Payroll [I Promised to Pay] **** (1961, Michael Craig, Françoise Prévost, Billie Whitelaw, William Lucas, Kenneth Griffith, Tom Bell) – Classic Movie Review 7,787

Michael Craig and Billie Whitelaw star in the 1961 British noir crime thriller film Payroll about a group of four criminals who plan a wages robbery on a payroll van that ends in disaster. 

Director Sidney Hayers’s taut, tense and tough 1961 black and white British neo-noir crime thriller Payroll [I Promised to Pay] stars Michael Craig as Johnny Mellors, who heads a group of four criminals planning a wages robbery on a state-of-the-art payroll van. Mellors gets inside knowledge from the firm’s accountant Dennis Pearson (William Lucas), who needs his share to please his greedy wife Katie Pearson (Françoise Prévost).

The heist goes wrong, with two men down: the payroll van driver Harry Parker (William Peacock) is killed and his colleague Frank Moore (Glyn Houston) fatally shoots Bert (Barry Keegan), but the gang make off with the money and lie low so they can make their getaway and spend it.

Billie Whitelaw also stars as Jackie Parker, the vengeful wife of the murdered armoured-car guard who joins up with a friendly policeman (Edward Cast), but goes rogue to catch the band of vicious robbers, organised by Johnny Mellors (Michael Craig), who made off with a hundred grand of payroll money.

George Baxt’s intense screenplay is based on Derek Bickerton’s 1959 novel. Lynx Films and Independent Artists should be pleased to have writer Baxt and cinematographer Ernest Steward on the payroll. Payroll is a very good example of Sixties British noir. It benefits greatly from its extensive location shooting,

Atmospherically set in Newcastle, where alas the actors apparently do not have local Tyneside accents, Payroll is neatly performed, with excellent performances from both the young and exciting Whitelaw and a cast-against-type Craig, as well as Kenneth Griffith and Tom Bell as other dodgy members of the crime gang. And it is directed at a dynamic rate, with Hayers keeping a lengthy film moving along engrossingly and urgently.

It is a good story, with a commendably harsh, gritty, cynical edge, but it’s the four main performances (by Michael Craig, Billie Whitelaw, William Lucas, Kenneth Griffith and Tom Bell), and the Newcastle location shooting that are the making of the movie. The all-location seaside climax in Norfolk makes for a satisfying conclusion to the drama.

There are a few downsides, particularly the over-wrought performances of William Lucas and Françoise Prévost, and also some studio shots and back projections that spoil the meticulous exterior work. Both these thing harm credibility in what is already a tall story for a UK setting.

But Craig and Whitelaw, both of them with an evil glint their eyes, really keep it going to the bitter end. You really can believe they are capable of murder. He would do anything for the money, and she would do anything for revenge, even willingly risk her life, which is now worthless to her now her man is dead, even though she has two kids to kook after. Chillingly, her children mean nothing to her now. Craig’s character has got absolutely no conscience at all, a difficult part to play, especially for a former Rank matinée idol, but he does it real well. Whitelaw seems as tough as nails. She’s quite scary really.

It’s the extremes of the characters, and what they are willing to do, that carry the film. Plus the stylish noir black and white cinematography by Ernest Steward and the jazz music score by Reg Owen.

Also in the cast are Françoise Prévost, William Lucas, Kenneth Griffith, Tom Bell, Barry Keegan, Joan Rice, Glyn Houston, Edward Cast as Detective Sergeant Bradden, Andrew Faulds as Detective Inspector Carberry, William Peacock [William Dexter], Vanda Godsell, Stanley Meadows, Brian McDermott, Anita Sharp-Bolster, Madge Brindley, Anthony Bate and Hugh Morton.

Payroll [I Promised to Pay] is directed by Sidney Hayers, runs 117 minutes (uncut) and 102 minutes (cut), is made by Lynx Films and Independent Artists, is released by Anglo-Amalgamated Film Distributors, is written by George Baxt, based on Derek Bickerton’s novel, is shot in black and white by Ernest Steward, is produced by Norman Priggen, Leslie Parkyn and Julian Wintle, and is scored by Reg Owen, with Art Direction by Jack Shampan.

It is shot at Independent Artists Studios, Beaconsfield, Buckinghamshire, England, and on various locations in Newcastle upon Tyne, England. Other scenes were shot in and around Gateshead and in Tynemouth, Rugby and Southwold.

It premiered at the Plaza cinema in London on 20 April 1961, and went on UK general release on 21 May 1961.

Michael Craig, who was on loan from the Rank Organisation who had groomed him as a star, was unimpressed with Sidney Hayers: ‘I think he’d learned “directing” from a manual.’

The theme music by Reg Owen and His Orchestra was released as a single, and the song ‘It Happens Every Day’, composed by Tony Osborne and Norman Newell and sung by Eddie Ellis in a nightclub scene in the film, was also released as a single.

The cast are Michael Craig as Johnny Mellors, Françoise Prévost as Katie Pearson, Billie Whitelaw as Jackie Parker, William Lucas as Dennis Pearson, Kenneth Griffith as Monty Dunston, Tom Bell as Blackie, Barry Keegan as Bert Langridge, Edward Cast as Detective Sergeant Bradden, Andrew Faulds as Detective Inspector Carberry, William Peacock as Harry Parker, Glyn Houston as Frank Moore, Joan Rice as Madge Moore, Vanda Godsell as Doll, Stanley Meadows as Bowen, Brian McDermott as Brent, Hugh Morton as Mr John, Keith Faulkner as Alf, Bruce Beeby as Worth, Murray Evans as Billy, Kevin Bennett as Archie Murdock, Mary Laura Wood as Mrs Murdock, Pauline Shepherd as secretary, Paddy Edwards as Beryl, Meadows White as Strange, Michael Barrington as Hay, Anthony Bate as detective, and Anita Sharp-Bolster as landlady.

Michael Craig was born Michael Francis Gregson on 27 January 1929

Michael Craig, who was born Michael Francis Gregson on 27 January 1929, turned 95 on 27 January 2024.

Other Brit heist movies include The League of Gentlemen, A Prize of Arms, Cash on Demand, The Good Die Young, Robbery, Strongroom, The Lavender Hill Mob, The Ladykillers, and The Duke.

The Top 20 British heist movies

The Top 20 British heist movies

© Derek Winnert 2018 Classic Movie Review 7,787

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