The Squeeze (1977 film)

The Squeeze is a 1977 British gangster thriller, directed by Michael Apted, based on a novel by Bill James (under the pseudonym David Craig).[2] The screenplay was written by Minder creator Leon Griffiths.[3]

This article is about the 1977 film. For other films, see The Squeeze (disambiguation).

The Squeeze
Directed byMichael Apted
Screenplay byLeon Griffiths
Based onWhose Little Girl Are You?
1974 novel
by James Tucker
Produced byStanley O'Toole
Starring
CinematographyDennis C. Lewiston
Edited byJohn Shirley
Music byDavid Hentschel
Production
company
Distributed byWarner Bros. Pictures
Release dates
  • 7 November 1977 (1977-11-07) (Sweden)
  • 20 March 1977 (1977-03-20) (United Kingdom)
Running time
104 minutes
CountryUnited Kingdom
LanguageEnglish
Budget$1.4 million[1]

The production headlines a major cast made up of American actor Stacy Keach, and British actors Edward Fox and David Hemmings. Irish actor Stephen Boyd was also featured in a major (and final) role as a gangster.

Apted called it an "informed look at the British underworld" and said Warner Bros considered the film "too indigenous."[4]

Plot summary

Before the action depicted in the film begins, Jill had left Naboth who, despite his habitual overdrinking, had managed to keep custody of their two sons. He had lost his job as a police detective and become a private investigator. Jill had since married Foreman and lived with him and his daughter Christine.[5][3]

In the film, Keith leads a gang of criminals including Barry and Taf and their driver Des. They kidnap Jill and Christine, using them to blackmail Foreman into helping the gang raid his security van full of cash. Foreman employs Naboth to help him recover Jill and Christine without doing any damage to his business reputation which he highly prizes.

Naboth follows Foreman to a rendezvous and discovers that the gang leader, Keith, was someone he had successfully investigated when he was a police detective. He tracks the gang to Vic’s house where he intends to rescue Jill and Christine but, instead, Keith recognises him and they beat him up, strip him naked, and send him home.[3]

Jill and Christine are detained by Keith, Barry, Des and Taf in a flat. Christine is left in a room with toys and a bed and rarely features in the action. Jill complies with the men’s demands for her to keep them occupied with cooking and playing backgammon, but eventually they intimidate her into stripping naked in front of them, echoing the way Naboth had been humiliated at Vic’s house.[6][5]

After the security van raid takes place, Jill and Christine are taken to be handed over to Foreman. Christine is released. Through circumstances, Vic’s daughter is also present and Naboth seizes her, threatening to shoot her if Jill is not released, and eventually she is. Naboth apprehends Vic.[3]

The plot relies on the relationships between the main characters including Jill’s history with Naboth, Foreman valuing his business more than his wife, Naboth and Keith’s past conflict as detective and criminal, and a sub-plot involving Naboth’s relationship with his friend Teddy.[5] It leaves open the possibility that Foreman was in on the kidnap plot as a means of stealing the company’s money and humiliating Jill.

Cast

Kidnap gang

Other characters

Production

The film was shot in London in October 1976.[1] Keach had lived and worked in London for many years. He says Apted was "a wonderful and intelligent director" who cast the actor on the basis of his appearance in Conduct Unbecoming.[7]

The producers of The Squeeze enlisted an ex-gangster called Bob Ramsey to act as a contact between the film unit and the local underworld to cut down on harassment, due to location shooting in rather undesirable areas where criminals were operating. Local people in the area were hired as extras. Sex Pistols guitarist Steve Jones accidentally became an extra in the film.

Reception

Leon Hunt found The Squeeze to be "a better sequel to Sweeney! than Sweeney 2 ...[with] its "superbly drawn and vividly played villains".[5]

Sight and Sound said that Apted "makes a fair fist of transferring the dirty cop thriller to Notting Hill" with "real world flair", but it found "Stacey Keach's problems as a drunken ex-copper ... unengaging."[8]

Keach said the film "didn't translate in America but it was well regarded and successful in England."[7]

Footnotes
  1. Roberts, Glenys (31 October 1976). "The Nonthinking Equilibrium of Stacy Keach". Los Angeles Times. p. t73.
  2. "The Writers of Wales Database: Bill James". Archived from the original on 3 September 2014. Retrieved 27 August 2014.
  3. Combs, Richard (1 January 1977). "Squeeze, The". The Monthly Film Bulletin. Vol. 44, no. 516. p. 80.
  4. Yakir, Dan (January–February 1984). "A Certain Edge". Film Comment. Vol. 20, no. 1. New York: Film Society of Lincoln Center. pp. 29–32.
  5. Hunt, Leon (1999). "Chapter 12. Dog Eat Dog: The Squeeze and the Sweeney Films". In Chibnall, Steve; Murphy, Robert (eds.). British Crime Cinema. London: Routledge. pp. 134–147. ISBN 0-415-16870-8.
  6. Malcolm, Derek (24 February 1977). "Repelling magnate: Derek Malcolm reviews Elia Kazan's version of The Last Tycoon, plus the other new London releases". The Guardian.
  7. Keach, Stacy (2013). All in all : an actor's life on and off the stage. Lyons Press. p. 120.
  8. "Film Guide: Squeeze, The (Columbia-Warner)". Sight and Sound. Vol. 46, no. 2. Spring 1977. p. 132.
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