Victim (1961 film)

Victim
Original 1961 British quad format cinema poster
Directed by	Basil Dearden
Produced by	Michael Relph
Written by	Janet Green, John McCormick
Starring	Dirk Bogarde, Dennis Price, Sylvia Syms
Music by	Philip Green
Cinematography	Otto Heller
Editing by	John D. Guthridge
Studio	Allied Film Makers
Distributed by	Rank Film Distributors
Release dates	31 August 1961 (1961-08-31) (UK[1]) 5 February 1962 (1962-02-05) (US)
Running time	96 min.
Country	United Kingdom
Language	English
Budget	£153,756[2]

Victim is a 1961 British suspense film directed by Basil Dearden, starring Dirk Bogarde and Sylvia Syms. It is notable in film history for being the first English language film to use the word "homosexual". (The first film to use the word was the German film Anders als die Andern in 1919.) The world premiere was at the Odeon Cinema in Leicester Square on 31 August 1961.^[1] On its release in the United Kingdom it proved highly controversial and was initially banned in the United States.^[3]

Plot

A successful barrister, Melville Farr (Dirk Bogarde) has a thriving London practice. He is on course to become a Queen's Counsel and people are already talking of his being appointed a judge. He is apparently happily married to his wife, Laura (Sylvia Syms).

Farr is approached by "Boy" Barrett (Peter McEnery), a younger working class man with whom Farr shared a romantic but asexual relationship. Farr rebuffs the approach, thinking Barrett wants to blackmail him about their relationship. What Farr does not know is that Barrett himself has fallen prey to blackmailers who know of their relationship. The blackmailers have a picture of Farr and Barrett in a vehicle together, in which Barrett is crying. Barrett has been trying to reach Farr to appeal for help since Barrett (a construction site wages clerk) has stolen £2,000 from his employers to pay the blackmail and the police are now onto him. With Farr intentionally avoiding him, Barrett is soon picked up by the police, who in turn discover why he was being blackmailed. Knowing it will be only a matter of time before he is forced to reveal Farr's identity as the other man, Barrett hangs himself in a police cell.

After discovering the truth of what happened to Barrett, Farr takes on the blackmail ring and recruits a friend of Barrett's to investigate for him. The friend identifies a gay hairdresser who has also been victimised by the ring, but the hairdresser refuses to divulge who his tormentors are. However, when the hairdresser is visited by one of the blackmailers, he suffers a heart attack. Prior to his death, he manages to phone Farr's house to leave a mumbled message referring to another victim of the ring.

Farr contacts this victim, a famous actor, who refuses to help him, instead preferring, along with other victims, to acquiesce to the blackmail in hopes of keeping their secret. Laura finds out about Barrett's death and confronts her husband, demanding he tell her the truth. In a heated argument, it turns out that before their marriage Farr had had a relationship with another man who subsequently killed himself when the relationship ended. He had told Laura about this before they married and promised that he no longer had such urges, but on learning of this new affair, Laura decides to leave him.

The blackmailers vandalise Farr's property, painting "FARR IS QUEER" on his garage doors. Farr resolves to help the police catch them and promises to give evidence in court, despite knowing that the ensuing press coverage will certainly destroy his career. Working with the police, Farr succeeds in ensnaring the blackmailers, who are arrested. He is then surprised to find his wife still at home. He tells her he prefers her to go ahead and leave so she will not have to face the brutal ugliness that will befall him during the trial. But he lets her know he will welcome her return when the ordeal is over. She tells him that she believes she has found the strength to do so. Farr then burns the picture that originally incriminated him.

Cast

Background and production

Until the 1967 Sexual Offences Act, which implemented the recommendations of the Wolfenden report, homosexual acts between males were illegal in England and Wales. There were prosecutions and Sunday newspapers gave space to the court reports. Yet, by 1960, the police were as relaxed as possible over the old laws. There was a feeling that the code violated decent liberty. But police restraint did not deter the menace of blackmail.

Scriptwriter Janet Green had already previously collaborated with Basil Dearden on a previous British "social problem" film, Sapphire, which had dealt with racism against Afro-Caribbean immigrants to the United Kingdom in the late 1950s. After reading the Wolfenden Report and aware of the context of several high-profile prosecutions against gay men, she became a keen supporter of homosexual law reform.

When the team of producer Michael Relph and director Basil Dearden first approached Bogarde, they warned him that a lot of people had already turned down the script because the material might be considered dangerous or unwholesome. In 1960, Bogarde was 39 and just about the most popular actor in British films. He had proven himself playing war heroes (The Sea Shall Not Have Them; Ill Met by Moonlight); he was the star of the hugely successful Doctor film series; and he was a reliable romantic lead in films like A Tale of Two Cities. He was flirting with a larger, Hollywood career—playing Liszt in Song Without End. Bogarde was suspected to be homosexual, living in the same house as his business manager, Anthony Forwood, and was compelled every now and then to be seen in public with attractive young women. He seems not to have hesitated over the role of Farr. Similarly, Sylvia Syms never flinched from the part of his wife, though apparently several actresses had turned it down.

