Man from Tangier

Robert Hutton - Chuck Collins
Lisa Gastoni - Michele
Martin Benson - Voss
Derek Sydney - Darracq
Jack Allen - Rex
Leonard Sachs - Heinrich
Robert Raglan - Inspector Meredith

Synopsis
Tangier. While trying to retrieve a wooden case hidden below the floorboards of a building in the city’s market area, a criminal called Montez is gunned down by a rival with the name Armstrong. He makes off with the case. Later, a man called Voss, together with his assistant, Michelle, is told of the circumstances surrounding the incident by an Arab hired to tail Armstrong. The woman had been trying to lure him into a trap set by her employer, who was also after the contents of the case. Voss surmises that since his adversary hates flying he will instead used two boats and a train to reach London where he will find a buyer for the property he holds. Since Michelle gave Armstrong her London number, she is instructed to fly to the city, reaching it before him. She has become disgusted by the whole business that Voss is involved with, which involves him not only dealing with Armstrong but double-crossing two very dangerous associates in the form of Heinrich and Darracq, that she refuses his order.

Voss then threatens to alert the authorities to the fact that Michelle is really a displaced person carrying a forged British passport. She reluctantly agrees. Armstrong arrives in London at Victoria Station and deposits the case in left luggage area and places the receipt in his pocket. He does not realise that nearby, another person is watching him. In a barber shop a short distance away from the station, American movie stuntman Chuck Collins is having a haircut when Armstrong walks in. He puts his coat on a rack and requests a shave. After his haircut, Collins takes what he thinks is his overcoat and leaves. Shortly after this, Armstrong discovers that his coat is no longer where he left it. The barber suggests to the increasingly angry customer that Collins must have taken the coat, which looks exactly like his, in error. He attempts to contact Collins by phone but without success. He assures Armstrong that every attempt will be made to retrieve the coat.

He tells him that should the American return that he can be contacted at a local hotel. Outside Armstrong is still oblivious to his being followed. That night Collins returns to his flat and receives a call from Armstrong about the item of clothing and demands that he goes over to his hotel and return it. Arriving at the hotel, the American is told the number and location of the room by the establishment’s porter. Collins knocks on the door but gets no reply although some activity can be heard from within the suite. He writes a note and pushes it under the door. He goes back to the foyer just as the porter goes on his tea break. Out in the street, Collins hails a taxi, something witnessed by two bystanders. A short time later, Armstrong is sent crashing through a window in the hotel and lands in the street.

The American visits a private nightclub where the only patron appears to be him. Everyone else is away watching a boxing match or listening to it on the radio. He puts the coat over a chair and fails to notice the left luggage receipt falling to the floor. At the end of the bout, Collins drunken friend Rex turns up and announces that he has won a small fortune on the result of the fight. He suggests a party and urges his friend to call some of the ladies he works with in the film industry. Collins retrieves an envelope from a pocket in the coat before realising that it is not his property. Rex grabs the envelope and notices a London number for a girl called Michelle. He then phones up Michelle, telling her that he is a business acquaintance of the person the letter is addressed to, a Mr Armstrong. Collins decides to come clean and takes over the call to explain the situation. The woman would rather hear his story in person and makes arrangements to come to the party…

Review
Although there was a modest profit still to be made by independent British production companies during the 1950s employing wholly domestic acting talent from radio, the theatre and the burgeoning television industry, a number of the more ambitious studios found that their chances of a more lucrative overseas, especially American, distribution deal were considerably enhanced by the presence of one or more well-known Hollywood performers amongst the cast list.

Firms like Merton Park and Hammer/Exclusive, who had a production and distribution arrangement with Lippert Films in the States, regularly employed actors whose cinematic career was on the wane, or were trying to escape the attention of the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC). Thus, talent as diverse as Forrest Tucker (The Trollenberg Terror 1958), Lex Barker (Strange Awakening 1958), Jayne Mansfield (Too Hot to Handle 1959), Richard Denning (Assignment Redhead 1956) and Richard Basehart (The Intimate Stranger 1956), all earned a crust at some point working in British B-pictures.

Most of these individuals eventually returned to Hollywood for careers in television or relocated to Continental Europe, especially Italy. Some, however, established long-term careers for themselves in the UK such as William Sylvester (Devils of Darkness 1964), and the star of the film under review here, Robert Hutton.

Something of a legend within the British film industry, mainly because of their continued existence, in various guises and incarnations, from the end of the 19th century until the start of the 1980s, Butcher’s are probably best known for being very prolific suppliers of quota fillers in the areas of crime thrillers and melodramas between the late 1940s and early 1960s. The majority of these were adapted from minor novels, provincial theatrical plays and radio serials. To maintain a consistent level of filmmaking, the company tended to employ a stock company of familiar supporting and character actors, together with a recurring group of journeyman production talent. Many of them appear here, making The Man from Tangier a quintessential piece of Butcher’s cinema from its era.

On this occasion what may be surprising is that, despite the screen credit “The Man from Tangier by P. Manning O’Brine” implying otherwise, this venture’s screenplay is not an adaptation of an existing source but rather an original piece of work. This is made even more surprising by the number of recurring elements found particularly in literary and theatrical adaptations from the period. Among these is a plot revolving around the existence of some item of importance to the criminal fraternity left behind by the Nazis. What was usually involved was lost or stolen gold bullion, diamonds or counterfeit currency (often US dollars), but here is the means to create an array of valuable documents of all types.

