Crossroads to Crime

Crossroads to Crime
Title screen
Directed by	Gerry Anderson
Produced by	Gerry Anderson
Written by	Story: Edgar Wallace Script: Alun Falconer
Starring	Anthony Oliver Ferdy Mayne George Murcell Miriam Karlin David Graham and others
Music by	Barry Gray
Cinematography	John Read
Editing by	David Elliott
Studio	AP Films
Distributed by	Anglo-Amalgamated
Release date(s)	November 1960
Running time	57 minutes
Country	United Kingdom
Language	English
Budget	£16,250

Crossroads to Crime is a 1960 British crime film, the directorial debut of Gerry Anderson and the only motion picture of his production company, AP Films. Known for his "Supermarionation" television series of the 1950s and 60s (such as Thunderbirds) which subscribed to the science fiction genre and starred marionette puppet characters, producer-director Anderson accepted an offer from distributors Anglo-Amalgamated to shoot an hour-long, low-budget B film after development on Supercar encountered distribution difficulties. Anderson's first production to include live actors, Crossroads to Crime details the investigations of a police officer (Anthony Oliver) who, without support from his colleagues, confronts and brings down a ruthless vehicle hijacking ring in an undercover mission.

Filmed predominantly on location in England from May to June 1960, Crossroads to Crime includes cast members who appear in later Anderson productions. It incorporates an instrumental score from composer Barry Gray who, along with other production personnel such as John Read and David Elliott, also continued their association with Anderson after the completion of the shooting. A box office failure, Crossroads to Crime has attracted a range of critical opinions since its release in November 1960. Sometimes seen as a fair "cops and robbers" thriller,^[1] it has also been denounced for Alun Falconer's scripting,^[2] the editing of Elliott^[3] and the plainness of its sets due to its modest budget.^[2] The film has been screened once on British television since it ended its brief cinema run.^[1]

Plot

Police Constable Don Ross (Anthony Oliver) uncovers a group of lorry hijackers operating from the back of a transport café. After an unsuccessful pursuit of a car holding the café owner, Connie Williams (Miriam Karlin), Sergeant Pearson (Arthur Rigby) scoffs at his concerns that the criminals are responsible for a spate of vehicle thefts along the A1 road. Deciding to start a private investigation of the group, Ross approaches Diamond (George Murcell) and accepts bribes from the gangster as an assurance of his silence.

However, the officer continues to gather incriminating evidence as the hijackers steal a £10,000 consignment of cigarettes at Connie's café. While preparations are made for a further robbery — the target being a £20,000 load of nickel ingots — Ross joins the assault himself in a bid to topple the ringleader, Miles (Ferdy Mayne). Diamond learns the truth of Ross's actions and threatens him with a gun. At this point, fellow gang member Johnny (David Graham) shoots Diamond dead and reveals himself to be another undercover police officer who has infiltrated the gang's set up.^[4]

Production

Following the success of Four Feather Falls from 1959 to 1960, Gerry Anderson approached Anglo-Amalgamated for work after broadcaster Granada Television rejected his plans for a new Supermarionation television series, Supercar.^[5] Known for distributing such films as the Carry On series,^[6] Anglo-Amalgamated had helped to commission Four Feather Falls after accepting the series pilot,^[7] and often produced low-budget B films with short running times to increase the proportion of British-made material in its output.^[6]

Desperate for a project from Anglo-Amalgamated's Wardour Street financiers Nat Cohen and Stuart Levy, and keen to establish himself as a motion picture director, Anderson agreed to make such a film on a low budget of £16,250 and without a contract.^[6][8] Alun Falconer, writer of the 1960 Peter Sellers thriller Never Let Go and crime drama The Unstoppable Man, scripted the film.^[6] As an in-joke, Four Feather Falls is referenced in dialogue when truck drivers stopping at Connie's café suggest a tune from the series soundtrack as the next jukebox record.^[9]

Casting

Supporting cast[8]
Actor	Character	Actor	Character
Geoffrey Denton	Butler	Arthur Rigby	Sergeant Pearson
Peter Diamond	Escort Driver	David Sale	Young Man 1
Patricia Heneghan	Joan Ross	Terry Sale	Young Man 2
William Kerwin	Martin	Bill Sawyer	Lorry Driver
Victor Maddern	Len	Donald Tandy	Basher
Harry Towb	Paddy	J. Mark Roberts	Phillips

