Dangerous Cargo (1954) User Reviews (11)

Fun, well-plotted British thriller

[Leofwine_draca · 6/10 · 25 November 2015]

A nice little B-movie thriller from mid-'50s Britain. The star of the show is one Jack Watling, who plays a mild-mannered airport employee who hooks up with an old war buddy (Terence Alexander) and embarks on a short-lived gambling career. Unfortunately for him, before long he's in debt with a loan shark, and a gang of bullion robbers have him in their sights. How will he get out of it?

This is a short, snappy thriller, well-paced and with an interesting story and characters to propel it along. The leading characters are flawed but a little too wholesome to really get behind, but the supporting characters are really interesting. Especially Alexander, playing against type as a spiv sort of character, and he's excellent - charming, and ruthless too. Watch out for John Le Mesurier being completely unconvincing as an Italian called Luigi!

Tired Script Borrows From Earlier Films

[malcolmgsw · 4/10 · 14 December 2010]

This is a film produced by the technicians union ACT.Presumably this was to provide employment for its studio technicians.However this is the sort of film that helped close cinemas by the hundreds at this time thus putting their cinema staff out of work.Much of this film was clichéd when it was made.Thus the anonymous boss who speaks to his gang by radio is a device first used in the 2 film versions of Edgar Wallaces "The Frog" which date back to the 1930s.The end of the film is slightly farcical.With the cops and robbers laying into one another ,the boss suddenly produces a weapon,and everyone,including his gang members stand still!Obviously none of the police thought that the gang would be armed.As mentioned in the other review John Le Mesurier does seem to have trouble in his role of "Luigi" in consistently maintaining an accent throughout.So what is supposed to be a dramatic moment loses its impact when Le Mes opens his mouth.Not one of his better efforts.

Weak Crime Thriller

[gordonl56 · 6/10 · 16 November 2014]

DANGEROUS CARGO – 1954

DANGEROUS CARGO is a lightweight crime thriller from the UK. There is really nothing new fans of the genre have not seen before. The easy to figure out plot has Jack Watling getting involved with some unsavoury types over a gambling debt.

Watling works at an airport warehouse that handles cargoes of gold bullion. A gang ran by Karel Stepanek have been watching the place. All they need is an in, and as it so happens, they have one. One of the gang members, Terrance Alexander is an old army buddy of Watling.

Alexander takes Watling and his wife, Susan Stephen out for a night of dining and a trip to the dog track. Watling wins some cash and thinks this is the life. What he does not know is that it is all a set up. The next few times Watling hits the track he loses his shirt. He is soon in debt to a bookmaker.

Needless to say the bookie is willing to overlook the debt for a bit of info on gold cargo deliveries. Watling is less than happy with this idea and tells the gang to get stuffed. He soon changes his mind after a sound beating and being told that the gang has kidnapped his young son.

Watling of course now agrees to go along with the deal. What he does is let his company in on what is happening. The Yard is quickly called in and a sting operation set up. When the gang try their hold-up the boys in blue are all waiting. There is a huge free for all with fists and clubs between the gang and the Police. Gang boss, Stepanek pulls a revolver but is disarmed by Watling after taking a round. The boy is rescued, Watling survives his wound and the film ends with him and wife Stephen kissing.

While not the worst crime film out there, the best thing that can be said about this film, is that it only runs for 61 minutes.

A darker, more dramatic ending would have made it a classic 'B' picture - but still better than one would have expected.

[jamesraeburn2003 · 7 January 2016]

An airport security officer, Tim Matthews (Jack Watling), meets a former army mate, Harry Preston (Terence Alexander), who is employed by a master criminal called Pliny (Karel Stepanek). Under his orders, Harry gets Tim into debt through gambling and then takes him to see Luigi (John Le Mesurier), Pliny's second in command, who, of course, has the ideal solution to his problems. For £500.00, Tim will have more than enough to clear his debts but, naturally, there is a catch - Luigi demands that Tim hands over the schedule for a bullion plane's arrival into Heathrow Airport. When Tim refuses, the gang abduct him and threaten him with his wife Jane (Susan Stephen). He then agrees to co-operate and the gang force him to act as an inside man by getting him to drug his colleagues' tea and to gain them access to the vault where £250,000 worth of gold bullion is being stored. But things turn out not to be as plain sailing as Pliny's thugs would have hoped.

