The Stars Look Down (1940) :
Brief Review -
Dark secrets of coal mine and industrialisation exposed in British Film Noir. Based on A. J. Cronin's novel of the same name, this Carol Reed drama is a burning film noir for the early 40s. Well, this came a year before master John Ford's classic American family drama, "How Green Was My Valley" (popularly known for beating Citizen Kane and The Maltese Falcon at the Oscars), which also had a similar topic but with more family value. Reed's film is a very dark one, not because of the coal mines, but because it exposes love, betrayal, industrialization, and its politics in hard-hitting manners. Davey leaves his mining village on a university scholarship, intent on returning to better support the miners against the owners, as planned by his hard-working father. He falls in love with a city girl, only to be betrayed by her big demands, which he thought were her love for him. He returns and appeals to the company to stop the work at the coal mine, which is dangerous for the workers. As it happens, disaster strikes at the mine, leaving everyone to believe that Davey and his father were right to call for a strike. The cinematography is top-class for its time and surely scares you with all those Black and Dark frames. Michael Redgrave and Edward Rigby are the star performers here, while Margaret Lockwood has been given an unlikeable and weak character as she performs below standards. I don't know how successful Carol Reed was in the first decade of his career because most of his acclaimed films came after the mid-40s. But 1940 has to be one of the biggest years of his life as he delivered two brilliant films, "Night Train to Munich" and "The Stars Look Down," and both were challenging films for a newbie. I read that the film had different climaxes for the British and US versions, and believe me, both work, even if you just read them.
RATING - 7/10*
By - #samthebestest.
Dark secrets of coal mine and industrialisation exposed in British Film Noir. Based on A. J. Cronin's novel of the same name, this Carol Reed drama is a burning film noir for the early 40s. Well, this came a year before master John Ford's classic American family drama, "How Green Was My Valley" (popularly known for beating Citizen Kane and The Maltese Falcon at the Oscars), which also had a similar topic but with more family value. Reed's film is a very dark one, not because of the coal mines, but because it exposes love, betrayal, industrialization, and its politics in hard-hitting manners. Davey leaves his mining village on a university scholarship, intent on returning to better support the miners against the owners, as planned by his hard-working father. He falls in love with a city girl, only to be betrayed by her big demands, which he thought were her love for him. He returns and appeals to the company to stop the work at the coal mine, which is dangerous for the workers. As it happens, disaster strikes at the mine, leaving everyone to believe that Davey and his father were right to call for a strike. The cinematography is top-class for its time and surely scares you with all those Black and Dark frames. Michael Redgrave and Edward Rigby are the star performers here, while Margaret Lockwood has been given an unlikeable and weak character as she performs below standards. I don't know how successful Carol Reed was in the first decade of his career because most of his acclaimed films came after the mid-40s. But 1940 has to be one of the biggest years of his life as he delivered two brilliant films, "Night Train to Munich" and "The Stars Look Down," and both were challenging films for a newbie. I read that the film had different climaxes for the British and US versions, and believe me, both work, even if you just read them.
RATING - 7/10*
By - #samthebestest.