Tag Archives: handmadefilms

The Cult Movie Club: The Long Good Friday (1980)

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Every post-1971 British crime movie has had ‘Get Carter’ and ‘Performance’ in its rearview mirror.

Made in summer 1979 but not released until 18 months later, ‘The Long Good Friday’ (original title: ‘The Paddy Factor’) has often been mentioned in the same breath as ‘Carter’. Is that justified?

Initially bankrolled by legendary impresario and producer Lew Grade, it was written by proper East Ender Barrie Keeffe (who reportedly knew Ronnie Kray), directed by Scotsman John Mackenzie and starred Brit acting ‘royalty’ Bob Hoskins and Helen Mirren.

When completed, the suits almost refused it a cinema run, deeming it too nasty, hoping to recut it and farm it out to television. A disgusted Mirren asked her friend Eric Idle to attend the premiere at the London Film Festival towards the end of 1980.

Idle was impressed and passed it on to his mate George Harrison, the main moneyman at newly-formed HandMade films. Harrison apparently loathed it but agreed it had hit potential. HandMade bought it for £700,000, funded by ‘Life Of Brian’ profits.

But how does ‘The Long Good Friday’ stack up in 2024? I watched the posh new 4K restoration – looks fabulous, but this film really belongs in a mid-’80s Cannon fleapit. With its casual racism/sexism/ableism and overlong dialogue scenes, it’s also now more redolent of ‘Sweeney!’, ‘The Squeeze’ and ‘Villiain’ than ‘Performance’ or ‘Get Carter’ – but is still fascinating and memorable.

There’s some real Brit nastiness, or ‘virtuoso viciousness’, as Pauline Kael called it in her ‘Carter’ review. Mackenzie comes up with three or four memorable set pieces (and a great final five minutes, apparently the first thing they shot, during which apparently the director drove the car and ‘fed’ Hoskins the entire plot of the film) which have given the movie legs. He also uses the London locations with some elan.

Keeffe comes up with some preposterously funny lines – ‘It’s like Belfast on a bad day!’ etc. – and Francis ‘Sky’ Monkman’s disco/prog/fusion score adds value. There’s also an amazing array of ‘Hey, it’s that guy/girl!’ actors, from Pierce Brosnan (whose swimming pool scene seems to have influenced Bronksi Beat’s ‘Smalltown Boy’ vid) to Gillian Taylforth.

Sadly though the key performance by Derek Thompson (Charlie in ‘Casualty’!) weighs the film down with its stoned insouciance and dodgy London accent (ironically, Thompson was born in Belfast).

And though some have compared Hoskins with Edward G Robinson and James Cagney (Keeffe apparently pictured a cockney Humphrey Bogart!), despite some amusing line readings these days he comes across more like Alan Sugar after a few too many espressos, whereas Michael Caine in ‘Carter’ had a kind of timeless, glacial rage.

Apparently under the influence of ‘Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels’, Empire magazine – astonishingly – voted ‘The Long Good Friday’ the #1 greatest British film in a 2000 poll. Hard to think it would get that accolade today. Still, it’s a fascinating snapshot of London on the brink of Thatcher’s decade, and a must-see for fans of 1980s cinema.

Further reading: ‘Very Naughty Boys’ by Robert Sellers

Book Review: Withnail & I (From Cult To Classic) by Toby Benjamin

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The ‘Withnail’ cult shows no sign of waning. Writer/director of the 1987 movie Bruce Robinson spent some of lockdown discussing the film while co-star Richard E Grant posted regular line-readings on social media. And now there’s news of a long-awaited, Robinson-endorsed stage play.

So Toby Benjamin’s excellent ‘From Cult To Classic’ seems to have arrived at the perfect time. Authorised by Robinson and written with his full co-operation, it assembles a veritable cornucopia of ‘Withnail’ info.

The brilliantly blunt Robinson foreword almost had movingtheriver punching the air with excitement. Elsewhere letters from his personal collection show correspondence around the film’s financing and script editing. There are anotated script pages, detailed location administration and premiere tickets. We even see Robinson’s London to Cumbria train tickets for the shoot. Richard Curtis and Richard E also donate personal letters.

There are brilliant on-set photos, many by official snapper Murray Close, some donated by Robinson and the cast (including a great one of a clearly mullered Ringo Starr). All the main cast members give long, interesting interviews, as do many key bit-part players (The Irishman, the ‘Get in the back of the van!’ cop, Farmer Parkin) and the hairdresser, stills photographer, makeup artist, cinematographer, production manager, costume designer and soundtrack composers Rick Wentworth and David Dundas. We even hear from the owner of Crow Crag (Sleddale Hall).

There are a few minor quibbles – the book is dotted with ‘celebrity’ endorsements of the film but you’d be hard pressed to recognise any of them, outside of Matt Johnson, Charlie Higson and Diane Morgan, and no biographies are provided. Also the book’s ‘distressed’ interior design will probably divide opinion.

But if you’ve seen ‘Withnail’ more than once, you have to have this book. Absolutely unreservedly recommended to scrubbers and terrible c*nts everywhere.