Around Midnight… All Night Long (1962)

I was so distracted by the stream of famous jazz players in this film that it took me a good portion of the action to realise that it’s a jazzed version of Othello. Patrick McGoohan plays drummer Johnny Cousin who has his eyes set on stealing his friend’s wife and using her to front his own band. He sets out by playing everyone against each other by whispering in their ear, spreading rumours and lies, undermining friendships and loves, aiming to break everyone so that he may succeed.

McGoohan goes further than Iago in terms of having a commercial end game but he’s so good in this role, pushing his friends as far as he can, letting them fall into traps of their own making and always seeming to be on their side. On top of this the actor also plays his own drums and, even if the sound of those beats was from drum coach/ “ghost drummer” Allan Ganley, he looks like he can keep a rhythm and he seemingly spent long hours practicing in a garage to copy the movement.

Just as the various characters take their cue from McGoohan’s lies so does the film’s tension revolve around the actor’s intensity and his ability to convey malice and nervous duplicity with ease. It’s Iago with a beat, self-hatred and a lonely soul as a motivator.

Charlie Mingus

All seems cool enough at the start when rich benefactor Rod Hamilton (Richard Attenborough) travels down from Belgravia in his Bentley to open up his warehouse club down in Stoney Street, Southwark. As he walks in, he greets one Charles Mingus, pipe in his mouth, warming up over a double bass and it’s the kind of moment that makes this film essential viewing for every jazz lover: Mingus in the flesh!

More players arrive including Tubby Haynes, Allan Ganley, Ray Dempsey, and others with a pretty young blonde name of Carol White – uncredited here but soon to take the world by storm as the Battersea Bardot. There are so many “faces” in the crowd… including Cleo Laine if you look hard enough. It’s as if someone just put in a call to Ronnie Scott’s to send down anyone who was playing that week.

The boys in the band greet Carol White

Sure enough the great Dave Brubeck turns up and it’s a delight to watch him work ads it is with Johnny Dankworth – see that’s why Cleo’s there! Some have complained that there’s not enough jazz versus story but there’s more than enough to establish a real vibe in the stary and anymore and we’d be looking at a musical rather than a drama and Basil Dearden's direction is too cool for that.

The balance works well enough and allows the intensity of the story to build as Johnny tries everything he can to break up the anniversary party given in honour of piano player Aurelius Rex (Paul Harris) and his wife, singer Delia Lane (Marti Stevens). Harris has great presence as the powerful Aurelius – London’s King of Jazz (hence “Rex) who, whilst he loves his Desdemona/Delia true, still asked her to stop performing when they got married.

Marti Stevens and Paul Harris

Johnny aims to coax her back and away from her man – he has his own designs all mixed up in fear and jealousy… so much does Paddy convey! Johnny also aims to undermine Aurelius’s manager and sideman Cass (young Keith Michell) and skilfully encourages him to fall off the waggon and smoke some weed against his boss’s instructions. He has lifted Delia’s cigarette case and gives it to Cass with more weed, pushing his buttons so that he might rebel.

It’s striking to see Aurelius and Delia’s mix-race relationship in 1962 and with not a comment from anyone. Cass’ girlfriend Benny (María Velasco) is also black, and the only problem there is Cass’ commitment phobia.

Patrick McGoohan, shaken and a stirrer...

Johnny plays on all of these things and strings everything together for a climactic scene of betrayal and violence. His own wife Emily (Betsy Blair) has stood by him even though he married her out of obligation and reveals his own conflicted soul driving him to ruin as much of everyone else’s happiness as he can.

Does it end like Othello or is their salvation in those Southbank streets…? I’d recommend you watch it and find out for yourself.

Dusty verdict: A powerful mix of drama and jazz which stands or falls on fine the performances of the key players. The jazz takes an inevitable back seat but gives the full feeling of the cutting edge of contemporary cool. The jazz is real and so too are the emotions… jealousy, anxiety and pure insecurity driving people to risk everything even though they’d be safer staying at home. And that is jazz.

