Monday Morning Foreign-Region DVD Report: '10 Rillington Place'

In the near-wake of a Richard Fleischer revival—see Dave Kehr's eloquent brief on the director in a recent Times; Richard Combs' ardent print-only elaboration on Fleischer's mise-en-scene in the current issue of Film Comment; and, if you're in New York, by all means go to Film Forum and see Fleischer's 1955 Violent Saturday, which runs through Thursday—I thought I'd commend the British disc of Fleischer's British-made account of a very British true-life criminal and his awful true-life crimes.

10 Rillington Place begins with an almost appallingly matter-of-fact depiction of a 1944 murder by John Reginald Christie, accomplished during a Blitz blackout in which Christie was putatively acting in an official capacity. Richard Attenborough, abetted by a prosthetic bald pate that's almost as effectively expressive as the performer himself, gives an astonishing, perfectly modulated performance as the monstrous, unknowable psychopath, a mild-mannered wheedler of the first stripe. (Attenborough's dubious directing career has resulted in, among other things, an undervaluing of the great work he did as a performer; his Christie is his second indelible portrayal of a criminal, the first being his white-hot work as Pinkie in the 1947 film of Greene's Brighton Rock.)

The film's main focus is Christie's interactions with the Evanses, a young couple with a new child who, some years after the depicted murder, rent the top flat of the miserable title house in London's Notting Hill—the neighborhood here a couple of transformations before its contemporary polyglot incarnation. Timothy Evans (John Hurt) is an illiterate laborer who's having a hard time adjusting to family man status, while his wife Beryl (Judy Geeson) is of somewhat cheerier disposition (at least at first) but equally at sea. When their domestic situation takes an unexpected and unwelcome turn, Mr. Christie intercedes, offering some medical services.

No, this doesn't look very good, does it, and in fact it's worse than it looks.

While the ultimate facts of this case are easily discoverable to anyone with Google, I do wonder how one might react to the events of this film if one were to see it completely ignorant of the facts. This is a remarkably bleak story, and Fleischer—greatly aided by his cast—tells it so straight it's practically unbearable. The film's only joke—an audio juxtaposition of two types of cracking, as it were—is an incredibly mordant one.

Man, is it an ugly world this film depicts—one has to commend the integrity of art director Maurice Carter and cinematographer Denys Coop for stalwartly resisting any temptation that might have occurred to put something pretty in a given frame. It's hardly a stretch to say that the film's depiction of miserable urban domesticity would not be matched until David Lynch's Eraserhead six years later. And Eraserhead's got more tunes—aside from a stoic opening theme by John Dankworth, this film's practically music-free.

The Columbia TriStar Special Edition DVD (which, as of this writing, Amazon.co.uk is selling for the equivalent of ten bucks) contains a strong transfer of the film and good extras. Attenborough—billed as "Lord Attenborough" on the cover, how fancy—contributes an introduction in which he frames the picture as one about "human vulnerabilty;" there's also an interview with him. Costar John Hurt does the commentary, and he's a companionable albeit often somber viewing mate (you can't blame him given the nature of the film). Some of the info he reveals about the production is kind of jaw-dropping, particularly if you're a bit conversant with British penal history to begin with. On the lighter side, his recollections of the hard-drinking crew at the studio where Rillington's interiors were shot are affectionate, funny, self-deprecating.

A fine package for a film that will work its way into your nightmares, guaranteed.

Comments

[bill]

I've been wanting to see this movie for ages. Thank God I finally got that region-free DVD player.

[Griff]

I think Attenborough is very good in the film -- Glenn makes an excellent point that his middling-to-dire directorial career has obscured Attenborough's great tenure as a character actor -- but while RILLINGTON is quite interesting, I just can't praise it to this extent.

I have seen almost all of Richard Fleischer's features. I like his early pictures: SO THIS IS NEW YORK is witty and funny, and NARROW MARGIN and ARMORED CAR ROBBERY are particularly terrific. 20,000 LEAGUES UNDER THE SEA will always rank among my very favorite movies. And, after everything is done and said, Fleischer gets a special place in my heart for directing the scene in HIS KIND OF WOMAN in which Vincent Price and a score of extras climb onto a small boat...which almost immediately sinks straight down into the drink.

That said -- and this is merely my opinion, of course -- I do not quite understand the recent outpouring of praise for the later work of the man who directed the likes of DOCTOR DOLITTLE, TORA! TORA! TORA!, CHE!, THE LAST RUN, SEE NO EVIL, MR. MAJESTYK, CROSSED SWORDS and a slew of other basically dull, limply directed films of the '60s and '70s. I fought sleep watching these pictures theatrically back in the day; while I'm usually open to reassessment and reevaluation, the idea of ever critically embracing some of these ill-advised turkeys is difficult to imagine.

[mark]

I remember seeing this on TV as a kid. Attenborough scared the life out of me.

[oakling]

And I thought Sweeney Todd was disturbing!

I do love movies that don't have background music telling us what to feel...

[Glenn Kenny]

Griff, you've got a wider window into RF's career than most...and it is hard to make those distinguishing calls. I want to check out "Majestyk" again based on Dave K's enthusiastic call on its behalf; by the same token, my last viewing of "See No Evil" didn't leave me believing I was watching any kind of lost masterpiece. Nevertheless, R.F.'s name on any given film back in the day was enough to give the junior auteurists of Dumont, N.J. reason enough to watch, back in the late '60s-early '70s, So why not reappraise the work that's available for viewing now...?

[Joseph B.]

Interesting article on Fleischer, Glenn. A few weeks back on my blog I posted a comment about Fleischer, where I list the next ten titles in my Netflix queue. I've currently got "The Boston Strangler" and "Soyent Green" coming soon. I asked the question.. is New York the center of the film universe? Whenever Film Forum or some other venue there holds even a partial retrospective, the cinematic world quakes. Next came a very good article in Film Comment about Fleischer, the blogs are lighting up about his work and the NY Times ran a short piece about him... basically I guess I answered my own questions that yes, NY is the center of the film universe. I'm woefully inadequate when it comes to Fleischer's career. Maybe now is the time to catch up. "10 Rillington Place" sounds like a good place to start.

[Dan]

Fleisher was always one of those guys who when he was on, he was amazing and when he was off, he was terrible. Man, I wish my region-free player wasn't broken...

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