The Man In The Back Seat

Bluesky

The Man In The Back Seat is a British second feature that was released in 1961. It is a short (about an hour) tightly scripted piece of neo noir set during a single night night in London. Two small time crook, Tony (Derren Nesbitt) the criminal 'mastermind' and Frank (Keith Faulkner) the easily led, rob a bookmaker Joe Carter (Harry Locke) as he leaves a greyhound track. Their plan is simple: batter the bookie over the head and make off with the day's takings. Things don't go exactly according to plan.

Tony and Frank attack the bookie, knocking him unconscious, only to discover that the money is in a bag chained to his wrist. Stealing his car, they travel round the cityscape clothed in night, first looking for a way to get the bag off the man's wrist, then for a way to get rid of the unconscious man. If the pair had done anything sensible then things might work out, but they fail to alight on a good idea.

After a couple of almost desperately comic encounters, they return to Frank's house. Frank's wife Jean (Carol White) is none too pleased. White brings a kitchen sink sensibility to her scenes. She is the only real antagonist to Nesbitt's Tony. Nesbitt made something of a name for himself playing slightly effete, somewhat homoerotic villains such as the SS officer Major Von Hapen in Where Eagles Dare and, memorably, 'Sandy Youth', a blackmailer of gay men in the 1961 film Victim. At one point Jean yells at her husband, "Why didn't you marry him instead of me?"

The streets of London are dark and grimy, full of shadows. They are not paved in gold but lit harshly by headlights and storefronts. The film's noirish credentials are boosted by the Austin A125 Sheerline DS1 with its late 1940s styling, its bulbous lines opposed to the futurist fins and angularity of models popular in the early Sixties. The interior of the car is high contrast, expressionistic. The view through the rear windshield has the blown out headlights of the tailing cars. Someone is always following them. What they have done is catching up.

In the finale, the film edges towards the Gothic. It is Frank's conscience that does the catching up. There is something reminiscent of The Tell Tale Heart about it.

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