Beat Girl (Wild for Kicks).

“Psychologists think most human neurosis comes from too much contact with other human beings” so says wealthy Paul Lindon (David Farrar) who has just brought his new French wife Nichole (French actress Noelle Adam) home following their wedding in Paris. The 24-year-old French beauty is only half the prominent architects age, something that strikes home when she meets Paul’s daughter, the rebellious Jennifer (Brigette Bardot wonnabee Gillian Hills), who immediately takes a dislike to her stepmother. The large austere family home that all three now share has few homely attractions. Jennifer describes it as a morgue with Nichole commenting on the houses barrenness - all of which does not help its repressive constraining atmosphere. 

 

Brigette Bardot wonnabee Gillian Hills.

The films narrative centres on the relationship between the two women and an area of London known as Soho. Nichole has a past to hide that involves an old friend called Greta (B-Movie actress Delphi Lawrence) who is the star performer at a strip club owned by her boyfriend Kenny King (Christopher Lee taking a break from Hammer Films). Jennifer’s frequents the Soho Coffee Bars where mainly spoilt little rich kids hang out listening and dancing to ‘cool decadent jazz’. They include the obligatory working class lad Dave (good use of pop singer Adam Faith in his first film, although his second movie, along side girlfriend of the time Carol White, Never Let Go (1960) had already been released), Tony, a general’s son whose mother was killed in the Blitz, who drinks to much (played by Peter McEnery also in his debut movie, an actor who had a prominent role in Victim in 1961 along side Dirk Bogarde) and Tony’s well bred girlfriend Dodo (Shirley Anne Field who famously played Arthur Seaton’s girlfriend Doreen in Saturday Night and Sunday Morning (1960))   

 

A cool crowd in Chislehurst Caves.

Directed by French filmmaker Edmond T Greville Beat Girl (1960) or as it was known in the USA Wild for Kicks, is a product of its time with its dodgy script and terrible corny dialog. There were small roles for Oliver Reed and Carol White and a larger one for Nigel Green, best known for his role as Colonel Ross in The Ipcress File (1965) and who also appeared in a range of British movies including the thriller The Man Who Finally Died (1963) alongside Stanley Baker. Also making his debut was composer John Barry with his first movie commission. Incidentally the films soundtrack was the first to be released on a LP (a large piece of vinyl with a picture cover!). Filmed at the MGM-British Film Studios at Borehamwood Hertfordshire its location shooting took place in Soho London with club scenes filmed in the Chislehurst Caves in Kent, Southern England.

 

An audition takes place in a late 1950's Soho strip joint.... 

....where its owner the late Christopher Lee interrogates Gillian Hills.   

 This was another of these films’ that received critically bad reviews but was popular with cinemagoers. It had problems with the censor that delayed its general release. The setbacks were down to displays of topless nudity and strip tease along with scenes of juvenile delinquency involving public road racing and ‘playing’ chicken on a railway line!  The movie was eventually given an adult only “X” certificate; thankfully my copy of the DVD was the uncut version that certainly made it a more appealing piece of British cinematic history.        

The Flesh is Weak.

Directed by Donald Chaffey, best known for his fantasy films that included Jason and the Argonauts (1963) and One Million Years B.C. (1966), The Flesh is Weak is a 1957 British crime drama that forms part of The Best of British Collection released on DVD by Odeon Entertainment. The film stars the American actor John Derek probably best known for marrying Ursula Andress, Linda Evans and Bo Derek, and the Italian beauty Camilla ‘Milly’ Vitale as well as British stalwarts William Franklyn, famous for voicing the "Schhh... You Know Who" adverts for Schweppes from 1965 to 1973 as well as appearing in many feature films including Roman Polanski's psychological thriller Cul-de-sac (1966), well-known character actor Martin Benson and star of stage and screen Freda Jackson.

John Derek and Shirley Anne Field. 

The naive 21year old Marissa Cooper (Vittale) arrives in London in search Of fame and fortune. She accepts the job of hostess at the Golden Bucket Club where she is the victim of some inappropriate attention from one of the punters, in steps the good looking Tony Gianni (Derek) and rescues her, offering her a better life if she goes with him, she readily agrees but little does she know that the manipulative Gianni is a pimp and that this is the first step in the grooming of her future role as a prostitute. When see realises the worst and tries to escape the clutches of the Gianni brothers her life is put in danger, only the investigative journalist Lloyd Buxton (Franklyn) can save her.

Milly Vitale.

The story is inspired by the notorious Messina Brothers, who were a Maltese-based criminal organization that dominated London's underworld during the inter-war and post-WWII years. They run an extensive vice ring controlling a network of prostitutes who it was alleged could earn in the region of £1000 per week, a lot of money for the 1940’s and 50’s. It was crime journalist Duncan Webb of The People newspaper that eventually helped exposed these ‘Emperors of Vice’ and the protection they were afforded by some members of Scotland Yard.

 

London's Soho in the 1950's.

Another hidden gem of British cinema, which manages to captured the sleazy atmospherics of London’s 1950’s Soho. This X rated shocker scandalised the British film industry at that time and can still be viewed as a serious film about a very real life problem, the exploitation of woman and post war street prostitution. But like Norman J Warrens Her Private Hell (1968), seems pretty tame by todays standards. This beautifully restored new print is well worth a look.

The Damned

British poster.

H L Lawrence’s novel The Children of Light told of a secret government experiment to cultivate a group of cold-blooded radioactive children to inhabit a contaminated earth in the aftermath of a nuclear war. With the encouragement of Hammers Michael Carreras, who wanted the production company to diversify from it’s reliance on gothic horror, Joseph Losey was persuaded to make a film based on Lawrence’s novel. Added to the novel’s basic British science fiction premise was “teenage rebellion” including a teddy boy/rocker gang lead by King (Oliver Reed) whose sister Joan (the lovely Shirley Anne Field Arthur Seaton’s love interest in 1960’s Saturday Night-Sunday Morning) uses her obvious sexual charms to lure American tourist Simon Wells (Macdonald Carey) into a mugging where he is beaten and robbed by her evil brother and his gang. This attack leads to Joan and Simon having an affair which narratively speaking leads to the discovery of the secret experiments and the children who, like their counterparts in the recent Never Let Go (2010), are innocent victims of a self serving ruthless ruling class. Stanley Kubrick used the same premise in 1971’s A Clockwork Orange in as much as questionable activities by both an extreme youth movement and the even more dangerous “authorities”.

American poster.

The movie, filmed on location in Weymouth and nearby Portland Bill, was originally made in 1961 but due to political considerations was not released until 1963 in the UK and 1965 in the USA where it went under the title of These Are The Damned. When viewing this film today it must be remembered that in the early 60’s many considered a nuclear war inevitable at a time when the Cuban missile crisis was at its height. Even the sculptures made by Freya Nielsen (Swedish actress Viveca Lindfors) were made to represent bodies of people and animals killed by a nuclear blast. (They were actually made by British sculptor Elisabeth Frink) Losey’s film, fascinating and menacing, captures the edgy nature of living with the threat of nuclear oblivion and is now can be regarded as one of the best of Hammers Films.

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