So much average

Good movie but grossly overrated

Fun premise, good actors, bad writing. This film seemed to have potential at the beginning but it quickly devolves into a trite action film. Ultimately it's very boring.

Tells a fascinating and unsettling true story, and does so well, without pretending to have all the answers.

Shifty crook, Jamie (Peter Reynolds), driver of the getaway car for a London bank robbery, drives off when he sees that the robbery has gone wrong. He ends up at his uncle's remote Devon farm where he tends to abuse the cold hospitality offered. After obtaining work at a garage in the local village, he chats up the easy middle class 'tart', Betty (Lana Morris), stealing from Kit, his uncle (Patrick Holt), to treat her, and himself. He receives a telegram from his wife, Linda (Elizabeth Sellars), to say that she is on her way down by train, and persuades his uncle, who had not known he was married, to let her stay at the farm. As there is only one bed, Kit agrees to sleep in the barn whilst Jamie is able to sleep more comfortably, with his wife, in Kit's bed. After a bad start, Kit and Linda get on well with each other, whilst selfish Jamie continues lying, stealing and his liaison with Betty One evening, Jamie meets up with his girlfriend, thieving from his employer's till to cover 'expenses'. The following day, Linda discovers him stealing from Kit's 'safe' in order to repay his employer. A struggle ensues, ending with Linda protecting herself with a heavy candlestick, accidentally killing her husband. She confesses to Kit who buries Jamie's body near the blocked entry to a disused tin mine. To all intents and purposes, Jamie has gone away, and eventually Kit and Linda's relationship develops into love, fuelling gossip in the village. Suddenly Jamie's mother, Kit's sister, arrives to see how her son is, but Linda's guilt overcomes her and she suffers concussion falling downstairs. In this state, she thinks the local doctor is her late husband, and the doctor hears her saying Jamie's name and that she had killed him. The police arrive the following morning, tipped off by the doctor, and whilst they are searching the old mine shaft, Kit explains all to his sister, who, although disappointed and saddened, will not say anything to the authorities. The police find nothing but, as they are leaving, Linda asks them to stay, and the film ends with us anticipating that Kit and Linda will tell them the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth! So help me - not a bad film to while away half a wet afternoon. Purely for local interest - the 'village' locations were mainly filmed in East Street, Ashburton, Devon. Tillingham's garage was situated between 'The Golden Lion' and 'The Red Lion' at the top of the hill. The stone 'folly' on the opposite side of the road, at the junction with Roborough Lane, is still there, and was probably a water trough for horses, or for washing clothes. One scene, filmed at the junction of North Street, looking up East Street, shows part of the Bank where I worked in the early 1960s!

What started out as a typical police pursuit ended up as a Gothic nightmare with eerie dream sequences, obviously a homage to those "Gainsborough Gothic" style movies that were so popular in Britain after the war.Jamie is on the run from a robbery gone wrong, even in the first few seconds his cowardly nature is revealed as he takes off, leaving his partners in crime stranded on the bank steps, when he hears a police whistle. He quickly travels up north to visit his taciturn Uncle Kit (Patrick Holt) on his farm in a remote little community. From a few small scenes - disregarding a "Close the Gate" sign, mishandling a horse, big noting himself at the pub to pilfering the till at the garage where he has managed to find work because of his dexterity with cars - a picture is painted of a scheming lout who the audience has no sympathy for. Suddenly Linda appears, his wife he says and for once he is not lying but she is as pretty and decent as Jamie is sly and calculating.Once Elizabeth Sellars steps out of the car and is captivated by the wild, vast landscape, the focus of the film changes. She was a fresh, young film face whose ethereal look was used to advantage here and with scenes showing her compassion for an injured dog or a cow having a difficult birth, she fits right into the farming life. Linda's arrival doesn't phase Jamie who has just started seeing the local rich, bad girl Betty (Lana Morris started out in the 1940s with plenty of promise but spent the 1950s in Bs) and has already stolen funds to show her a good time. Linda finds him stealing money from Kit's safe and stands up to him - things get physical and Jamie is accidentally killed. The rest of the movie turns into a guilt ridden manifesto. Kit and Linda already have feelings for each other and together they try to wipe the crime from the face of the earth. Linda's guilty conscience arises in a series of dreams where she is running through the church-yard, falling into the abyss and standing against craggy rocks and there is a nightmarish, Gothic quality about them. Then Jamie's mother turns up...............Peter Reynolds who played the cowardly Jamie unfortunately died at 45 in a flat fire. He had moved to Sydney, Australia in the early 1970s and was a fixture of the small screen in shows like "Boney", "Division 4", "The Rovers", "Barrier Reef" and "Homicide".

Jamie the bad sheep of the family gets involved in a robbery and flees to his relatives farm in the west country.subsequently his wife arrives.however the wife falls for farm life and Patrick Holt simultaneously.The wife finds Jamie stealing money from a tin box.she struggles with him and eventually hits him on the head.he dies and is buried on the farm.his absence is noted and eventually the police come to search the farm but cannot find the body.however in one of those logic defying moments that happen so often in films of that era it is clear that the wife will confess to the police.it is extremely slow and in the end rather dull and disappointing.

I just saw a pretty little UK drama, in the noir and Gothic style.The photography and score are awesome. The tale of a petty bank robber who tries to escape from the city where he knows he can be hunted by the police. So he goes to the country, to his uncle's farm, near the coast, where he works in a garage, repairing cars. But he keeps stealing, his own uncle, whose wife surprises our lead taking some money away. So they struggle and the young woman (SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS) accidentally kills the young. He dies right in the middle of the film, big surprise, as Janet Leigh in PSYCHO, under the shower.And his uncle's wife has to go on with her own guilt following her, as an obsession all along the feature. She and the uncle bury the body and the film goes on. Henry King could have make such a film, with Christianity influences. The ending is unfortunately predictable.Not a bad drama, very well made.