All Night Long is available on Blu-ray and DVD from Network and you can order it direct from their site right here.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Mind craft… The Third Secret (1964)

Let’s get this out the way from the start: the First Secret you keep from others, the Second Secret you keep from yourself, and the Third Secret is the truth. This applies to the everyday as much as the narrative in this smart psychodrama directed by the venerable Charles Crichton and starring Hollywood’s favourite Ulsterman, Stephen Boyd and the precocious Pamela Franklin – just 14 at the time of filming but carrying so much old emotion; a remarkable performance.

The film has elevated production values, with some glorious shots of the Thames side near Kew at Strand-on-the-Green where a lot of the action happens although when I say “action” I mean deep pondering set against the wide-grey waters and a poignant monochrome sky… Boyd is adept a brooding and carries an energy that suggests he is not only capable of dynamic action but also destruction and this much we see in one sequence where he trashes an apartment, accidentally making a small cut on the face of his young friend, Catherine.

Pamela Franklin and Stephen Boyd

The girl herself is fascinating as an actress and a character; not many teenagers could pull of the emotional conflictions she does and create the impression of violent damage as well as something deeply hidden… the “third secret” is one you can hold from yourself.

Catherine’s father, prominent London psychoanalyst Dr. Leo Whitset, is discovered fatally injured from a gunshot wound and as he dies, he whispers, "Blame no one but me." It looks like suicide and the coroner agrees but his closest patients tend to disagree. Boyd plays Alex Stedman, an investigative TV reporter haunted by demons and drink but still driven by a need to seek the truth. Catherine and he share a bond and she turns up at the studios to plead for his help in investigating what she is convinced is murder.

Stephen Boyd and Nigel Davenport

For a dynamic reporter, Alex certainly has a lot of self-doubt but I guess that’s why he was seeing Dr Whitset, but his need to restore his friend’s reputation is almost as important as the need to find his killer. Chief suspects look to be anyone of the Professors’ regular customers which just so happen to include Alex…

Aside from the angry, unpredictable journalist, there’s Alfred Price-Gorham (Richard Attenborough) who runs an elite art gallery, Sir Frederick Belline (the great Jack Hawkins) a high-level judge and Anne Tanner (Diane Cilento) a nervous secretary completely lacking in self confidence or resilience…The suspects are all impressive enough and what’s interesting is Alex flawed approach in investigating them. He’s no Sherlock Holmes even though he’s smart, solving the riddles that Catherine keeps on chalking on the walls of bankside near her home.

Richard Attenborough

At Price-Gorham’s gallery, Alex strikes up an encouraging conversation with his PA, Miss Humphries (Judi Dench in her first big screen role, before co-starring in the following year’s Four in the Morning). Her boss is a frustrated artist and trying to sneak his own work amongst the more established artists on show. Alex decides he’s an unlikely suspect based on his fear of elderly and opinionated customers… but you never know, he was working on a portrait of the professor.

Next Alex takes his “professional” interest in the case far too far in a one-night stand with the very vulnerable Anne Tanner (Diane Cilento) … it doesn’t end well and, as with his first interview leads us no closer to the chief suspect. It serves to show how “vulnerable” Alex is and how, if anything, he’s just another one of the four main characters who has lost their therapist.

Diane Cilento and Mr Boyd

The same is true of his eventual meeting with Sir Frederick who, whilst he undoubtedly has many things to hide, is not about to break down and deliver.

All of which leads us back to the Thames and the word games and pensive silences between Alex and Catherine… she in search of a father figure and he, possibly even unsure whether he’s a suspect. It’s a film that undermines the traditional string male lead and, whilst it meanders, leads us all down a false trail on purpose.

Dusty verdict: The Third Secret is well directed by Charles Crichton with some subtly stunning cinematography from Douglas Slocombe; if it feels less than the sum of its parts that’s possibly because there’s not enough meat in the character’s motivations outside of their internal crises. It’s perhaps too introverted for its own good.

The denouement is dramatic and might catch the unwary… it leaves a feeling of unease, something that could have been more prevalent earlier for despite itself, the film doesn’t have enough suspense or action.

Young Judi

That said, the acting is superb and none more so than from Pamela Franklin. There’s also a good supporting cast including Rachel Kempson, Peter Sallis and the ever-superb Nigel Davenport as Alex’s boss! Well worth seeking out now that it’s on Blu-ray.