A Place to Go (1963)

Mike Sarne?Didn't he "direct" "Myra Breckinridge"?Yes by golly he did The boy done good then...I suppose. Although I'm not sure what he did afterwards except nearly bankrupt the studio. Actor,pop star,here was a young man for his time although both his vocal and thespic skills may have been open to question by some less - than - kind commentators. In "A place to go" he plays a disaffected youth (what else?) who attempts to turn to crime but doesn't have the bottle. An embarrassed - looking Bernard Lee plays Cockney Rebel Dad who does an excruciatingly incompetent escapologist's act(reminds me of one I saw "entertaining" the crowds waiting for Winston Churchill's funeral cortege to pass Tower Hill a couple of years later - I had to look twice to make sure it wasn't the same geezer). Mum is Doris Hare who isn't the slightest bit embarrassed but should have been. Rita Tushingham is not convincing as a cockney sparrer - Princess Margaret could have done a better job. It would like to have been "It always rains on Sundays" with its dour but somehow rivetting look at working - class life in Bethnal Green but it lacks almost everything except John Slater. It's patronising,opportunistic and cliched. Just like "Eastenders" then. And just about as realistic.

In the immortal words of Syd Field, What A Performance, and that's only Mike, Come Outside, Sarne, what a pity he didn't take himself outside before filming started, but fair dos, you could say the same about virtually anyone involved. Doris Hare? You've got to be kidding. On The Buses was just about her mark and even that dire piece of cheese makes this look like Citizen Kane. As someone remarked on this site Rita Tushingham is the best actress here by a country mile but Rita Tushingham as a cockney sparrer, do me a favour. Bernard Lee, poster boy for the Temperance Society, Doris Hare, and Mike Sarne in the same family? Who was the Casting Director, Mr. Bean? Do yourself a favour and give this one a miss.

A PLACE TO GO is an odd little blend of the classic British kitchen sink social drama and the more old-fashioned crime thriller that was popular a decade before and still doing the rounds even in the early 1960s, although this is very much a last-gasp attempt with the burgeoning popularity of the spy genre soon wiping away the trend for safe cracking and night time robberies.It works better as a kitchen sink film than a crime thriller, because the heist itself, although the best part of the movie, is dealt with very hurriedly and doesn't take up much of the running time. Instead the viewer is treated to a slice-of-life drama involving a poor working class family presided over by Bernard Lee, cast against type as a street performer with a Houdini-style breaking chain act! Pop star Michael Sarne is the idealistic hero seeking to escape from his drab existence. He hooks up with the inimitable Rita Tushingham, who proves to be more than a match for his wiles as her character is full of life and rather independent. She's the best actor in the whole thing, certainly showing up Sarne as a rather bland leading man (at least we get the likes of John Slater and Roy Kinnear who are rather more fun in delivering mannered supporting characters). The feisty romance scenes are rather well handled, although the pacing is a little slow and the crime elements feel rather unnecessary and tacked on to the story. Still, it's a perfectly watchable film for lovers of the era.

Some excellent and vivid location work around Bethnal Green in London is the setting for this slice of "kitchen sink" life.It portrays a family struggling to keep their heads above the water as the man of the house Bernard Lee loses his job for being too mouthy at work, he then takes to the streets as an escapologist in order to get money for food on the table, quite often embarrassing himself and his family in the process. Meanwhile his son played by 60ts singing star Mike Sarne is fed up being on the breadline and turns to local gangster John Slater to do a robbery at the factory he works at, it goes wrong but he manages to get out of it in a hurry, meanwhile Sarne's love interest played by the lovely Rita Tushingham certainly is'nt an easy catch. All in all a really good slab of realism directed by the excellent Basil Dearden. Recommended.