The End of the Road *** (1954, Finlay Currie, Duncan Lamont, Naomi Chance, David Hannaford, George Merritt, Gordon Whiting, Edie Martin) – Classic Movie Review 13,415

Wolf Rilla’s 1954 British second feature drama film The End of the Road stars Finlay Currie as a veteran employee who has retirement forced on him by his employers.

Director Wolf Rilla’s 1954 British second feature drama film The End of the Road stars Finlay Currie, Duncan Lamont, Naomi Chance, David Hannaford, George Merritt, Gordon Whiting, and Edie Martin.

The always relevant, awkward, quite challenging subject of what to do with elderly loved ones gets a reasonably intelligent and involving airing in this low-budget Group Three Films production. It succeeds not only because of its solid basis in a radio play by James Forsyth but also thanks mainly to a powerfully played rare lead role for the doughty Finlay Currie, then aged 76, though he was busy in movies till his late 80s.

Currie plays veteran employee Mick-Mack, angry at being forced out of his electroplating job at the Jericho Works at retirement age, who fights it forcefully but is dumped anyway, with just a small clock as a retirement gift. Mick-Mack says: ‘That’s life, when you don’t like to work, they make you, and when you want to work, they won’t let you!’

He returns to his old factory as night watchman but then is fired. Duncan Lamont and Naomi Chance are also good as his son and daughter-in-law with whom he lives in an increasingly difficult relationship.

[Spoiler alert] It is a depressing subject, not great for a night out at the cinema even as a second feature, and the film tackles it honestly and honourably, at least until the phony happy ending in which Mick-Mack’s old employers decide that only he can solve their electroplating section troubles.

It is made at Beaconsfield Studios, Buckinghamshire, the home of the National Film and Television School since 1971.

The screenplay is written by James Forsyth and Geoffrey Orme, and the film is produced by Group Three Films with funding from the National Film Finance Corporation. It was released in the UK by British Lion Films on 15 November 1954.

The cast

The cast are Finlay Currie as Mick MacAulay, old ‘Mick-Mack’, Duncan Lamont as Barney, Naomi Chance as Molly, Edward Chapman as works manager, Hilda Fenemore as Madge, George Merritt as timekeeper, Gordon Whiting as young Kennie, David Hannaford as wee Barney, Eugene Leahy as old worker, Edie Martin as Gloomy Gertie, Pauline Winter as personnel manager, Michael Bird as builder, Anthony Kilshawe as manager, Kenneth Henry as Labour Exchange clerk, Herbert C Walton as first old man, Claude Bonser as second old man, Sam Kydd as first postal clerk, Hugh Munro as second postal clerk, Bert Simms as crane driver, John Baker as foreman, Ewen Solon as policeman, Edward Malin as nightwatchman, Herbert C Walton, Claude Bonser, and Eugene Leaky.

The End of the Road is directed by Wolf Rilla, runs 77 minutes, is made by Group Three Films, is released by British Lion Films, is written by James Forsyth and Geoffrey Orme, is shot in black and white by Arthur Grant, is produced by Alfred Shaughnessy, is scored by John Addison, and designed by Michael Stringer.

© Derek Winnert 2025 – Classic Movie Review 13,415

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