Synopsis
After the war is over, two army pals take opposite paths in civvy street. One becomes a petty criminal, the other becomes a policeman.
Nightbeat
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Alternative Title
Night Beat
Genre
Releases by Date
Theatrical
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Sweden
12 Apr 1948
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UK12
Releases by Country
Sweden
22 Dec 1947
- Theatrical
UK
12 Apr 1948
- Theatrical12
Popular reviews
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Anne Crawford, Maxwell Reed and Ronald Howard star in this noir crime drama about two ex-servicemen who take very different paths after being demobbed, one joining the police force and the other involved in racketeering after drifting into a life of petty crime.
The film begins fairly conventionally while the soldiers are adjusting to their life on returning back home, but then becomes a surprisingly complicated five sided relationship (a romantic pentagon I guess?) as these very different characters and their stories intersect.
This moves it all into suitably noirish directions as Howard’s inexperienced civilian gets involved with the black market that boomed after the war; I really liked the parts focusing on this element of the story, with Reed’s…
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Nightbeat is a shapeshifter of a film, opening as a story about the return of two jovial serviceman to civilian life in London, and then morphing into a love story, about one of those servicemen and his friend's sister, before finally exploding the nasty crime picture that had been lurking in the background all along, raising to center stage the most gloriously icy of femmes fatale (Christine Norden as Jackie). The film's three phases are not equally or consistently effective, but Norden is magnificent as a woman so calculating even the most canny of crime bosses underestimates her, and Maxwell Reed makes for an extremely tall, pleasingly languid, criminal foil to both the film's good girl and its bad one.…
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Harold Huth’s drama is set after WWII, where two army friends join different sides of the law after struggling to adjust to civilian life. Starring Anne Crawford, Maxwell Reed and Ronald Howard.
Night Beat - which is rated 12 by the British Board of FIlm Classification - concerns two British commando best pals (Maxwell Reed and Ronald Howard) who join different sides of the law after the conflict.
Maxwell Reed and Ronald Howard both give good performances in their respective parts as Felix Fenton and Andy Kendall, the two buddies who find it hard to change to neutral life, so then go their separate ways and they couldn’t be any more different from one another, with one being up to…
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Something felt a little off about the Nightbeat (1947). This got terrible reviews when it was released too, so it wasn't just me struggling to appreciate it. But I didn't totally hate it either. Loved the face-slapping quarrel, and the fighting scenes were oddly fun too. I guess the main downfall was the lack of likable characters, and with that the pals on opposite paths didn't engage the way it should.
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A surprisingly alright low-budget drama from the 1940s.
All the main characters are pretty unlikeable, with the majority of actors putting on false and exaggerated accents - Ronald Howard, I'm looking at you! - which, for me, makes the film standout among others of a similar vein.
Christine Norden's singing voice is very noticeably dubbed but, other than this, there isn't too much to fault Night Beat on.
The film flew by nicely. -
A bit kooky and over-the-top in parts, but a perfectly respectable second-tier Brit noir.
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Army pals Ron Howard and Hector Ross pick new careers after the war. One becomes a copper and the other falls in with swindling spiv Maxwell Reed - who runs girls at a nightclub. I Say!
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Some fine harloting from Christine Norden in an otherwise humdrum post war Brit Noir. Notable for being one of Sid James' first on screen appearances but sadly no trademark cackling.
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A film noir snapshot of post war Britain - the music, dancing, fashion, bombed out buildings, sexual politics, social attitudes and anxieties and a take on women offenders that was to last another sixty years and counting (they’re mad, sad or bad - and this one is bad). If you lose interest in the plot (it’s exciting but needed a bit of polishing) and the quaint period moral underpinnings, sit back and enjoy the performances of familiar names and faces - the ubiquitous Sid James pushing the envelope of his range, Sir Michael Hordern, in a bit part and an early role for Michael Medwin (look him up if the name isn’t familiar). Marvellous.
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A snappy British noir in which Christine Norden makes a notable debut as the club singer who can't find love - the nominal leads are Hector Ross and Anne Crawford, but they are eclipsed by Norden and other secondary characters Maxwell Reed and Ronald Howard.
This is part social problem (soldiers finding peacetime employment) and potboiler (gangster troubles) and is engrossing throughout - a really nifty piece of cinema. You'll also spot Sid James in a good little bit long before his Carry On years.
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This is a somewhat sprawling and uneven Brit noir -- at times, the 90 minutes feels like 3 hours -- but nevertheless, there is lots to love about its gloriously seedy portrayal of London's 1940s underworld. Many British films of this era suffer from handicaps which are particularly debilitating in this genre: the preponderance of incredibly posh RADA-trained actors playing criminals, and the tendency to moralize in the most cringeworthy fashion with upright characters lecturing the audience on how crime never pays. There are elements of that here, but the film still takes a more prolonged look at the criminal underworld than many similar films, and is noticeably more violent.
Two soldiers arrive home from WW2, one of whom is…
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War buddies Ronald Howard and Hector Ross end up on opposite sides of the law in this noir-ish British crime thriller, with shady nightclub owner Maxwell Reed doing his best to steal Howard's girl. An engaging tale featuring some familiar names (Sid James as a morose, gimp-legged pianist, lower down the cast list, a chubby Michael Medwin as a spiv, and Michael Hordern as a police instructor).