Pretty Good

While it is a pity that the story wasn't told with more visual finesse, this is trivial compared to our real-world problems. It takes a good movie to put that into perspective.

It's a good bad... and worth a popcorn matinée. While it's easy to lament what could have been...

While it doesn't offer any answers, it both thrills and makes you think.

This begins quietly enough and if Ralph Richardson is effective as the butler, there is no real hint that this is going to rise much above the level of a decent melodrama. Things do pick up, however, and an effective thriller seems to rise out of very little other than meticulous directing, flawless cinematography and fine acting. Bobby Henrey is enormously effective as the young boy although I understand this was more down to the personal efforts of director carol reed and careful editing than any particular acting skills on his part. Nevertheless he is most convincing and as the tension mounts the frustration surrounding his ability to know who to trust works extremely well. As with the 1946 film, Spiral Staircase, a central set of stairs is crucial to the tale with almost all action taking place on or through a door off them. There are one or two outside exclusions to the London streets and one particularly effective and evocative one towards the end when the boy runs out into the stunningly lit night streets. Absorbing, involving with a most exciting last act.

This is the first of three joint ventures that Graham Green and Carol Reed did together. Their second, The Third Man, was released the following year, and I believe THAT to be one of the greatest movies ever made! But, this movie, based on Graham Green's short story, "The Basement Room," was an absolute gem of a thriller on a smaller scale. Whereas The Third Man was set over the entire city of post-war Vienna, this one takes place almost entirely within the main quarters of a French embassy in England. This was my second viewing, and the more I see it the better I LOVE it!! In fact, I consider it to be a small masterpiece!The story revolves around a young boy, Phillipe (Bobby Henrey), the son of an ambassador. Phillipe is left alone with the ambassador's butler, Baines (Ralph Richardson) and his wife (Sonia Dresdel). It is interesting to note that the ambassador leaves at the beginning of the movie and Phillipe's mother is never seen at all until the very end of the movie. Another thing that sort of 'sets the table' for this movie is that Phillipe is not only virtually an orphan, but he also seems to have no friends his age. His world revolves around adults, imaginary friends, and a pet snake. His main friend seems to be the playful Bains, who seems more comfortable entertaining Phillipe than by being the traditional English butler. This is not the case with Mrs Bains. She is a nagging wife to her husband and a strict, almost cruel, governess toward the boy. In short, she is 'a bitch' of the first order.As Phillipe follows Barins to a local tea house, he oversees him in the midst of a tryst with another embassy employee, a young typist, Julie (Michèle Morgan). In front of the boy, Bains and Julie talk in sort of an adult code language, by referring to THEIR problems—of getting free of Mrs. Bains--as 'a friend's problems.' Later, when Bains and the Phillipe are alone, Bains asks the boy to keep his meeting with Julie a secret. Phillipe agrees to their secret as if it were just another of their games together.When Mrs. Bains is killed by falling down the stairs, Phillipe tries to protect Bains from the official suspicion that is growing around him as his wife's killer. But, in truly believing that Bains is the murderer, he becomes confused as to when to keep their secret and when, if, and how he should lie or tell the truth. It is truly baffling as one adult tells him one thing and another adult, another. The boy's dilemmas present us with the framework for the story's thrilling climax.This thriller continually grows as the movie progresses. It's amazing to think that most of the movie takes place in within the embassy's entrance and that the long spiral staircase is such a prominent feature of the movie that it is almost an inanimate 'actor' in the story. Carol Reed manages--through great direction, photography, and editing--to make an ENTIRE WORLD from this one small staging area. The greatest part of the movie is when Bains, Julie, and Phillipe are playing hide-and-go-seek in the embassy entrance hall. As they run though the area waving sheets, turning light switches on and off, and creating child-like mayhem, there is such a fantastic sequence of cinematography that it, alone, should be studied and revered by film students, directors and cinematographers alike. This movie shows Carol Reed's early signature style. It is a worthy successor to Odd Man Out (1947), and more importantly, a worthy predecessor to The Third Man (1949). The techniques are there but just done on a smaller 'stage' with a much smaller scope and cast.

I don't wish to duplicate other members synopses of the storyline of this wonderful, classic film, but I would like to say something about the performance of the then eight years old Bobby Henrey as Phillipe and how crucial he was to Carol Reed's realisation of The Fallen Idol. Bobby's parents were writers and he had initially been chosen to star in the film both for his looks when Reed had seen a photograph of him peering out of the window of his London apartment on the dust jacket of one of his parents books and because he was bi-lingual, having spent his early childhood in both France and England and spoke English with a French accent, which was called for in the script. Bobby had never acted before, but Reed, a man of infinite patience where children and child actors were concerned, persevered with him over an incredible shooting schedule of five months (a long time for those days) shooting numerous takes of every scene involving the boy and his dialogue, which paid off handsomely, as he managed to coax out of him the most incredible and natural performance by a child actor ever seen on the screen and certainly not bettered since.No better example of all this can be found than in the scene where Philippe is convinced that Baines, his only friend whom he idolises, is going to be sent to the gallows for a murder he did not commit. At this point, he realises just how much he adores and loves Baines and that he cannot live without him. With all the passion in his heart and soul, Phillipe pleads with the police to listen to him as he finally decides to tell the truth about what happened in the hope that this will save his friend: "Oh, please, you must listen to me! I have something to tell you! Oh, please listen to me! Oh, please! Please listen to me! You have to listen to me! You must listen to me! It will only take a moment and it will put everything right." But the police completely ignore him. This scene is so gut-wrenchingly heart-breaking, that it's almost too upsetting to watch and you become totally involved in it and feel very deeply for this increasingly desperate little boy. It is an incredible performance that is so perfect, it has to be seen to be believed. I cannot recommend this film highly enough. It is one of the finest films ever made in the history of the cinema.

Mr Baines (Ralph Richardson) and his wife (Sonia Dresdel) are left to look after a boy, Phillipe (Bobby Henrey) in a French Embassy house while the parents are away. Phillipe looks up to Mr Baines while disliking Mrs Baines, the housekeeper. He discovers Baines meeting up with another woman Julie (Michele Morgan) and is told to keep it a secret from Mrs Baines. However, she finds out with disastrous consequences...This film is well acted. Ralph Richardson gives a performance that holds back a little and is just on the right side of frustrating while my favourites in the cast are Sonia Dresdel and Dennis O'Dea who plays "Inspector Crowe". Scenes that stand out for me include the section where Mrs Baines is hiding in the house one night and we get a genuinely scary moment. I also found Inspector Crowe extremely watchable in his attempt to get the truth from Phillipe towards the end of the film and he delivers the wonderful line - "Will someone get this child out of here!" I found the film involved me gradually as it played out. The beginning was pretty mild and not very exciting as we focus on the rather annoying Phillipe with his strange accent. They should have cast someone else. However, the dialogue wins through at the end of the day and he gets some great lines, eg, when the police are in the middle of their investigation, he confides to Julie "we must think up more lies and keep telling them". Brilliant. And when he discovers that Mrs Baines has killed his pet "MacGregor", he puts forward the following as the epitaph for the burial - "MacGregor - killed by Mrs Baines - and the date". Genius.Another great quote comes when Dora Bryan who plays a prostitute called "Rose" is given the job of trying to find out who Phillipe is when he shows up at the police station.