Tread Softly Stranger (1958) User Reviews

good thriller

[blanche-2 · 7/10 · 16 March 2011]

The stunningly beautiful Diana Dors gets involved with two brothers in "Tread Softly Stranger," a 1958 British 'B' movie. It's on a set of six films called "British Cinema," and it's by far the best of the lot.

Dors is Calico, a real slut, albeit a gorgeous one, who is hanging out with a nerdy office worker, Dave Mansell (Terence Mansell), an accountant in a nearby factory. Then his brother Johnny (George Baker), a handsome con man running away from a bad debt, comes to town. Calico quickly switches allegiance, but keeps her options open. When Johnny finds out that Dave is 300 pounds short in the accounts because of embezzling to buy Calico gifts, he decides to hock the watch Dave gave Calico, add his own money to it, and gamble on a sure thing. With an impending audit coming up, there isn't much time to replace the money.

Unfortunately, Calico has another idea. While Johnny is at the race track and winning, Calico convinces Dave that Johnny isn't coming back and insists that he just rob the factory of all its money - that way, the shortfall won't show up. She promises Dave that if he does it, she will go away with him. Turns into a real mess.

This is a very suspenseful story, very dark and loaded with atmosphere. One gets the feeling of a small, crummy factory town. The acting is good; Dors is a knockout. Definitely work seeing.

Kitchen Sink Noir

[JamesHitchcock · 7/10 · 12 September 2013]

Johnny Mansell is forced to flee London after running up large gambling debts and returns to his native town, the industrial town of Rawborough, where he moves into a flat with his brother Dave and Dave's girlfriend Calico. (It's a nickname!). The two brothers are, at least on the surface, very different. Johnny is a suave, fashionably dressed playboy, whose sources of income are rather mysterious, whereas the dowdy, bespectacled Dave is a wages clerk in a local steel mill. The outwardly respectable Dave, however, is hiding a guilty secret. He has embezzled £300 from his employers in order to buy expensive gifts for the glamorous but mercenary Calico and desperately needs to repay the money before the auditors make their annual visit to the firm. Johnny believes that he can win enough money in a betting coup, but Calico comes up with a plan for Dave to rob his workplace and to steal enough money to cover his fraud. Dave is desperate enough to go ahead with this plan, and the rest of the film deals with the disastrous consequences of his action.

British films noirs, unlike their American counterparts, often included elements of the "kitchen sink realism" which was very much in vogue in the Britain of the late fifties and early sixties, not only in the cinema but also in literature and the visual arts. "Tread Softly Stranger" with its factories and its shabby flats and nightclubs, permeated by an atmosphere of seediness and moral corruption, fits well into this tradition. George Baker's Johnny, a handsome, charming drifter living on the edge of the law but with a certain sense of honour and loyalty, is a classic noir figure.

This was the second film which Diana Dors made after returning to Britain following her brief and unsuccessful attempt to conquer Hollywood; the first, "The Long Haul", was also a crime drama. Dors is often thought of as Britain's answer to America's blonde bombshells like Marilyn Monroe and Jayne Mansfield, but on the evidence of this film she could also be seen as the British equivalent of femmes fatales like Lizabeth Scott and Gloria Grahame. American films noirs often featured a beautiful and seductive but dangerous young woman as one of the main characters, and British directors working in the same style sometimes copied this feature. Although there were occasional brunette examples, such as the character played by Ava Gardner in "The Killers", the majority of these women were blonde, possibly because blondes had a greater visual impact in films shot in black-and-white. (This was said to have been the reason why Hitchcock used blondes in so many of his films, although he continued doing so even after he switched to colour).

