HIGH TREASON (1951)

The Brothers Boulting, John & Roy, were well-established producer/directors by 1951,  but this neat police procedural following homegrown Communist Party Members out to sabotage British factories & electric plants was a Paul Soskin production, Roy soloing as writer/director.  And while he makes a good job of it, like many a Boulting pic, he leaves a lot on the table.  Here, it’s a problem of focus with randomly split attention between interesting lower-middle-class saboteurs and the generic police team chasing them down before the next attack.  Nice to have some sympathetic personalities among the conspirators (they meet at a local club for ‘modern’ classical music where a planted cop nearly gives up his cover endorsing Bach, Beethoven & Brahms), but the film only teases the backstories while ‘cheating’ with easy coincidences to help the investigators.  Then the big climax leaves the more personalized players out of the action, reducing suspense & emotional involvement.  Still, technically, it’s very well organized with exceptional lensing inside dark factories and around dismal urban neighborhoods & tenement flats from cinematographer Gilbert Taylor*, just off similar work amongst the London hoi polloi in a similarly plotted Boulting production, SEVEN DAYS TO NOON.

DOUBLE-BILL/LINK: As mentioned, SEVEN DAYS TO NOON/'50.  https://maksquibs.blogspot.com/2020/06/seven-days-to-noon.html

SCREWY THOUGHT OF THE DAY: *With DR. STRANGELOVE; HARD DAY’S NIGHT; REPULSION; FRENZY; THE OMEN; STAR WARS on a very long C.V., Taylor deserves more name recognition.