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Bob Hoskins.
I've not seen this movie who stars in this movie?
Bob Hoskins.
I largely agree with all of whats been said about the film. The final scene in particular, is undeniably one of the all time cinematic masterpeices.
What actually stays with me though is the scene when Shand realises he's been pitted up against a force he can't compete with - that look of horror upon his face is brief but memorable.
Yeah, some good scenes in the film - too many worthy ones to really list, although as a highlight I particularly liked the dialogue in the scene where Dave King, as the clean-cut-but-bad copper, meets Shand in some murky location and informs him that the forensics boys have been all over the remains of his Rolls Royce (which is on a trailer hitched to a Range Rover in the background) without success.
A good flick for car spotters too - for me the black Series 2 Jaguar XJ6 represented a dark force in itself.
Originally Posted by Cuffy
I may be mixing him up with somebody else with the same name, but I believe that Dave King was a singer-cum-comedian in the 50s and 60s before he turned to acting.
Apparantly, Bob Hoskins was in hospital being treated for a tapeworn infection when he read the script for The Long Good Friday. He'd appeared in Zulu Dawn and had wanted to eat local, African food, but came back with more than he bargained for.
I don't believe he has acted better than in this classic gangster film.
Except maybe in Who Framed Roger Rabbit?
Just consider what he did there, especially when he was handcuffed to Roger.
It's not easy to react to something that's going to be drawn in afterwards.
But he was very good in The Long Good Friday as well
In fact I think he's done a lot of good performances and it's hard to choose between his best ones.
Steve
You are quite correct, it's the same Dave King.
Until I first saw this flick (which by sheer coincidence, just happened to be on a Good Friday a few years back) I'd never really rated either Bob Hoskins nor Helen Mirren. I was so wrong!! I've never seen either of them in the same light again.
Is this movie a thriller?
It's a gangster film and a thriller.
The former because it concerns gangster Harold Shand's criminal empire. The latter because Shand - as played by Bob Hoskins - has to work out why, and by whom, that empire is coming under attack.
This film's Main Title music is superb. Composed by Francis Monkman - of the groups Sky and Curved Air - it is repeated to great effect in the famous car scene.
An excellent film, and the DVd special edition looks lovely. The BBC did a bit on it on the latest Film Programme BBC - Radio 4 The Film Programme - Home Page
One of Bobs best films,
Aitch,
The Long Good Friday: Vision of a dark future
Terrorists, transatlantic pacts, untrammelled greed: The Long Good Friday could be an ode for our time.
By James Mottram
The Independent
Published: 22 September 2006
A few years back, Bob Hoskins was turning into his drive when he hit another car. He got out of the car to apologise, he says, but "he recognised me and his face dropped. I could see these guys hanging up on meat-hooks in his eyes." Such was the power of the seminal British gangster film The Long Good Friday.
Reissued this week on DVD, what is remarkable about The Long Good Friday is just how fresh it remains. It's also prophetic. Set on the cusp of the Eighties, as Hoskins puts it, "What was extraordinary about it was that we were just on the verge of Thatcherism. It hit the nail so firmly on the head, of where the Eighties were gonna go."
It didn't start that way. The film was written by Barrie Keefe, whose connections to the East End underworld lent the film its authenticity, but according to the director John MacKenzie the original script was "not very good". "They took the Mafia guy to Stratford and went to see Coriolanus. It was tongue-in-cheek, almost 'Carry on Down the Avon.' It degraded the good bit - this idea of this mogul-gangster."
After no less than eight rewrites, the script took shape. The film begins with London kingpin Harold Shand (played by Hoskins) at the peak of his powers. Keefe recalled the Krays, but Shand emerged as a more modern gangster. "I'm not a politician," he says. "I'm a businessman with a sense of history."
From the moment we see him striding through Heathrow as if he owns it, accompanied by Francis Monkman's remarkable score, Shand rules in the manner of a Roman emperor. Hoskins testifies that the real-life criminals on the set taught him how to behave. "They say, 'Naw, Bob - don't shout. Remember the man's dignity.' They wanted the boss to be a proper boss, not a prat."
Shand is a curious mixture: bigoted, bullish and above all patriotic, he laments the demise of England. Yet with his public-school educated wife (Helen Mirren), his yacht and his Rolls-Royce, he is nouveau riche. The only difference between Shand and those in the City is his willingness to hang opponents on meat hooks when he wants information.
