Victim

Victim (1961), Dirk Bogarde, Basil Dearden, British film censorship, and queer cinema history.

While American films are censored by the Hays code, which does not allow them to stage adultery, passion or «sexual perversity», the British are free to be bold, and to show all of that. Basil Dearden is one of those directors who love original subjects. Male homosexuality has been criminalized since 1533 in the United Kingdom, thank you Christians, and it will be so until 1967, so, this 1961 film, is a piece of activism.

Victim, begins in THE male environment : building construction. A young man is running away from a construction site, the police is after him, he tries to reach a lawyer, Melville Farr, he needs money to leave the city, but none of his friends can give him any.

«OUT» can be read the scenery, as to push the character to reveal himself or to flee. The police eventually catches him and guesses a plot of blackmail. The inspector understands that this man, Jack Barrett, nicknamed «Boy», is homosexual, and probably involved in a case of blackmail. 90% of blackmail cases handled by the police target homosexuals.
In pre-trial detention, Jack hangs himself in his cell. But the police continues the investigation.

When he understands why Jack died, Melville Farr the lawyer, also wants to investigate on his own to find the blackmailers, out of guilt, as Jack’s lover, out of justice, but also to save himself from disgrace. Melville is to be appointed a Queen’s Counsel, and this position cannot suffer from any lack of good moral.

Melville’s investigation will lead him to other homosexuals Harold, Eddy, Phip, Henry the hairdresser who wants to sell his salon to escape all this… and Tiny Calloway, the famous actor, who has a relationship with his Teddy Bear.

This film takes the form of a social thriller, and is a plea against an unjust law, clearly stated in the dialogue : the debate on the legislation and how to approach it. Should they report the blackmailers at the risk of incurring themselves prison for crime ?

Fear is the air the whole movie, it hangs over almost every scene, even if it is less sensitive nowadays. The gay characters are gentlemen, with situations to save, and wallets full enough to yield to blackmail.

Regarding Melville Farr, it would be incorrect to qualify him as a bisexual man, clearly Melville appears as a married man by duty. He and his wife Laura look the perfect couple. A perfect couple in appearance, like Barbie and Ken, two beautiful plastics, affectionate, without sex. They have no children.
Laura quickly understands that her husband is certainly not the man she believed. Their marriage included a form of tolerance, but not the possibility for her husband to have a lover. She confronts him, and for Melville, the truth is not easy to tell. Jack Barrett was indeed hir lover.
Despite everything, and especially the injunctions of her brother, she remains sincerely supportive of her husband, including facing the public shame.

Far from the clichés about the alleged perversity of homosexuals, the plot reveals stories of love, feelings, and a context in which only looks form a possible language between two people. In a pub for example.
British society seems in need for progress.

The film shows a negative lgbition, because it describes a difficult and hostile reality, even if the scenario takes the side of the victims, against, a homophobic society. One of the cops and the bartender represent the "puritan" opinion of the time and the inspector an opinion a little, more tolerant.
The staging uses the contrasting codes of the thrillers, well known to decipher society.

Dirk Bogarde, who plays Melville Farr, plays a risky and strong role. Far from harming his career, the film will boost it. The actor is perfect in this character, it must be said that it echoes with his private life, since he lives a very secret relationship with the man presented as his agent, Anthony Forwood.

Bogarde’s early career was suspended by his incorporation into the British Army in 1941. He lived the dreadful liberation of a Nazi camp, the bodies piled up and emaciated, the survivors, the jackets with the yellow stars, the pink triangles… A rather powerful warning, which will incite him to live hidden all his life, to burn evidence.

The army is also the proximity of men. Bogarde had his first great love with J.D."Tony" Jones, a soldier who landed in Normandy. In 1948, Dirk met Anthony Forwood, an aspiring actor he had met just before the war. Anthony Forwood divorced his wife in 1948, and devoted himself entirely to Dirk, officially, as an agent. The two men lived together until Tony’s death in 1988, including 17 years in Provence. Dirk will never dare to tell the audience clearly his love story...

I’m not spoiling the end, who is the blackmailer ?

Dirk Bogarde, a great British actor, with a hidden life, and a furtive career behind great films.

Fiche technique du film : IMDB [ .fr ]

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