Gideon's Day (1958)

Just perfect...

hyped garbage

It's hard to see any effort in the film. There's no comedy to speak of, no real drama and, worst of all.

A terrific literary drama and character piece that shows how the process of creating art can be seen differently by those doing it and those looking at it from the outside.

Gideon of Scotland Yard is a fine 1950s British detective film based on a book by the prolific writer John Creasey. It stars the inimitable Jack Hawkins as the gruff yet likable detective working hard on a number of overlapping cases during a single 24 hours in London. The film was directed by John Ford, of all people, the man best known for his epic American westerns, who brings a kind of slick stylish look to the screen.The running time flies past because this is a very entertaining movie, one of the fastest-paced films of the 1950s I've seen. There's never a slow moment, just a building of tension, suspense, and yes, humour, which delightfully offsets the darker and more tragic elements of the plot. Watching Hawkins trying to juggle various cases, crimes, criminals, superiors, underlings, and of course his home life, is a sheer delight. An exemplary supporting cast adds to the experience, making this an all-round winner of a film.

This is a run-of-the-mill police drama noteworthy for being directed by John Ford. Lots of familiar British character players give it some interest but it compares poorly with The Long Arm, another police picture also starring Jack Hawkins. I don't usually spot mistakes in films but I did notice two in this one. When policeman Andrew Ray follows killer Laurence Naismith down the street he picks up the newspaper Naismith has dropped and we see the headline. When we see it again it has a different headline. When Hawkins' wife Anna Lee takes a hot casserole from the oven she uses an oven cloth but two minutes later daughter Anna Massey takes the lid off with her bare hand.

This is the Ford movie that everyone hates – except of course for the entire cast and crew, plus a couple of film critics including yours truly. In production stills, a benign John Ford can be seen with his smiling god-daughter Anna Massey (making her film debut), and an equally happy Jack Hawkins. Co-starring with Jack, albeit in a very small role, is Anna's fellow Canadian, Dianne Foster. The rest of the players, made up of the best of British, parade many very familiar faces doing stand-out work, sometimes in much-larger-than-usual (Michael Trubshawe, Frank Lawton) or unfamiliar (Ronald Howard, Derek Bond, Marjorie Rhodes) roles.Oddly, it's Ronald Howard who walks off with the picture's acting honors. I've never thought highly of the young Howard's ability (in my opinion, he makes a really woeful series' Sherlock Holmes, although admittedly hampered by rock-bottom TV production values), but here he really excels as an impassioned artist who has turned to crime, and even manages to steal the limelight from super-charismatic Dianne Foster.Based on the 1955 novel by John Creasey, the first of a series of 21 books featuring Superintendent George Gideon of Scotland Yard, Gideon's Day, as the title implies, chronicles a typically crowded day in the inspector's calendar. Gideon deals with a variety of problems, petty nuisances and working-day events, some domestic, some humorous, but most dealing with crime and criminals, including a psychopathic killer (Laurence Naismith); an informer (Cyril Cusack) menaced by wide boys who are surprisingly brought to heel by a sissy curate; a payroll robbery; and finally (just when we think it is all over) an attempt to rob a high security bank vault.Through it all, Jack Hawkins displays plenty of bad temper, with lots of frustrated shouting from the very beginning almost to the end, but extremely little of his customary charisma. All the "acting", he leaves for the rest of the cast which is unfortunate because he is the central character and his lack of audience empathy throws the film right off balance.Despite murders, robbery and violence, the tone of the movie (as set by its opening song themes) is generally light. True, it has its suspenseful moments, particularly in the chase sequence with Cyril Cusack pursued in the fog, but Gideon's Day is not film noir. Ford gives equal weight to the humorous sequences which (with the exception of the brief court hearing with Miles Malleson and John Le Mesurier) tend to be tiresome rather than funny. Moreover, the lead character, Gideon, is never in any real danger, even when threatened by the lovely Dianne Foster.

This resoundingly ordinary film about the busy day of a Scotland Yard inspector is likely to be a disappointment to those seeking a great unknown film by a great film director. The themes and larger than life characters and scenery one tends to find in a Ford picture just aren't here. What we have instead is a likable Jack Hawkins playing a Scotland Yard detective with a busy life that gets in the way of his life at home. It's all pretty amusing, swiftly paced, and there are good bits throughout. Any of the above-average directors of in the US could have made this picture, and it would have looked pretty much the same. The one exception -- Jack Hawkins sidekicks act and behave in much the same way as John Wayne's sidekicks in his various Ford calvary movies.Best way to deal with this one is ignore it was directed by John Ford. Think of it as one of those cop shows on BBC America, except that it's the 50s and therefore the family being ignored is NOT dysfunctional, just comically bemused.Acting is all professional British -- all very good, efficient, and not terribly memorable when it is all over (except for Jack Hawkins, who does his usual good job here). And, because all the little mysteries must be wrapped up at the end of the day, none of those are especially complex or deep. So, at the end of the day, this is worth seeing, but not worth a film school thesis.