Runtime: 108 minutes
Directed by: Cy Endfield
Starring: One hell of a cast, which I'll list below
From: The Rank Organisation/Aqua Film Productions
Turns out, Patrick McGoohan can play a real evil SOB.
Last night I returned to the DVR, viewing something recorded off of TCM last month. It played during an afternoon of related movies such as Wages of Fear. You see, the plot of this British film concerns an ex-con who joins a company that mainly hauls gravel in dump trucks to various sites. It's an employer of no scruples... I mean, the drivers are actually encouraged to break every rule on the road & drive fast on what look like bad rural roads for the purpose of more delivers. The foreman is Red, a “gentleman” who is the alpha male of the gang, psychotic, almost always has a cigarette in his mouth-at least when he's not drinking a bottle of Guinness while driving on the job-and has a prize of a gold cigarette case to anyone who can make more deliveries than him, which is an honor he earns each day.
It was pretty good overall, but holy crap look at the cast:
Stanley Baker
Herbert Lom
Peggy Cummins
McGoohan as Red
The first Doctor Who, i.e. William Hartnell
Jill Ireland
David McCallum
Sid James
In one of his first roles, Sean Connery
A nice lineup, especially considering that a decent number of them found far greater fame in the years after this was released. They are a tight-knit group, and unfortunately are willing to turn on one of their own if their leader thinks that this person is “a yellow belly.”, a coward in other words.
Now, there's a romance angle which seems shoehorned in but otherwise I can't really carp. It had nice drama, villains that are easy to hiss at, some brawls, truckers that were as uncouth as the stereotype is of them in America, and action where big trucks drive real fast & almost crash into everything. If this sounds like a ride you'd love to be on... actually there are ways to see it illegally but it'd be preferable if there are more legal streaming options in the United States.
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