The Horse's Mouth

How To Out Bluff A Film Buff
If a film buff askes you to name a classic film you realy like you can do no worse than to answer "The Horse's Mouth". Try to suppress a smile as the buff looks at first puzzled and then cautiously admits that they have never heard of let alone seen that movie so can it be that good?

Well actually yes it is explain to them then casually mention that it is the only film that Alec Guinness ever wrote a screenplay for and that he gained an Academy Award nomination for his trouble and that in his "Parkinson" interview in 1977 he almost (but not quite) admitted that it was his favourite film in his long career.

Then you can go on to tell that it is one of the few films from the 1950's that shows London in colour and the music adapted from Sergei Prokofieff's "Lieutenant Kije" gives the film a touch of class and a unique sense of style not to be found in other films of the period.

You may then mention that the acting is superb; as well as Guinness' faultless study of an obsessive and...

"Burning bright" indeed
I recently purchased this film from Amazon as well as "The Alec Guinness Collection" which includes Kind Hearts and Coronets (1949) plus four others: The Man in the White Suit (1951), The Lavender Hill Mob (1951), The Captain's Paradise (1953), and The Ladykillers (1955). Frankly, I was amazed how well each of the six films has held up since I first saw it.

This film is based on a novel by Joyce Cary, The Horse's Mouth. Guinness wrote the screenplay which was nominated for an Academy Award. The director was Ronald Neame who also produced it. Special credit should also be given to the cinematographer, Arthur Ibbetson, who brilliantly captures the beauty of London while sustaining the viewer's focus on both the splendor and squalor of Gulley Jimson's passions. For me, Guinness' portrayal of that aging and impoverished but obsessed painter gives a whole new meaning to the word "eccentric." As in the novel, the spirit of William Blake is very evident. Art is Jimson's religion...

Hilarious and poignant Guinness
First off, this isn't a review--it's a reminiscence. I saw this film in the '60s in Berkeley, and I loved it then partly because it spoke to me of what I believed were the issues of the day--freedom (artistic and otherwise) and the power of the individual. I am now buying the video so that I can at long last have a joyous reunion with the unforgettable characters--the artist's dishevelled, indignant and loyal girlfriend; his equally dishevelled, adoring and unquestioning young admirer, and the artist himself, the outrageous Gully Jimson (Guinness). I still see his raffish little boat on the Thames, chugging along to the regal strains of Prokofiev, just as the often obnoxious and stubborn Jimson is dignified by the strength of his commitment to art and self. (This film was based on the novel by Joyce Cary)

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