A British b-pic heist thriller from ACT Productions, a company founded by the film technicians union with the aim of countering unemployment in the industry and it specialised in low budget programmers such as this. It went out on the Gaumont-British circuit supporting the Rita Hayworth picture, Miss Sadie Thompson in 1954. Trivia buffs will like to know that the storyline was provided by none other than Percy Hoskins who was chief crime reporter for the Daily Express newspaper.

Dangerous Cargo is better than one would have expected for a second feature with director John Harlow generating some tension and suspense but, alas, he is defeated by the obligatory happy ending that was always the way for these productions and one can see it coming from some distance off. A darker, more dramatic ending would have lifted this well above the average. Nevertheless, there are good performances from a cast that includes many familiar faces including John Le Mesurier (Dad's Army) and Terence Alexander (Bergerac) and the film has a good sense of place thanks to its authentic locations that are put to good use and good black and white lensing.

An entertaining hour

[scrubber · 7/10 · 25 July 2022]

Fairly typical 50's low budget British B movie. Reasonably entertaining and at a little over an hour is not long enough to outstay it's welcome. Jack Watling is the naive airport worker set up by the obviously dodgy Terence Alexander in a gambling scam which leaves him as a blackmail victim. John Le Mesurier who is usually seen as an urbane, middle class character plays the ruthless, foreign enforcer. Yes, that's ridiculous!. Stand out for me was Susan Stephen playing the dutiful wife of Jack Watling. I enjoyed every scene she was in. Can't think why!

"Violence is the only language some people understand"

[hwg1957-102-265704 · 6/10 · 18 April 2023]

Based upon a story by the famous crime journalist Percy Hoskins it concerns a security worker at an airport being forced by a gang of villains to supply them with information enabling them to make a gold robbery from the airport's vault. Playing the worker Tim is Jack Watling, ably suggesting an innocent helplessly caught in a tightening trap. Good support is given by sweet Susan Stephen as his wife Janie, Terence Alexander as the dodgy friend Harry and Richard Pearson as the loyal friend Noel. The great John Le Mesurier is also in it as a gang member but puzzlingly is saddled with playing an Italian. His accent wavers around implausibly. It could have been a more exciting film but it does hold one's attention throughout.

Barely passable time filler that fortunately doesn't take up too much of your time.

[mark.waltz · 3/10 · 1 June 2022]

I guess they were going out of the industry to find actors to star in the required amount of B quota quickies made by the British motion picture studios, and in this case, one that would be definitely considered their version of a poverty row film company. Jack Watling and Susan Stephen star as a struggling husband and wife having financial issues mainly over his gambling problem which leads him to become involved with a group of smugglers who use his position at work to aide them to get them access to cargo of valuable bullion, and not the kind that makes soup. They call him up when he's at home with rather cryptic instructions and of course this makes his wife suspicious.

The villains are one-dimensionally bad, reminding me of the types you'd see in low budget World War II movies, and the dialogue is really cliched. They try to make this into an intense crime thriller with little bits of comedy thrown in, but they seem inappropriate considering the storyline. The bouncy theme score doesn't help either. Fortunately this won't take up your day or tax your brain, although in my case, I struggled to stay interested.

Enjoyably ridiculous B movie

[johnshephard-83682 · 3/10 · 23 August 2019]

Utterly terrible - and therefore watchable for all the wrong reasons - B movie heist story with unconvincing characters, nonsensical plot and, in the version I saw on tv, at least one key scene either accidentally edited out, or not filmed at all, creating an unfortunate hole in continuity. Nice-but-dim Tim (Jack Watling) is led into gambling debts by old chum Harry, making him a prime target to collude with the villains in robbing gold from Tim's workplace. Mr Big, Pliny (Karel Stepanek) speaks as if he has spent months planning a cunning and complex heist, whereas in fact he has simply hired a few heavies to rob the place once Tim has drugged his security colleagues. As other viewers have alluded to, the final showdown - where the police, forewarned and prepared for the ambush of the villains, rather than simply outnumbering and arresting them, engage them in a fist fight but (what a surprise) the Mr Big has a gun - is laughable, and the real Met should sue. Mr Big also has a bag on his head, so he looks like The Elephant Man, and when he produces the gun the actors freeze, as if you have pressed the pause button on your remote. Fortunately the day is saved by the hero making a lunge at the gunman, and the fighting continues exactly from the point where they paused it, thus at least ensuring an ending in keeping with the rest of this risible dross. As for 'Luigi' - Sgt Wilson will be turning in his grave. Laughably bad but fun nonetheless. Susan Stephen is charming as Tim's wife, but why she would marry such a drip is beyond me - she does at least insist on them having separate beds!