Other gay cast members included Dennis Price and Hilton Edwards. Though it mostly treats homosexuality in a non-sensationalised manner, there is one rather catty aspect to the film—Price's character (a prominent gay theatre star) would have been fairly easy for contemporary audiences to identify with Noël Coward.

The script was originally entitled Boy Barrett, changing to Victim late in production. A number of controversial scenes were cut during discussions with the BBFC, including scenes with teenagers.^[4]

Reaction

Victim became a highly sociologically significant film; many believe it played an influential role in liberalising attitudes (as well as the laws in Britain) regarding homosexuality.^[5] It was not a major hit but by 1971 had earned an estimated profit of £51,762.^[2]

The British Board of Film Censors originally gave the film an X rating. In a letter to the filmmakers, the BBFC secretary raised four objections to the film. First, a male character says of another man, "I wanted him". Second, references to "self-control" in the revised script were left out of a filmed discussion of homosexuality, leaving the discussion "without sufficient counterbalance". Third, the film implies that homosexuality is a choice, which "is a dangerous idea to put into the minds of adolescents who see the film". Finally, when the blackmailer Brenda unleashes a tirade against homosexuality, her popular view will be discredited since she is such an unsympathetic character.^[6]

Hollywood Production Code

In the United States, the use of the term "homosexual", and its opposition to anti-gay criminal laws, kept the film from receiving approval by the Hollywood Production Code. A few years prior to Victim, the film makers of Suddenly, Last Summer (1959) had persuaded the code censors to allow their film to use homosexuality as a plot device, but only if presented through cryptic innuendos, and film had to illustrate the "horrors of such a lifestyle". (Hadleigh, B. (2001). The Lavender Screen: The Gay and Lesbian Films—Their Stars, Makers, Characters, and Critics (Rev. ed.). New York City, NY: Citadel Press. ISBN 978-0-8065-2199-2.)

The film Victim, in contrast, was deemed to be too frank and liberal in its treatment of homosexuality, and, thus, was initially not given approval by the censorship code. However, in 1962, the Hollywood Production Code had agreed to lift the ban on film's using homosexuality as a plot device. A few years later the code itself would be replaced by the Motion Picture Association of America, which introduced age-appropriate classification for films.

Initially, Victim was generally classified as an "adult" film, often with the X classification that was initially given to pornographic films. However, as anti-gay prejudices declined, the rating classifications for the film were also revised.

When Victim was released on VHS in America (1986), it was given the PG-13 rating. Likewise, when Victim was re-released in the United Kingdom it was reclassified with the much more milder PG/12 rating.^[7]

On The Use of the term "Queer"

The term "queer" is used in the film, in two completely different ways. As mentioned above, "FARR IS QUEER" is painted on Farr's garage door (i.e. Farr is homosexual), and the expression "Queer Street" (meaning in desperate poverty) is used in a reply to some red herring fraudsters that write begging letters.

Home media

The film was released by the Criterion Collection in January 2011.^[8] However, the release did not receive a spine number; it was instead released as part of an "Eclipse" box set.

See also

• Different from the Others (Anders als die Andern) — a 1919 German film seen as a precursor of Victim.
• The Children's Hour — a similar film, starring Audrey Hepburn and Shirley MacLaine and also released in 1961, that was controversial for its storyline dealing with lesbianism.
• List of lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender-related films

References

Further reading

• John Coldstream: Victim: BFI Film Classics: British Film Institute/Palgrave-Macmillan: 2011: ISBN 978-1-84457-427-8.
• Richard Dyer: "Victim: Hegemonic Project" in Richard Dyer: The Matter of Images: Essays on Representation: London: Routledge: 2002.
• "William Drummond" (pseud. Arthur Calder-Marshall): Victim (1961), Corgi: film novelisation
• Patrick Higgins: Heterosexual Dictatorship: Male Homosexuality in Postwar Britain: London: Fourth Estate: 1996: ISBN 1857023552
• Philip Kemp: "I Wanted Him: Revival: Victim" Sight and Sound 15:8 (August 2005): 10.
• Andrew Watson: "Shifting Attitudes on Homosexuality" History Today: 65.20 (September/October 2011): 15–17.

External links

• Victim at the Internet Movie Database
• Victim in the British Film Institute's "Explore film..." database
• Victim at the British Film Institute's Screenonline
• Criterion Collection article about Victim