Fury at Smugglers' Bay
Fury at Smugglers' Bay is a 1961 British adventure film produced, written and directed by John Gilling and starring Peter Cushing, Bernard Lee, Michèle Mercier and John Fraser.[1] The plot revolves around smuggling in Cornwall. Studio sequences were filmed at Twickenham Film Studios in west London with the external sequences representing the coast of Cornwall actually being shot at Abereiddy on the north Pembrokeshire coast in south-west Wales.[2] Although filmed in colour, scenes of shipwrecks during a storm have been lifted from an earlier black-and-white film and have been tinted to match the other footage.[3]
| Fury at Smugglers' Bay | |
|---|---|
| Directed by | John Gilling |
| Written by | John Gilling |
| Produced by | John Gilling |
| Starring | Peter Cushing Bernard Lee Michèle Mercier John Fraser |
| Cinematography | Harry Waxman |
| Edited by | John Victor-Smith |
| Music by | Harold Geller |
Production company | John Gilling Enterprises |
| Distributed by | Regal Films International (UK) |
Release date | March 1961 (UK) |
Running time | 92 mins |
| Country | United Kingdom |
| Language | English |
Plot
In 18th century Cornwall, Squire Trevenyan (Peter Cushing), a magistrate to a sleepy fishing village, is blackmailed by a vicious smuggler, Black John, (Bernard Lee) into keeping quiet about his murderous gang’s shipwrecking racket. The squire’s son (John Fraser) deepens the dilemma when he attempts to stand up for his honour, his father’s and that of the girl he loves (Michèle Mercier) whose own father (George Coulouris), a petty thief, has been sentenced to a penal colony at the insistence of Black John. The daughter engages the help of a local highwayman (William Franklyn), an honourable thief who watches over those he has robbed to ensure their safe return home, to stop Black John once and for all.
Cast
- Peter Cushing as Squire Trevenyan
- Bernard Lee as Black John
- Michèle Mercier as Louise Lejeune
- John Fraser as Christopher Trevenyan
- William Franklyn as The Captain
- George Coulouris as François Lejeune
- Liz Fraser as Betty
- June Thorburn as Jenny Trevenyan
- Katherine Kath as Maman
- Maitland Moss as Tom, the butler
- Tommy Duggan as Red Friars
- Juma (actor) as Juma
- Christopher Carlos as The Tiger, a pirate
- Miles Malleson as Duke of Avon
- Alan Browning as 2nd Highwayman
- Bob Simmons as Carlos
Critical reception
In the Radio Times, David Parkinson gave the film three out of five stars, and noted, "as Cushing suggested in his memoirs, this 1790s adventure is tantamount to an English western, with a saloon brawl, sword-wielding showdowns and a last-minute rescue. However, the peripheral characters are more subtly shaded, with Miles Malleson's comic nobleman and George Coulouris's abused outsider being particularly well realised."[4]
References
- ^ "Fury at Smugglers' Bay". IMDb.
- ^ . Ftvdb.bfi.org.uk. 16 April 2009. Archived from the original on 3 September 2009. Retrieved 11 April 2014.
- ^ https://petercushingblog.blogspot.com/2012/01/bay-watch-peter-cushings-1961-fury-at.html[user-generated source]
- ^ "Fury at Smugglers Bay | Film review and movie reviews". Radio Times. Retrieved 11 April 2014.
External links
- Fury at Smugglers' Bay at IMDb