If any scene summarises his capitalist spirit, it's the boat party Shand hosts to welcome his US counterparts, and broker a deal with the Mafia. As the revellers float down the Thames, past a Docklands on the verge of redevelopment, Shand announces: "Our country is not an island anymore. We're a leading European state. And I believe that this is the decade in which London will become Europe's capital."
Boasting a contemporary outlook, this was not the foggy East End of the Sixties but a city in transition. "I wanted it to be a vibrant city, expressing the feel of the time at the beginning of the Eighties and the flash but real feeling of Harold," adds MacKenzie.
So it's no surprise that Shand talks of a "new London" and toasts to "hands across the Ocean", a bond with his US guests that rather mirrored Thatcher's relationship with President Reagan. Indeed, it's his confrontation with the IRA, who set out to tear down his corporation after he crosses them, that most reflects upon the political situation of the day. You might even view Shand as envoy of Thatcher, as he foolishly promises to "crush them like beetles".
"The idea that we had a capitalist thug versus a committed terrorist was great," says MacKenzie, a fact that remains as resonant today. He admits he had sympathies with Harold's enemies. "I was not sympathetic to the violence. But I was sympathetic to the sense that they are committed people who do something for a cause."
While the film is as much about the IRA as, say, Neil Jordan's The Crying Game, it was this perceived pro-terrorist stance that led the film towards a difficult gestation. Released in 1981, it was actually shot at the end of 1979, the delay coming in part because the financiers at ITC, led by Lew Grade, disliked the film. "They thought it was unpatriotic, disparaging of the British army and promoting terrorism," says MacKenzie. "And Grade was frightened that bombs would go off in his cinema. Crazy!"
With MacKenzie away on holiday, the film was cut down by almost half-an-hour to 82 minutes with the idea that it was to be sold to US television. They even went as far as re-dubbing Hoskins' voice with an actor from Wolverhampton for fear American audiences wouldn't understand his Cockney accent. Outraged, Hoskins decided to sue - drumming up support from the British acting community.
Before the case went to court, MacKenzie and Hoskins managed to convince ITC to sell the film to Handmade Films, the company owned by George Harrison that had financed Monty Python's Life of Brian the year before. When it finally came out, Hoskins was hailed by those that he portrayed. "I met some top gangsters after filming, who said 'I've seen the film and I'm glad to say we're so proud one of our own is doing so well.' I've had letters from Freddie Foreman, Frankie Fraser - all the guys that are telling their stories now and want films made of their lives - saying I should do it!"
As it happens, rumours circulated that there was to be a sequel - despite the ending of the original, which left Shand at the mercy of the IRA. Thankfully Hoskins, who went on to play thugs in everything from The Cotton Club to Mona Lisa, backed out. But the British gangster film never quite scaled the same heights again. Mediocrity beset the genre after Guy Ritchie's Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels inspired copycat film-makers to deliver cheeky post-modern movies that saw public school boys playing with shooters.
While there has never been a gangster film quite like The Long Good Friday again, you might argue that this is because it's a product of its time. These days, Harold Shand would probably be running a blue-chip company.
'The Long Good Friday - 25th Anniversary Edition' is out now on DVD, £15.99
(or better still, get it for free on FILM FOUR....)
Re Long Good Friday, Great scene when the yacht goes into the dock with the sun glittering on the water, nice music very atmospheric, also like the scene shot in Brixton around Loughborough park when he visits "Erroll the Ponce". Anyone know where the pub that got blown up was filmed?
I saw it on film 4 and it was great!
I'll probably misquote this but Michael Caine was asked which were the best three UK gangster movies of all time; " I was in the first, 'Oskins was in the second and we wuz both in the third!"
The thing is if he obviously didn't mean what he said and it was simply a throwaway hissy fit riposte to get up the noses of the people who'd just dropped him.
I think he was the archetypal Thatcherite and an excellent analogy for the reality and moral bankruptcy of the decade ahead.
My favourite British film too.
A ripping story and wasn't Ms Mirren at her best? I know they had Cagney and Edward G. and Bogie but BH can match 'em in my humble opinion and he's never bettered this!!
I agree he was fantastic. What a pity he then wandered off doing phoney american accents in a series of less than leading roles for the next few years.
Hi Guys, just a note to ask if you knew that they ran out of money on TLGF, and it was saved by the actors putting in, and taking deferred wages. Bob Hoskins put in and I believe Helen Mirren too.
Nothing changes in this business does it.
I'd say that is a pretty good illustration of how business works in Britain in general i.e. the bosses and management are incompetent and have to rely on the goodwill of the workforce to pull them out of the shit and then take all the credit.
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