Tiger Bay (1959)

Simply A Masterpiece

best movie i've ever seen.

By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.

The film never slows down or bores, plunging from one harrowing sequence to the next.

I was disappointed when I watched this film again.I saw it when I was a kid but it doesn't stand up to the test of time.The relationship between the killer and the girl just wouldn't work now in modern cinema.In this their friendship is innocent (no pun intended), but I am sure if this film was remade, Hollywood would put a much sinister slant on it. It's unavoidable in a way. She's 11 and he's early 20s.The film drags on far too much, and when all is said and done there isn't much of a story. It's a disjointed film, uneven and boring in parts.I didn't like it much and couldn't wait for it to end. The bleak surroundings and black and white print didn't help much.The acting is average. The ending unsurprising. Just 4/10.

"Tiger Bay" is significant for being one of the first films of the British New Wave. Influenced by the French and Italian neorealists, these films were often shot on location in a pseudo-documentary or cinema verite style.Though it was ahead of its time in showing aspects of life not usually displayed in film in the 1950s, "Tiger Bay" isn't as relentless in its realism as the more gritty flicks ("This Sporting Life", "Look Back In Anger" etc) that would be made in the following decade. As such, the film is unusual in that it straddles the line between traditional and modern social realism. It's too classical and slick to fit in with the more edgy New Wave films that would follow, but too grim to fit in with those that came before.In terms of plot, the film is simple. A young girl witnesses a Polish sailor murder his girlfriend. She thwarts the police's attempts at capturing the sailor, becomes friends with him, and together they attempt to escape by sea.Where the film excels is in it's portrayal of working class Cardiff. The street scenes, shabby apartments, and generally oppressive atmosphere, all offer a tangible feel of life in the era. Beyond this, the strange relationship between a wayward girl and a much older man, lends the story an interesting edge.7.9/10 - Though the film drags in the middle, its final act is as suspenseful as anything Hitchcock cooked up. Child star Hayley Mills is also excellent.Worth one viewing.

For a movie that starts with a murder fueled by rage and ends with a dangerous decision to be made in rough seas, Tiger Bay is one of the most touching and endearing studies of childhood and friendship you could hope to see. Please note that elements of the plot are discussed. When a young Polish seaman named Korchinsky (Horst Buchholz) returns to his home port in Wales after a long spell at sea, he is the happiest man alive. He has some money in his pocket and a good-looking girlfriend. He can hardly wait to arrive at her apartment flat, which he has been paying the rent on. But he meets someone else living there. When he finally locates his girl, he finds she's been seeing someone else, a man she thinks has "class." It's the old story. She begins screaming at him. He loses his temper and screams back. She pulls a gun from a dresser drawer and orders him out of her apartment and out of her life. In a mater of seconds he's wrestled the gun away from her and she's lying dead on the floor of multiple bullet wounds. And while this has been going on, ten-year-old Gillie (Hayley Mills) has been crouched down and staring at what she could see through the mail slot in the door. Gillie is bright and quick. She lives with her aunt down the hall. She's good at making up stories, not lies, exactly, but close enough. Her friends won't play cops and robbers with her because she doesn't have a toy gun. She loves to imagine adventures. Korchinsky hears the police arriving. He hides the gun and then hides himself. As soon as he disappears, Gillie nips in and takes the gun from where she saw Korchinsky hide it. But now Korchinsky spots her. For the rest of the movie we follow Gillie as she avoids Korchinsky, as she shows off the gun to a friend during choir, and as Detective Superintendent Graham (John Mills) questions Gillie and the neighbors to try to make sense of the murder. It doesn't take long for Korchinsky to abduct Gillie with a tale of escaping on an adventure to another country. He knows she is the only one who can identify him. Gillie, her head full of excitement, is no dummy, but she longs for what she imagines. Korchinsky, in fact, turns out to be a young man over his head, almost as young in some ways as Gillie. He begins to see Gillie as the same kind of uncomplicated dreamer in some ways he is. While he convinces Gillie not to give him away, he leaves her for a few hours so he can sign on to a ship soon to sail for Caracas. When Gillie is found alone and waiting for Korchinsky to return, Superintendent Graham must try to convince Gillie that Korchinsky is dangerous and that she must corporate to capture him. Gillie, despite the best efforts of Graham, will not betray her friend. The cat and mouse struggle between Graham and Gillie is one of the most amusing situations in the movie. The climax is on the freighter bound for Caracas just outside the three mile zone off the coast of Wales. The inspector has arrived on a pilot boat with Gillie to identify Korchinsky. He is determined to bring Korchinsky in. Just when it looks like Korchinsky will be safe, Gillie falls overboard in the high seas. The only one who sees her fall is Korchinsky. If he lets her die unseen, he will remain on the ship and be safe as it heads away from Britain. If he dives in to try to save Gillie, he will be picked up by the pilot boat, even if he saves her, and returned to Wales, sooner or later to be tried for murder. It's his choice and he has only seconds to decide. This was Hayley Mills first movie. She was 13 and she is extraordinary. Buchholz and Mills (her father) do fine jobs, but the movie fails or succeeds on whether or not the person of Gillie captures us. We not only have to identify with Gillie, we have to believe in her. Mills makes Gillie a person we root for, a person we understand why she won't turn in her friend even after she realizes he won't be taking her anywhere. Mills does all this with straightforward and unaffected charm, and without a speck of sentimentality. But nothing is perfect in this world, and Tiger Bay is cursed with one of the most awful screen scores I've ever heard. It's not only loud, it's cloyingly sentimental with tons of lush strings. Worse, it punctuates every tense scene with cliché-ridden horn stings and drum beats. The score does a disservice to the movie.

I was 2nd Radio Officer aboard the British cargo ship OSWESTRY GRANGE, which sailed regularly between the UK and the River Plate, from June 1958 until February 1959. At the beginning of October 1958, we were in Avonmouth (Bristol), when the "Tiger Bay" cast and crew came aboard to film the dock scenes, which were supposed to be in Barry. The ship's name was over-painted with the name LA PALOMA, and the white Maltese Cross on the funnel was transformed into a white square. When we sailed, we had to have our correct ship's name painted on boards, which were suspended over the bows, and only removed when filming was taking place. Our unique funnel must have caused a lot of puzzlement aboard other ships.We then sailed up and down the Bristol Channel for a few days, while the filming of John Mills' arrival and boarding from the pilot boat, as well as the chase and jump involving the Hayley Mills character, took place. The jump was performed by a stunt woman, who was very much bigger than Hayley. It was a cold day, and the Bristol Channel looked very uninviting, but the stunt girl was cheerful and unperturbed. Fortunately for her, only one take was needed! The film people, including John and Hayley Mills, were very friendly. Of course, we had no idea what it was all about.I didn't manage to see the film until I was serving with the Zim Israel line, when it was shown in a cinema on Mount Carmel in Haifa in June 1960. I'd expected to see myself in the scene where the ship was leaving Barry docks (i.e., Avonmouth), but I'd ended up on the cutting room floor.I now have the film on DVD, and love re-watching it, because it's a really good film, with an amazing performance by Hayley Mills, and also, of course, because I can see my old ship again, and recall my youth and those fascinating days with the cast and crew.