The Long Memory (1953)

the audience applauded

Excellent, Without a doubt!!

As somebody who had not heard any of this before, it became a curious phenomenon to sit and watch a film and slowly have the realities begin to click into place.

This is a coming of age storyline that you've seen in one form or another for decades. It takes a truly unique voice to make yet another one worth watching.

The Long Memory has John Mills getting out of prison after serving 12 years for a crime he didn't commit. Murder no less and the "victim" framed Mills for his own death.Despite the advice he's given that he should just chalk it up and go on with his life, that advice is hard to take. No, Mills is going to find out the truth and settle things with the folks that perjured themselves in court and put him in this jackpot.Fascinating though that Scotland Yard who apparently might have had some doubts about the case or at least paying attention to his public threats about these people put a tail on Mills. But he's too clever for that.There's not much you can do about perjured testimony though. Any number of wrong people in jail in any legal system can tell you that.One should also note the presence of John Chandos the man who is supposed to be dead and living high on the hog now and John McCallum as the Scotland Yard Inspector. Mostly Eva Bergh as one of the false witnesses whose guilt is too much to bear.The Long Memory is a nicely done British noir.

I caught this on film four a couple of weeks ago and thought it was excellent. It is a painful story at times, watching John mill's former lover grappling with her guilt, often physically is portrayed with undignified desperation. Her husband, the investigating officer quietly torn apart by the realisation of his own hand in a miscarriage of justice and his subsequently crumbling home and professional life. John Mills' constant struggle to realise a revenge that has torn him throughout his years in prison and an inability to exact that revenge. He shows, without being sanctimonious, how damaging and unfulfilled revenge is and the characters around him prove that redemption is always hard won.

This is an excellent British film, which has managed to pass the test of time, and still stands today as an absorbing & well executed piece of work. The story line is strong, and the locations are particularly memorable, especially the bleak & foreboding Kent coastline which adds significantly to the brooding atmosphere. The performances are uniformly excellent, with the sole exception of Elizabeth Sellars who barely changes expression throughout. John Mills gives one of his most intense performances in the lead role, and demonstrates once again what an extremely fine actor he always was. The direction & editing are first class, and the film never falters in holding the attention. For fans of the genre, this is not to be missed.

I have seen "The Long Memory" twice, and was sufficiently impressed (and like John Mills) that I bought the book when I found it. After seeing the film a second time I then started reading the book. To my delight (that's how I like films) it was close to the film, and I realized that much of the quality of the film, beyond its strong visual imagery of London dockside slums, damaged by the Blitz (you have to know this: there is no sign saying "house flattened by bomb"), and post- war austerity (rationing continued in Britain into the early 1950s!), is directly due to the book author Howard Clewes (about whom little is available on the internet).Despite not LOOKING like the author described him, John Mills acts the character described by the author, as do the rest of the cast.The post-World-War-II setting is crucial to appreciating the bleakness of the film. Life was tough then, for many British, and even more so for Displaced People -- war survivors and immigrants from Europe. Petty crime was rife. In fact things were probably tougher than during the flashback sequence to the Depression, when the young Mills character is accidentally drawn into cross-Channel smuggling of wanted criminals, and contraband.The old "beachcomber's" singing of a traditional English folksong is a haunting addition to the film that does not appear in the book.