Sad to find Susan Stephen trapped in this boring "B".

[JohnHowardReid · 3/10 · 16 August 2017]

An A.C.T. (Association of Cinema Technicians) Production, made at Nettlefold Studios. U.K. release through Monarch: July 1954. No U.S. theatrical release, but distributed to TV through Modern Sound Pictures. Australian release through Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer: 31 October 1955. 5,563 feet. 61 minutes. Censored by 90 seconds in Australia.

SYNOPSIS: A member of the security staff at a London airport loses heavily at the dog races, thus falling into the clutches of a blackmailing gangster.

VIEWER'S GUIDE: The British Board of Film Censors found no cuts at all were necessary in the original film in order that it might qualify for a "Universal" certificate, allowing it to be exhibited without any restraints on advertising and notification that it was suitable for screening before all audiences, including young children.

COMMENT: An excellent example of the worst in British B- picture=making. With the exception of the engaging Susan Stephen, the players are both unattractive and uninteresting.

The story, supporting this parade of no-talent, is even less appealing. Mercilessly padded out with circular, repetitious and boringly inconsequential dialogue, "Dangerous Cargo" is a chore to sit through.

Admittedly, director John Harlow attempts a few game tries to lift the movie's audience appeal, including a spot of location shooting at a real aerodrome, and a laudable endeavor to make a few packing cases go a long way at the climax, but he is stymied by the quota quickie budget and the utter poverty of talent in almost all the cast and technical crew - let alone the impoverished screen writing!

Routine 'Cops and Robbers' British B film

[new_market41 · 2 December 2010]

The plot of DANGEROUS CARGO has most of the basic ingredients of a standard mid-fifties British B film. Tom Matthews is a trusted precious-cargo handler at a main airport. He has a chance meeting with an old wartime colleague Harry who takes Tom and his wife Janie to the dog track and they gratefully win some money. However Harry is chauffeur to a gang leader who intends to mount a raid on the airport secure vault but they need inside information about when precious cargos arrive. So Harry takes Tom to the dog track again and encourages him to bet but Tom ends up heavily in debt to a bookmaker, money that he cannot pay. This leaves him open to blackmail by Luigi, one the gang leaders, who forces Tom to reveal when the next precious cargo is due.

The film offers a fairly rare leading role for easy-going actor Jack Watling but his acting abilities are barely tested with this one. Susan Stephen who looks and sounds uncannily like Haley Mills plays Janie his wife. The villains try to be classic 1950s B film stereotypes complete with foreign accents (genuine in the case of Karel Stepanek who plays the gang leader Pliny and phoney in the case of second-in-command Luigi played by John Le Mesurier). In fact the latter's 'foreign' accent cannot be sustained and he frequently lapses into 'home counties'. Pliny preserves his anonymity from the other motley gang members by addressing them from an adjoining room with the aid of a microphone, speaker and two-way mirror. It's hilarious stuff and a novel system similar to that used by villain 'The Voice' in the early 1960s British TV serial 'Gary Halliday '. It's a bit of a shock though to see popular actor Terence Alexander playing the two-timing Harry but he is smooth and convincing.

As a British B film aficionado I found it mildly entertaining but not a lot.

Little forgettable heist film from UK

[searchanddestroy-1 · 7 March 2024]

A very rare gem indeed, very hard to find, unfortunately it doesn't necessarily offers the expected stuff. It is lousy, talkative. Only the last ten minutes are worth the watch for heist film lovers, which I definitely belong to. It is not Peter Yate's ROBBERY nor Sidney Hayers' PAYROLL. No, even those last ten minutes don't justify this tepid piece of junk. Maybe the tiny budget explains this total mess. I usually crave for those small budget UK crime flicks. But only the bigger budgets are really interesting. Watch A PRICE OF ARMS instead, this latest is really worth. Forget this one once and for all.