The punk vs. the Godfather
By Dennis Hartley
No day at the beach: Brighton Rock (2010)
“It seemed to Scobie that life was immeasurably long. Couldn’t the test of man have been carried out in fewer years? Couldn’t we have committed our first major sin at seven, have ruined ourselves for love or hate at ten, have clutched at redemption on a fifteen-year-old deathbed?”-Graham Greene (from his novel, “The Heart of the Matter”)
Did you ever get on a kick with a writer? It can be quite a passionate love affair. When I was in my early 20s, a friend loaned me a dog-eared paperback copy of The Heart of the Matter, by Graham Greene. The diamond-cut prose, compelling narrative, and thematic depth left me gob smacked. “Ah,” I thought, “so this must be that ‘literature’ of which they speak.” It was time to put Ian Fleming and Alistair MacLean behind me and kick it up a notch (when I was a child, I thought as a child, etc.). I had to have more of this, immediately. And so it was that I got on a Graham Greene kick, voraciously devouring virtually every word that he ever fought from his pen. As I plowed through the oeuvre, I began to notice prevalent themes emerging; most notably that whole Catholic thing (for someone like me, with a Jewish mother and a Protestant father, it was theologically fascinating). There was much ado about guilt, mortal sin, clutching at redemption, moral failure, lapsed faith…and more guilt. But you could still “dance to it” (in a literary sense).
The rich complexity and narrative appeal of Greene’s “theological thrillers” certainly has not been lost on filmmakers over the years; nearly all of his novels have been adapted for the screen (with mixed results). Probably the most well-known are two Carol Reed classics, The Fallen Idol (1948) and The Third Man (1949). Other notable adaptations include the 1942 noir, This Gun for Hire (based on A Gun for Sale), the 1944 Fritz Lang thriller The Ministry of Fear, John Ford’s 1947 film The Fugitive (based on The Power and the Glory), The Heart of the Matter (1953), The End of the Affair (1955; remade in 1999), The Quiet American (1958; remade in 2002) and two uncharacteristically light-hearted entries-Our Man in Havana (1959) and Travels with my Aunt (1972). All the aforementioned are worthwhile, but if pressed to pick a favorite Greene-to-screen (well, after The Third Man, natch)… it would be John Boulting’s 1947 thriller, Brighton Rock. 
That film was memorable on several counts. It was stylishly directed (Boulting later helmed one of the early nuclear paranoia thrillers, Seven Days to Noon and the classic comedy I’m All Right, Jack), well-scripted (by Greene himself, along with Terence Rattigan) and topped off by then 24 year-old Richard Attenborough’s indelible portrayal of the central character, a ruthless and ambitious hood named Pinkie Brown. In fact, Attenborough so thoroughly inhabits the creepy, sociopathic Pinkie that you find it difficult to connect the actor who plays this hateful little punk with the future Oscar-winning director of Gandhi (by then addressed as ‘Sir’ Richard). Any way you slice it, a tough act to follow, for anyone attempting to do a remake. And guess what-someone has.
For the new, BBC Films production of Brighton Rock (currently available on pay-per-view) writer-director Rowan Joffe has, for the most part, kept the original characters, chief plot points and thematic subtexts in place, but moved the time period up to the 1960s (Greene’s novel was first published in 1938). The story is set in 1964 Brighton; more specifically, on the eve of the infamous Mods vs. Rockers youth riots which took place at the popular English seaside resort that year (shades of Quadrophenia). Sam Riley (who channeled doomed singer Ian Curtis in Control, which I reviewed here) tackles the Pinkie Brown role. Pinkie is a low-rung mobster who has been scheming for dominance of his gang. When his mentor (Geoff Bell) is killed by a rival outfit that is attempting to monopolize the local gambling racket, Pinkie sees an opportunity to upgrade his own status by proactively seeking vengeance on his friend’s killer (Sean Harris). In their haste to grab the intended victim (on a crowded boardwalk and in broad daylight, no less) Pinkie and his cohorts get sloppy and involve an innocent ‘civilian’, a naïve young waitress named Rose (Andrea Riseborough). A ‘pavement photographer’, intending to take a picture of Rose, inadvertently gets an incriminating shot of the soon-to-be murder victim and his abductors. When Pinkie learns that Rose has a claim ticket for the photo, he ingratiates himself into her life, pretending to be romantically interested (while in reality only biding time until he can figure out what he’s going to do about her).
Joffe’s film left me feeling a little ambivalent. While on the one hand it is kind of refreshing to see a British mobster flick that isn’t attempting to out-Guy Ritchie Guy Ritchie, this version of Brighton Rock may be a little too somber and self-consciously weighty for its own good. Moving the time setting to 1964 doesn’t detract from the original, but it doesn’t necessarily improve on it, either (and did it really need ‘improving’?). In fact, large chunks of the film are essentially a shot-by-shot remake of the 1947 version. Joffe’s version does exude more of a Hitchcockian vibe; it is particularly reminiscent of Suspicion (especially once Pinkie and Rose are married). Riley is a good actor, and does bring a brooding intensity to the role, but his portrayal lacks some of the subtlety that Attenborough was able to inject. In Greene’s original novel, Pinkie is described by Rose as someone who, despite his youth, seems to “know” he is “damned”, and all of his actions are predicated on this feeling of quasi-religious predestination. Attenborough, I think, embodies that perfectly, while Riley simply comes off as preternaturally evil, like a boogeyman. Dame Helen Mirren feels a bit wasted as Rose’s employer Ida, who is suspicious of Pinkie and becomes a thorn in his side; oddly, her character (an important one in the book and the 1947 film) seems to have been downgraded here. The usually wonderful John Hurt barely registers; not really his fault as his character feels underwritten. The ubiquitous Andy Serkis chews the scenery in a couple of scenes, as the rival mob’s boss, and there is a standout supporting performance from Philip Davis (whose presence also brings a sort of symmetry to the Quadrophenia connection; he played ‘Chalky’, one of the principal Mod characters). There are worse sins than watching Joffe’s film, but if you prefer to clutch at redemption, rent the original.
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