With a leading role in this modest British film instead of the comic sidebars he usually had in big Hollywood projects at the time*, Robert Morley, portly, eccentric, richly entertaining and funny by default, makes this grimly determined courtroom drama watchable. Or does till forced to deliver a socially enlightened plea at the end. With courtroom testimony broken up by extended flashbacks to scenes described in the witness box, director Sidney J. Furie etches in a sort of fraudulent realism, detailing a charge of robbery/murder against four lads, ‘Teddy Boys’ by the look of them, though more probably harmless teens, goof-offs rather than toughs. It’s all circumstantial evidence, loads of it presented by prosecutor Richard Todd in the first act; refuted in Act Two as out-of-context misunderstandings by Morley on defense. But having flipped expectations, scripter Stuart Douglas, flips again, none too believably, working against too much character development for his ‘got’cha’ gasp. Just the sort of cheap dramatics Furie would be drawn to again & again over his long, busy career. (Apparently, still up & running in his 87th year.)
DOUBLE-BILL: *Morley was soon back to supporting roles, but once again above-the-title for WHO IS KILLING THE GREAT CHEFS OF EUROPE?/’78; the film regrettably coarse, but there he is.
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