Impressed with his performance in a West End production of the Agatha Christie murder mystery The Mousetrap, Anderson cast Welsh actor Anthony Oliver in the lead role of Police Constable Don Ross.^[6] David Graham, appearing as undercover agent Johnny, had starred in an episode of the television series Martin Kane, Private Investigator that Anderson had directed in 1957.^[8] A number of the cast contributed to later Anderson productions: George Murcell (Diamond) provided the voice of Professor Rudolph Popkiss in earlier episodes of Supercar, while Graham voiced parts in Stingray and Thunderbirds.

Anderson recalls that German actor Ferdy Mayne (Miles) on occasion misinterpreted the script, and that a scene between Oliver and Miriam Karlin (Connie Williams) set at the café had to be reshot more than once when Karlin inadvertently upstaged Oliver, altering the arrangement of the sequence so as to obscure his face from the camera.^[9] Terence Brook, hired for the part of gang member Harry after being noted for his "tough-guy" appearance in an advertisement for Strand cigarettes, had to be doubled by David Elliott, the editor and second unit director, in one stunt sequence which depicted the character jumping off the back of a lorry.^[10]

Filming

Shooting ran in and around Slough, Buckinghamshire and Maidenhead, Berkshire for five weeks from May to June 1960.^[2][5] The location filming in Slough included the AP Films Studio itself (appearing as the gang's warehouse), a café on the other side of the street (the main hideout), Burnham Beeches^[2][10] and points along the A4 road.^[8] The production team also filmed briefly at Halliford Studios at Shepperton, Surrey.^[6] On one occasion, when the production had fallen behind schedule and a night shoot at the café had stretched into dawn, crew members attached black drapes to the windows to obscure the light and permit the filming to finish.^[2] Production staff such as John Read, the cinematographer, and Elliott remained associates of AP Films for later Anderson productions. Sylvia Anderson performed the role of continuity supervisor under her maiden name, Thamm.^[1] With production completed, Gerry terminated his first marriage and he and Sylvia married.^[1]

Post-production

Composer Barry Gray recorded his score in six hours^[11] on 21 June 1960,^[8][9] The opening titles music re-appears in the Supercar episode "The White Line", the Fireball XL5 episode "The Robot Freighter Mystery" and the Captain Scarlet and the Mysterons episode "Manhunt".^[8] In a biography of Gray, it is suggested that the instrumental tone of the soundtrack is emulated in subsequent Anderson series such as Thunderbirds.^[12] To attain a U certificate from the British Board of Film Classification, Elliott dubbed over profanities such as "bloody" (replaced with the milder "ruddy").^[9] For the purposes of making the film accessible to American audiences, the post-production process also substituted references to "quid" as a British slang term for the pound sterling.^[9] The BBFC awarded its U rating on 26 July 1960.^[8]

Distribution

Although Crossroads to Crime has not been released on home entertainment formats, it has been broadcast at least once on British television.^[1] The British Film Institute possesses a print of the film, which screened at the Pictureville Cinema of the National Museum of Photography, Film and Television in Bradford in 1997 to commemorate Anderson's motion picture career.^[1] The tagline "£20,000 the Prize and Death the Price!" accompanied the original 1960 cinematic release.^[1]

Reception

When the film finished and the lights came up, there was complete silence. Then Nat Cohen turned round slowly and said, "Well, I've seen worse." In retrospect, I can smile about it. But whenever I work on a production I give it my all in terms of energy and hours spent trying to get it right. Crossroads to Crime was no exception. So at the time I felt terrible about it not being up to the standard I'd hoped it would be. I felt sick as a parrot.

