As I began watching Pool Of London I knew I'd seen it before, perhaps without knowing it at the time. Or maybe it just captures the feel of a certain kind of British movie of its era: post-war but pre-prosperity, noirish and crooked, a version of a bomb-scarred Fifties Britain that contradicts the hindsight glow cast upon it by social conservatives.
The two lead characters are foreign merchant seamen: an American called Dan (Bonar Colleano) and a Jamaican called Johnny (Earl Cameron). The London it takes place in is thick with spivs, brasses, thieves and bobbies on the beat who turn up at all the right moments. We see Camberwell, Rotherhithe and Tower Bridge. There is jiving, there are black market nylons and there's an interracial relationship - radical for its time. The whole thing looks great.
Buy it as part of a box set of London films and listen to a recent edition (26 June) of Francine Stock's Film Programme about it here.
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