get is not enough character development and a story that, whilst competently directed by Charles Saunders, falls between the twin stools of titillation, crime and socially aware drama.

Grumpy breakfast with mum and his ol' dad.

Terry’s tense breakfast with his belligerent Dad (Thomas Gallagher) and long-suffering mother (Edna Doré) starts with a close-up of a fry-up and abrasive exchanges that almost lead to violence; they’re a family on the brink and Terry’s either going to put up or shut up. The headline in The Daily Express tells him there is no going back as it’s revealed that his mugging has turned into a murder.

But no one seems to take Terry seriously and as the girls in the club, Dimples, Margo (Anne Scott) and another (Gillian Watt) laugh at him he slaps out and is floored by a fierce straight right from Dealer (Fred Griffiths). Terry just hasn’t got what it takes and just doesn’t know it and as Sue takes pity on him, getting him laid out in her dressing room her quickly turns from grateful of hateful as he forces himself on her.

Things are about to get worse for Terry though as his former partner in crime, Johnny Calvert (Kenneth Cope), gets early release from Wormwood Scrubs and comes looking for his share of the proceeds from the job that landed him in clink as well as his old love, Sue. Terry’s spent the money though, of course, but has a plan to rob the club and pay his mate back in spades.

Gillian Watt dances as Kenneth Cope and David McCallum make plans

Johnny’s hard to persuade though after making up with Sue – accepting his own part in her having to turn to this life even as Jacko is lining up a new star dancer Dolly (a brief cameo from Jacqueline Jones who was in Antonioni’s Il Grigo in 1957). Meanwhile the coppers have found the old man’s wallet and, having identified prints, are sweeping the neighbourhood trying to find the matching fingers…

Time is running out and everything will turn on the boy’s plan to rob the club – just one last job to get Johnny the money to get away with Sue and Terry’s only hope of escaping the law. What do you reckon’s going to happen?

Dusty Verdict: Jungle Street is very near the real thing and is saved by the grit of McCallum and the grace of Ireland. There’s decent support all round and you do end up caring about – most – of the characters although Terry’s a particularly un-redeeming character which, to be fair, is the point; we keep on expecting him to turn the corner but he can’t and whatever he sows, he reaps. Plenty of character actors to spot and there’s a smashing turn from Meier Tzelniker as elderly jeweller Mr. Rose. Shirley Anne Field has a bit part too although she doesn’t dance.

Attentive audience

Vanda Hudson

Marian Collins

Faye Craig

Jill Ireland

Anne Scott

Gillian Watt

John Chandos and Jacqueline Jones who had a much bigger role in Antonioni's acclaimed Il Grido (1957)