Renown Pictures Ltd, which were originally founded by George
Minter in 1938, is a Production and Distribution company that revives British
classic movies and whose restoration of British B-movies is exceptional giving
the viewer a chance to see rare films in clarity beyond reproach. And it’s done
it again with The Shakedown (1959), another ‘missing’ B-movie which boasts a
solid story, played out with a strong cast and could easily be mistaken for the
main feature at 89 minutes with an exciting pace that does not falter from
start to finish.
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| Augie Cortona (Terence Morgan) instructs one of the models. |
Written and directed by Toronto born John Lemont who entered
the film industry in 1935 and worked with the Army Film Unit during WW2. His
first feature film was not until 1954 and his best-known is the crime drama The Frightened City (1962) that stared a
pre-Bond Sean Connery as a villain. He also worked a great deal in Television.
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| Jessel (Donald Pleasence) |
As far as I’m aware this is the first time that The Shakedown has appeared anywhere on
DVD. It stars Terence Morgan (Tread
Softly Stranger 1958) as a crook called Augie Cortona who is due for
release from prison and shares a cell with a petty crook called David Spelligue
(Bill Owen There
Was a Young Lady 1953, Dancing
With Crime 1947). Before Augie
was incarcerated he run a call girl racket in Soho, London’s red light
district. Grassed up by his disloyal partner Goller (a foreign looking Harry H
Corbett!) who now runs all of Augie’s previous rackets – but the released jail
bird wants them back, or at least to find away of getting back at his ex
partner. To this end he robs two of Goller’s henchmen of their latest takings, the
proceeds of which are more than enough to set up a photo-modelling agency with
Jessel (Donald Pleasence Hell is
the City 1969) a professional photographer, who Augie met quite by
accident in a public house!
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| Thats no way to treat an ex alcoholic! |
Is our ex pimp going straight? Chief Inspector Bob
Jarvis (Robert Beatty) certainly does not think so and puts an undercover
officer in to the studio. But unbeknown to both the police and Augie, Goller
has also placed a plant in the agency. Augustus Cortona’s hard shell falters
when he falls for one of the studio’s high-class models Mildred Eyde (the stylish
B-movie queen Hazel Court) and starts up a courtship.
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| Augie's courtship of Mildred Eyde (Hazel Court) |
Well shot, this gritty realistic black and white
movie is a must for crime film lovers and ‘is
possessed of a gumption worthy of the best American B-movie and a welcome alternative
to those prim and stodgy British films that are mistakenly called classics’[1] A
rather risqué film with its hint of nudity and an indication of elicit sex. It
also manages to capture the same sordid and gritty feel of Michael Powell’s classic
Peeping Tom (1960), which is praise
in its self.
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