How Graham Greene earned The Spectator a place in cinematic history

When Graham Greene impulsively took up film reviewing for The Spectator in 1935, he was not yet the renowned literary figure he was to become, and thus, like so many other writers in those parlous economic times, prosaically in need of cash. As it happened, the confluence of interests between a 30-year-old novelist of modest commercial success and Derek Verschoyle, The Spectator’s literary editor from 1932 to 1939, resulted in something extraordinary — for there is nothing prosaic about these reviews. Greene’s opinions about the films he critiqued for the magazine over nearly five years constitute an impromptu cultural history of the 1930s, in addition to being a joy to read. That they led to Greene’s more lucrative occupation as a screenwriter makes his achievement all the more remarkable, since Hollywood in those days was just as indifferent to art and as merciless toward dissenters as it is today.

‘How, I find myself wondering, could I possibly have written all those film reviews?’ Greene later wrote.