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Moon Over the Alley, The
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| Year: |
1976
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Director: |
Joseph Despins
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| Stars: |
Sean Caffrey, Basil Clarke, Debbie Evans, Peter Farrell, Doris Fishwick, Sharon Forrester, John Gay, Joan Geary, Leroy Hyde, Erna May, Norman Mitchell, Patrick Murray, Lesley Roach, Miguel Serdides, Vari Sylvester, Bill Williams
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| Genre: |
Musical, Drama |
| Rating: |
  5 (from 1 vote) |
| Review: |
The moon has risen over the alley where down and outs Sybil (Doris Fishwick) and Akki (Peter Farrell) opt to make their bed for the night, and Sybil sings to her friend by way of explanation when he asks her about it. They settle under their makeshift blankets and drift off to sleep as life in this London district winds down for the night, but when the sun rises, it's time for the inhabitants of number 19 on the road adjacent to wake up and seize the day. Landlady Bertha (Erna May) waves off her husband Bert (John Gay) and rouses her teenage son Ronnie (Patrick Murray), not knowing their peace is about to be interrupted...
The Moon Over the Alley was a production funded by the British Film Institute when such idiosyncratic ambition on a low budget was more common, although not necessarily more popular. This was the second and final film to be made by director Joseph Despins and writer William Demaresq after their previous film, Duffer, had not exactly set the world alight, and in this case was possibly one of the most obscure musicals ever made. Not that there were many grand numbers to be seen here, as all of the tunes developed organically out of the characters' interaction, so one will be singing along to the radio, or another will be showing off a new song he's written.
These songs were actually penned by Demaresq (lyrics) and Galt McDermot, who is still best known for bringing the world the stage sensation Hair in the sixties, although it was hard to say that this film represented his best work, not being immediately catchy and the words being a little precious, letting down his melodies somewhat. There's also the way that the format played with the form to be considered as well, because what started out as a denotation of the characters' emotions, beginning lightheartedly, wound up bitter and depressing, not traditional musical stylings but not completely unknown either.
It was just that the way in which the filmmakers chose to bring down a potentially uplifting mood was especially bleak, and would likely make you consider if you had really been spending your time wisely with a production that left such unpleasant feelings by its ending. The seeds of dejection were sown by a scene early on where a man from the council appears at Bertha's door and informs her that her house is going to be knocked down in a few months so he is giving the residents notice that they have to find somewhere else to live. Not exactly an original idea, but one which heralds an apparent purpose to the story, that purpose being to show that the whole area would be better off demolished.
And some of the citizens who live there, too. We drop in on various locals, mainly from number 19, as they go about their daily business from Ronnie tentatively going out with the newsagent's daughter whose bigoted mother does not approve because Bertha is German, to the West Indian couple with a young baby, to the barman trying to persuade his wife to stop her prostitution. As all this incident accumulates, a sour feeling does too as increasingly bad things happen to them: the nice West Indians end up bundled away in a police van during a demonstration they had nothing to do with, leaving their baby abandoned in the street, a gang of youths become menacing, and the barman struggles with alcoholism, unable to face his wife's predicament. If you're expecting things to look up before the final scene, you'd be wrong as by that time assault, rape and murder have occured and many loose threads are left hanging. You admire the fact that this was made, and it was made well, but it's almost perversely hard to enjoy.
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| Reviewer: |
Graeme Clark
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