Gerry Anderson (1996)^[13] recalling the reception at the test screening

Although box office reception of Crossroads to Crime has been poor since its release in November 1960, critical reaction has remained mixed.^[9] Anderson has branded his production "possibly the worst film ever made",^[1] while David Elliott remembers it as "awful".^[3] In publicity for the puppet film Thunderbirds Are Go in 1966, on the subject of Crossroads to Crime, Sylvia Anderson stated, "The less said about it, the better".^[14] She affirms that it "hardly ranks as one of our best efforts".^[15] Unimpressed, Cohen and Levy did not offer Anderson further commissions for Anglo-Amalgamated.^[5] However, Monthly Film Bulletin stated, "Quick off the mark, this modest little thriller soon settles down into a routine 'cops and robbers' format, efficient if not always too convincing."^[1] In an October 1960 issue, Kine Weekly credited Crossroads to Crime as being "refreshingly free from pretence"^[9] and added, "The film's moral is lofty, its tender domestic asides encourage feminine interest, and the climax is a corker."^[9]

Anderson biographers Simon Archer and Marcus Hearn describe Mayne as a "saving grace" for the film,^[2] but deem Barry Gray's music overbearing and unsuited to the subject matter, stating, "Its innovative combination of booming brass and twangy electric guitar was possibly intended to evoke the contemporary sounds of Stanley Black or John Barry, but fell wide of the mark on both counts."^[9] Crossroads to Crime is summarised as "irredeemably compromised by its prosaic settings, convoluted screenplay and miniscule budget".^[2] Supermarionation historian Stephen La Rivière asserts that the film is "remembered with dread"^[3] and that "the wafer-thin plot is a tedious affair",^[3] proceeding to criticise the editing for leaving a final cut that is "more than a little rough around the edges".^[3] He suggests that the little attention that Crossroads to Crime receives can be attributed to the fact that the Andersons later produced the highly successful television series Thunderbirds.^[10]

References

1. ^ ^{a b c d e f g h i} "Feature Film Productions: Crossroads to Crime". fanderson.org.uk. Archived from the original on 21 February 2008. http://web.archive.org/web/20080221134355/http://www.fanderson.org.uk/prodguides/movies.html. Retrieved 5 August 2010. 
2. ^ ^{a b c d e f g} Archer and Hearn, 56.
3. ^ ^{a b c d e} La Rivière, 47.
4. ^ Crossroads to Crime is not available in any commercial home entertainment format. The plot summary of this article is referenced to The Complete Gerry Anderson: The Authorised Episode Guide (Bentley, 301) and What Made Thunderbirds Go! The Authorised Biography of Gerry Anderson (Archer and Hearn, 56).
5. ^ ^{a b c} Bentley, Chris (2001). The Complete Book of Captain Scarlet. London: Carlton Books. p. 11. ISBN 1-84222-405-0. 
6. ^ ^{a b c d e f} Archer and Hearn, 55.
7. ^ Archer and Hearn, 50.
8. ^ ^{a b c d e f g} Bentley, Chris (2008) [2001]. The Complete Gerry Anderson: The Authorised Episode Guide (4 ed.). Richmond, London: Reynolds and Hearn. p. 301. ISBN 1-905287-7-47. 
9. ^ ^{a b c d e f g h i} Archer and Hearn, 57.
10. ^ ^{a b c} La Rivière, 48.
11. ^ de Klerk, Theo (25 December 2003). "Complete Studio-Recording List of Barry Gray". tvcentury21.com. Archived from the original on 13 December 2009. http://www.tvcentury21.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=67:complete-studio-recording-list-of-barry-gray&catid=116:barry-gray&Itemid=182. Retrieved 5 August 2010. 
12. ^ Titterton, Ralph; Ford, Cathy; Bentley, Chris; Gray, Barry. "Barry Gray Biography" (PDF). lampmusic.co.uk. Archived from the original on 22 July 2010. http://www.webcitation.org/5rP7v8Ktg. Retrieved 5 August 2010. 
13. ^ Archer, Simon; Nicholls, Stan (1996). Gerry Anderson: The Authorised Biography. London: Legend Books. p. 45. ISBN 0-09-978141-7. 
14. ^ La Rivière, 187.
15. ^ Anderson, Sylvia (2007). My Fab Years! Sylvia Anderson. Neshannock, Pennsylvania: Hermes Press. p. 40. ISBN 1-932563-91-1. 

Bibliography

• Archer, Simon; Hearn, Marcus (2002). What Made Thunderbirds Go! The Authorised Biography of Gerry Anderson. London: BBC Books. ISBN 0-563-53481-8. 
• La Rivière, Stephen (2009). Filmed in Supermarionation: A History of the Future. Neshannock, Pennsylvania: Hermes Press. ISBN 1-932563-23-7. 

External links

• Crossroads to Crime at the Internet Movie Database
• Crossroads to Crime at AllRovi