Another recurring feature is the presence of a sultry foreign woman (Lisa Gastoni) with a hidden past, along with the presence of a gang of international villains, with highly suspect accents, led by Martin Benson, Leonard Sachs and Derek Sydney. Even more than ten years after the end of World War II, the issue of refugees and other displaced persons was still providing many British potboilers with background material for spy thrillers and other tales of foreign intrigue. The only real deviation from the formula from other films of this type is that rather than the hero being a professional, along the lines of a detective, journalist or intelligence agent, Robert Hutton has the rather more exotic occupation of movie stuntman.

It does not seem entirely outside the realms of possibility that P. Manning O’Brien’s material did in fact begin life as a theatrical venture. That impression is underlined by the fact that much of the action is limited to a few sets, important plot information and characterisation is conveyed by long, static dialogue exchanges and the camera appears to be located from the front stalls of the theatre. Much of this dialogue is banal and only succeeds in slowing down the narrative pace of the movie, making its rather meagre 66 minute running time something of a chore to sit through.

Matters are not helped by Lance Comfort’s direction. Comfort had helmed some major pictures for studios like British National Films, Paramount British and Associated British Pictures (ABPC), of which Hatter’s Castle (1941), Bedelia (1946) and Daughter of Darkness (1948) are particularly highly thought of. By mid-1950s, however, Comfort was alternating between shooting television dramas and churning out generally unremarkable second features and B-movies for companies like Butcher’s, Mancunian, and latterly Planet. Here he handles the very familiar material in a thoroughly routine manner. He particularly fails to pull off one of the film’s most potentially exciting sequence where Hutton packs Gastoni’s belongings into a case in her flat, while the armed Benson hides just out of sight in a wardrobe.

Although Geoffrey Faithfull’s deep-focus cinematography adds some lustre to the proceedings, visually the film unremarkable with little in the way of imagination or creativity. Comfort and his crew are unable to obscure the project’s meagre resources, notably the bog-standard sets by John Stoll, whose nightclub venue actually looks more like someone’s living room.

One-time Warner Bros contract player Robert Hutton makes for a rather bland, if not entirely dislikeable hero. Even though his character is a movie stuntman, he proves something of a liability in a fight, usually coming off second best in a brawl with the villains or their henchmen. Luckily for him, they prove to be even more inept that he is, particularly when it comes to interrogating Armstrong (Emerton Court) and, later, Hutton. They also appear to be entirely incapable of disposing of troublesome witnesses. The police, meanwhile, do not inspire much confidence either. Led by the gruff Robert Raglan, they miss vital clues, arrive at the climax of the film too late to actually achieve a result, and appear content to merely observe events as they develop. They could not be described as pro-active.

Glamorous Italian import Lisa Gastoni was largely wasted during her British movie career that ran for some eight years from 1953. While she is certainly sultry here, she is given very little to do, apart from being employed as the typical damsel-in-distress. A potentially fascinating back-story about her losing her family in the Holocaust is not developed to any degree, and ends up being a very minor and frustrating plot detail.

Where a low-budget effort like The Man from Tangier is really of interest is in its position to offer character and bit part actors more substantial roles than they would normally be allocated when working for larger studios like Rank and ABPC. Here, the biggest impression is undoubtedly made by one of the leading supporting players of the 1950s and 1960s, Martin Benson. Benson easily dominates every scene that he is in with his oily and reptilian criminal mastermind Voss. He is particularly impressive when arguing or double-crossing his associates, played by Leonard Sachs and Derek Sydney, providing some of the movie’s few dramatic fireworks.

One other redeeming feature that the production has is the relatively large amount of location shooting. This provides viewers with a nostalgic view of London and the Home Counties that either no longer exists or has changed beyond all recognition. Among the most striking locations are Victoria Railway Station, Soho and Portobello Market, from where Lisa Gastoni is drugged and kidnapped. Interestingly, the mews property where the villains hole up in later turned up as Johnny Alucard’s domicile in Alan Gibson’s late period Hammer vehicle Dracula A.D. 1972 (1972). The exteriors are well used by Lance Comfort and Geoffrey Faithfull, and inject some much needed vitality into the proceedings, as well as making the work stand out from similar studio bound ventures from the same period. Vintage car enthusiasts should also gain some enjoyment from the picture with marques like Humber making an appearance.

In a departure from the usual warehouse setting, The Man from Tangier has its climax in the much more photogenic confines of an airfield near Nettlefold Studios in Walton-upon-Thames. Here, the villains turn on each other with pistols, resulting in a surprisingly high body count, while Hutton proves he has a mean right hook. Although the actual shootout is ineptly handled by Comfort, the setting is at least more original than was the norm for such a venture.

The Man from Tangier managed to secure an American release through Republic Pictures under the title Thunder Over Tangier.

Apart from occasional US ventures like Eugene Lourie’s The Colossus of New York (1958), and his own directorial debut with the cult favourite The Slime People (1960), Robert Hutton worked largely in the UK until the mid-1970s when he returned home. His British appearances included a number for director Freddie Francis such as the Amicus anthologies Torture Garden (1967) and Tales from the Crypt (1972), as well as many TV roles.

Lisa Gastoni, meanwhile, returned to her native Italy at the start of the 1960s where she worked steadily until the late 1970s. Some of her titles included Robert Bianchi Montero’s peplum Tharus Figlio di Attila (1962), Antonio Margheriti’s sci-fi adventure I Diafanoidi Vengono da Marte (1966), and Carlo Lizzani’s Mussolini: Ultimo Atto (1974).

Author Brian McFarlane has written a biography of Lance Comfort, published by Manchester University Press.

©Iain McLachlan 2006