'SAPPHIRE' & 'VICTIM'......U.K. HATE CRIMES, BACK-TO-BACK

Sapphire (1959) and Victim (1961).....constitute a gut-punch double feature from the British filmmaking team of producer Michael Relph and director Basil Dearden.....

               Both films took a groundbreaking, unflinching and controversial view of open wounds in post-war British society.......racial strife and government criminalizing of homosexuality........

                Cleverly crafted as literate thrillers (complete with detectives, suspects and red herrings) each of these films suck you into a storyline where seething hate lurks underneath the civil veneer of typical British reserve......

                 The more melodramatic, sensation-filled "Sapphire", filmed in color to match the flareups of hatred on display, deals with the brutal murder of the title girl a light-skinned black college student who'd been passing for white....and ends up stabbed to death while three months pregnant......
     
                 The calm, even-handed Inspector on the case (Nigel Patrick) and his racist fellow cop (Michael Craig) sort out a pile of suspects, both black and white.........including Sapphire's white fiance (Paul Massie) and his deeply anti-black family.....

                 The film casts an unforgiving, cruel eye on the sorry state of race relations in 50's England......and no surprise at all, it's .not much different than the United States.......even allowing some brief moments where black characters display equal contempt for the society that demeans and oppresses them.

                   And there's no great triumph or satisfaction when the murderer's revealed in the final minutes, only a sense of tragedy, disgust and resignation at the sorry state of human nature......

                   2 years later, the Relph-Dearden team stirred things up again with "Victim", a black-and-white drama that targeted Britain's 'anti-sodomy' law......which allowed police and courts to round up and jail gay men for committing the crime.......of being gay men.

                    The heinous law provided  blackmailers with  an open invitation to prey on deeply closeted gays........and the cops, in the process of arresting men for gay sex, also  found themselves inundated with extortion cases.

                    Extortionists of all types run rampant in "Victim", at one point driving a tormented young man to hang himself in jail after he's been arrested for embezzling money to pay off  the never ending demands of his blackmailers.

                   And as in "Sapphire",  the more worldly wise of the police inspectors understands the plight of gays while his rabidly homophobic partner despises them as some kind of alien creatures

                     When the blackmailers are finally caught and exposed (with the help of a bi-sexual, closeted high court barrister played by Dirk Bogarde) they seem more driven by hatred than money.
And they manage in their own way to commit murder, by driving their victims to suicide or fatal heart attacks.......

                     The always superb Bogarde functions as the centerpiece here.......as a.conscience stricken gay man who's suppressed his instincts enough to avoid criminal charges, but nevertheless chooses to sacrifice his own reputation to pursue justice.

                      Given the stringent, British film censorship of the era, "Victim" treads more carefully around homosexuality than "Sapphire" did with racism........in dealing with its gay characters, the script remains diplomatically oblique and ever so carefully worded......with not an offensive noun in sight other than 'queer'......(smeared on Bogarde's garage door)

                      But combine the two films together, with their excellent casts, and the standard Michael Relph-Basil Dearden professional sheen, they make for a still up-to-date powerhouse double feature. BQ declares each one a 'must watch' for all lovers of international cinema. 4 stars for each. (****)