Saloon Bar(1940).Against a background of Christmas and the pending arrival of another baby for the landlord, a group of pub locals lead by bookie Joe Harris set out to prove that former customer Eddie Graves is not guilty of the murder for which he is due to be hanged in the morning. Written byJeremy Perkins <jwp@aber.ac.uk>... Synopsis Saloon Bar(1940)
Movie Title: Saloon Bar(1940)
Run Time: 76 min
Rating: 7.2 / 10
Genres: Thriller
Release Date: 2 November 1940 (UK)
Director: Walter Forde
Writer: John Dighton,Frank Harvey (play), more credit ... and other credits
Actor: Gordon Harker,Elizabeth Allan,Mervyn Johns
This is probably the greatest film, set entirely inside a pub, ever made (admittedly a small field). The interest is not on the whodunit plot, and certainly not on the plausibility of the premise that the regulars in a pub could solve a mystery in a single night before closing time. But the combination of a group of vintage character actors doing their stuff, in a setting dripping with nostalgic possibilities, is irresistible. Mervyn Johns at his most lugubrious, spending virtually the entire picture on a barstool; Gordon Harker as a bumptious bookie; Roddy Hughes as a vague, cheery doctor; a wonderfully characterised set of bar staff; a hilarious group of cheeky carol singers (including the young Roddy McDowall). The film gives a tremendous sense of the small communities in the middle of London in the immediate post-war, and the transient populations of rich and poor alike who might wander through. The historians and sociologists can detect the wartime social solidarity about to break down; those who lived through the times can enjoy the nostalgia. Warm, funny and brilliantly realised.
