Although I can’t generally get too worked up about remakes, just as I can’t get too worked up about most things these days — too old; too tired; too long in what teeth I still have left (four, I think) — I suppose this Brighton Rock does have its work cut out.
Although I can’t generally get too worked up about remakes, just as I can’t get too worked up about most things these days — too old; too tired; too long in what teeth I still have left (four, I think) — I suppose this Brighton Rock does have its work cut out. The director Rowan Joffe, who also wrote it, has said it should not be compared with John Boulting’s 1947 classic film noir adaptation of the Graham Greene novel, starring Richard Attenborough as the unblinkingly sadistic Pinkie, and wishes it to be judged ‘on its own terms’, which is fair enough, but how can you? Once you have seen Boulting’s film, how can you un-see it and erase your memory bank?
I wish I could un-see it, and start afresh, as Mr Joffe would like, but it’s a big ask and while I don’t normally mind a big ask — ask me, and ask me big, as I will often say to people; go as big as you dare — this particular ask had me utterly defeated and, ultimately, this film came off the worse. As much as Joffe may have returned to the book, and as much as this Brighton Rock departs from Boulting’s, I still felt as if I’d already seen the definitive version of it. You may do better and, in a way, I hope you do, as I suspect this deserves a chance, but I just could not rise to the occasion, I’m afraid.
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