My Brother's Keeper (1948)
War hero turned villain George Martin escapes from the police, but he is handcuffed to a naive young crook Willie Stannard. After using a clever plan to obtain railway tickets, and with the police and the press in hot pursuit, George has to find a way of breaking loose from Willie, and to make his escape.
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Pretty Good
One of my all time favorites.
Good start, but then it gets ruined
It’s an especially fun movie from a director and cast who are clearly having a good time allowing themselves to let loose.
This low budget film is an early version of The Defiant Ones.Jack Warner does a villainous turn who along with George Cole are handcuffed prisoners on the run. Warner is smart, cunning and amoral. Cole is naive and dim, pretty soon he is stitched up for murder that Warner committed. Warner even manages to have a meet up with an old flame, even though his wife is fretting over him.Comedy is provided by David Tomlinson as a reporter on his honeymoon persuaded by his editor to cover this breaking news story.Warner provides an energetic even complex performance, a world away from PC George Dixon, but the film is too uneven, the comedy sections with Tomlinson and his editor just gets in the way. The film has some nice location shooting, appearances from some familiar British actors and even a social conscience.
Before becoming PC George Dixon in 1950 Jack Warner tried his hand at the other side of the law notably in Hue And Cry and this trite effort which clearly gave Stanley Kramer the idea for The Defiant Ones some years later. This is neither one thing nor the other with the two escaped prisoners- Warner and a young and callow George Cole - intercut with unconvincing reporter David Tomlinson more or less abandoning his honeymoon to cover the story at the insistence of his editor Raymond Lovell. It's another benefit for the usual suspects with a heavily disguised Bill Owen, Maurice Denham, Wilfrid Hyde White, Beatrice Varley, Jane Hylton and just about everyone else who wasn't working. Barely watchable.
In so many ways this is a fine all round film, which is only let down somewhat by the unnecessary comedic element of the young newspaper reporter (David Tomlinson) accompanied by his new bride (Yvonne Owen), on their honeymoon, covering the man hunt for the two escaped prisoners. The inclusion of this improbable and forced attempt at humour simply jars within the context of the whole film. That great character actor, Jack Warner, is excellent in the lead role, playing against type. He is ably supported by a young George Cole, and the ever dependable Jane Hylton. The film also has a lively pace about it, and is well staged, with the outdoor locations lending a good balance to the proceedings. It's a film that doesn't seem to be widely available, but is certainly well worth tracking down, despite the inappropriate light-hearted interludes.
An interesting piece of casting, having Jack Warner playing the bad guy, but he is a good enough actor to pull it off. He plays a war hero George Martin, who with another convict, Willie Stannard, (George Cole) break loose from police custody, while handcuffed together. David Tomlinson as the young reporter, who is called in to work on the story. A film from another era, that is well worth watching.