We make our own sordid hell and then we live in it, and the innocents among us deserve what they get because they can't tell the difference. Not exactly Graham Greene with his Catholic conflicts, but this excellent film written by Greene (and Terence Rattigan) from Greene's novel certainly sets up the issues. Brighton Rock is an excellent movie, scarcely dated, and features one of Richard Attenborough's most effective performances. His Pinkie Brown will wipe away all those avuncular grandfathers and Santas he's been playing the last few years.

Pinkie leads a small criminal gang in Brighton in the late Thirties. The gang's former leader was betrayed by a man named Fred Hale. When Hale is spotted in the guise of newspaper reporter Kolley Kibber passing out coupons near the Brighton pier in a promotion stunt for the paper, Hale's health is about to fail. Pinkie and the gang face Hale in a pub, then follow him through the streets of Brighton waiting for an opportunity to kill him. On the Brighton pier Hale meets Ida Arnold, a blowzy, cheery woman he encountered in the pub, and pleads with her to stay with him. She agrees, but then must leave him for a moment to retrieve a handkerchief. Frightened out of his wits, he gets on a tunnel of frights ride...and at the last moment Pinkie slips into the seat next to him. Hale is dead before the ride ends. Now Pinkie realizes there are a couple of loose ends. He kills one and marries the other, an innocent young waitress named Rose who saw more than she should have. A wife, after all, can't testify against her husband. Before long, Pinkie is plotting a double suicide for himself and Rose. Naturally, she'll go first. I'm not giving anything away, but things at last don't turn out Pinkie's way.

Did I mention? Pinkie is a puritanical sociopath. He doesn't smoke, doesn't drink and prefers to use a straight razor. He's 17. His gang has only three other members, all older. He dominates them because he knows what he wants, he's calm and he doesn't hesitate to take action. He can become violent, but with all the emotion of a snake. He marries his young waitress to get an alibi. While she naively loves him with all her heart, he can barely keep from showing his impatience and revulsion for her. On the Brighton pier together she sees a recording kiosk where people can make a record of their voices. Make a recording for me, she begs Pinkie, so I'll always have something that tells me how you feel. While Rose, outside the booth and unable to hear, gazes at him through the glass, Pinkie speaks into the mike. "You wanted a recording of my voice, well here it is. What you want me to say is, 'I love you'. Well I don't. I hate you, you little slut... " They don't have a gramophone so Pinkie knows she can't play the record. Pinkie wants security and power. He sees both slipping away as stronger competition from another gang moves in, as his own gang starts to crumble and as the relentless Ida Howard dogs his steps, pulling the police behind her. It all comes together in the rain late at night on the pier.

Attenborough was 24 when he played Pinkie. It was his breakthrough performance, and he's so good it's a wonder he wasn't typecast. Pinkie's age is not made much of; we learn it only when we learn he is underage, as is Rose, and must utilize a corrupt, aged lawyer to arrange the marriage ceremony. The off-hand way we realize how young Pinkie is makes his youth and his cold behavior even more disturbing. Hermione Baddeley as Ida, loud, vulgar and loving a drink and a good time, and William Hartnell as Dallow, the senior member of Pinkie's gang and a hard man with a certain degree of loyalty, are excellent. One of the major stars is Brighton, itself, and how it has been photographed. There's the pier and the rides and the beach chairs, of course, but this Brighton also has grubby and depressing boarding houses, loud pubs and narrow, dark streets and alleys. The location photography brings out all the grit and desperation.

Graham Greene is even more worth reading as he is watching; try his novels and "entertainments," including Brighton Rock. Even so, these three movies with screenplays by Greene are great movies, produced in just three years: Brighton Rock (1947), The Fallen Idol - Criterion Collection (1948) and The Third Man - Criterion Collection (2-Disc Edition) (1949). The Region two Optimum/Canal DVD of Brighton Rock, available from AmazonUK, is in fine shape. It's one more reason to have a region-free DVD player.

('Young Scarface' is the American Title for 'Brighton Rock')

`Brighton Rock' is essentially a tale of a teenage gangster, Pinkie Brown, and his attempts to silence a potential witness, Rose, to a crime. John Boulting (Thunder Rock, 1942; I'm All Right Jack, 1959) directed it in 1947 and was producer by his twin brother Roy. The screenplay was adapted from the Graham Greene novel of the same name by Terence Rattigan. There are significant differences at the ending of the film in relation to the novel (the book is more brutal) but I think that it takes nothing away from the film or the book. Due to BBFC rules at the time some changes had to made to the intended ending (the record scene) of the film because they wanted it to have a happy ending, which I think in retrospect made it better. The only feature really missing is the strength of character development one could only expect from a novel. However saying all that, the adaptation is excellent.

`Brighton Rock' featured two brilliant performances from Richard Attenborough (In Which We Serve, 1942; A Matter Of Life And Death, 1946) as Pinkie and Carol Marsh as Rose. Richard's performance is a career highlight for him, which could be regarded as the emergence of the `angry young man' in British cinema, but it was Carol's performance that I really loved. Her performance of innocence is something we so rarely see in modern cinema that it is remarkably refreshing to watch. One thing worth pointing out though is that Rose in the novel was not quite as pretty and we see more of her family life and the possible reason for her attachment to Pinkie. Carol Marsh never made many other significant films that I feel it's a bit of a shame because I think we've missed something there. I place her performance alongside Dorothy Malone's bit part in `The Big Sleep' (1946) who we also never saw enough of sadly.

Cinematography on `Brighton Rock' was by Gilbert Taylor who would later work on films such as `Repulsion' (Polanski, 1965) `Dr Strangelove' (Kubrick, 1964) and the much loved `Star Wars' (Lucas, 1977). Other films adapted from Graham Greene novels worth watching are `This Gun For Hire' (Tuttle, 1942) which has a similar theme and the excellent `The Third Man' (Reed, 1949). I loved this film and I loved the novel and I recommend both to you.

`Brighton Rock' is ranked No.15 in the BFI Top 100 British Films.

I can't believe this is not available on Region 1 yet. Get it on region 2 from Amazon.co.uk. Well worth it.