Film

What's on at the cinema plus reviews of the latest movie and DVD releases

Search cinema listings

Browse cinemas A-Z

Search 20,000 reviews

 

Temptation Harbour (1947)

Director: Lance Comfort

Average user rating
No reviews

Movie review

From Time Out Film Guide

Reviewers contrasted this unfavourably with Renoir's La Bête Humaine, but Simenon's story, with the fates leading a well-intentioned hero to his destruction in the docks of Dieppe (here Newhaven), now looks like an interesting bridge between the gloomy French melodramas of the '30s and American film noir. Newton is the harbour signalman who retrieves a suitcase full of money after witnessing a murder, fails to report it to the police, and finds himself the object of murderous and mercenary interest. He gives a wonderfully tension-ridden performance, fleetingly caressing Simone Simon's slip, erupting into exasperated anger with the nervy Hartnell, but never allowing full expression to the lust and violence clearly visible beneath the kindly surface. The ending may appear disappointingly conformist, and Simone's bored femme fatale fails to fulfil her potential (despite having 'enough atomic energy in the lobes of her ears to flatten London'); but this is the price one has to pay for Comfort's dogged refusal to simplify, to sacrifice realism to melodrama, which is in itself interesting.

Author: RMy

Time Out Film Guide


  • Print this page
  • Send to a friend

What do you think?
Post your review now

clear rating
Min 1 star. Zero stars will be treated as unrated.

*mandatory fields





Top Stories

A Farewell To Tartan Films

A Farewell To Tartan Films

To mourn the loss of the great Tartan Films, Time Out remembers a few of the best films to emerge from their impressive canon

Jason Bateman: interview

Jason Bateman: interview

Jason Bateman – star of ‘Hancock’, alongside Will Smith – talks to Time Out about his comic influences and how to pretend to throw a car

Ten Great Head Shots In The Movies

Ten Great Head Shots In The Movies

Lots of people get shot in the head in the new film 'Wanted'. Read our guide to some other great head shots on film

Set visit: 'The Damned United'

Set visit: 'The Damned United'

Dave Calhoun gets his training kit on as he visits the set of a new film about football legend Brian Clough’s torrid spell at Leeds United in the mid-1970s