Diana's pneumatic figure and platinum blonde looks meant that she was often cast in comedies, generally with a sexual edge to them, but her real strength was in serious drama. (Although many people thought of her as little more than a sexy bimbo, she was actually a classically trained actress). "Yield to the Night" from two years earlier is often quoted as her greatest achievement in the cinema, but in my view she is equally good here. The two roles are in a sense complementary. Mary, her character in "Yield to the Night", is a murderess, yet is portrayed as a woman more sinned against than sinning. Calico, by contrast, is selfish and amoral, yet it is Dave and Johnny, both of whom have fallen for her charms, who have to pay the price for her selfishness and amorality.

The one jarring note in Diana's performance is her accent. In her private life she spoke with a strong West Country accent- she was a native of Swindon- but in her films she generally used the upper-class Received Pronunciation she had learned at drama school, and that sounds wrong here, as Calico is supposed to be a working-class girl who has clawed her way up from the gutter. British film-makers of this period, however, could be curiously careless when it came to regional accents, even when they were aiming for realism in other respects. Rawborough is supposed to be in Yorkshire- Rotherham was used for location filming– but there are hardly any Yorkshire accents to be heard. ("Brief Encounter" is another example of a film ostensibly set in the North where everyone sounds as though they are from the Home Counties).

The film did well at the box-office on its original release in 1958 but was generally ignored by the critics; there was a common assumption, on both sides of the Atlantic, that crime dramas, including some which are today regarded as cinema classics, were no more than potboilers. Interest in them, however, has grown over the decades. "Tread Softly Stranger" is not, perhaps, in the same class as the greatest British noirs such as Carol Reed's "The Third Man" or Robert Hamer's "The Long Memory", but with its gripping action, some good acting and its starkly expressionist photography of the industrial scenes it certainly remains worth watching. 7/10

Suspenseful British "B"

[MikeMagi · 8/10 · 23 November 2015]

When the British make a "B" movie, they tend to get it right -- and "Tread Softly Stranger" is a good example. George Baker as Johnny has left London and returned to his childhood home -- a scraggy northern town -- to escape the bookmakers who are screaming for his hide. His brother, Dave, a payroll clerk at a local steel mill, is a wimp, hopelessly smitten with next door neighbor Diana Dors. When the brothers set out to heist the mill's payroll, everything that can possibly go wrong does -- no surprise. But there's a nifty twist at the end that certainly is surprising. The atmosphere -- from grubby pubs to the factory's blistering operations -- provide a colorful backdrop. Worth watching.

Fun movie

[samhill5215 · 6/10 · 8 September 2009]

This is not a great movie by any stretch of the imagination. But it IS fun, lots of fun. The characters are real people with all the frailties and peculiarities that make them interesting. Even though I half expected the outcome it didn't really matter because the way there was so much fun to watch. Nobody was perfect, all good or all bad, just real. Of the two brothers one began as shady and questionable character and the other as an upright citizen but as the film progressed they switched places. The transition was believable and based on facts clearly brought out in the script. Diana Dors was the fulcrum about whom the entire exercise revolved and she did an excellent job playing a woman who is confident of her appeal, willing to use it, but is anything but one-dimensional.

So what's not to like? I can't help but think that in the hands of a better director this could have been much, much better. Those same elements that made it fun could have made it great had they been handled more expertly. Dors' sensuality was shamelessly exploited and don't get me wrong, I just as shamelessly enjoyed every bit of it. But there were some superfluous shots that did nothing to advance the plot and appear to have been inserted just to give us another look at this gorgeous woman. And then there was the theme song, played to distraction. I for one, don't get the connection. What do the words "Tread Softly Stranger" have to do with the relationship between two brothers and a woman?

But in the long run, even though I can't rate it any higher, I heartily enjoyed this film and will gladly do so again. For those who haven't yet seen it do so immediately.

Those Mansell Brothers -- Fools For Love

[bkoganbing · 6/10 · 19 April 2017]

George Baker and Terrence Morgan play the Mansell Brothers about as different as brothers can get. Baker has gone to London where his gambling has put him in debt with some bad people. He decides to go home to his north of England factory town and hole up there for a bit.

Where he's reunited with his rather dull brother Morgan who is a bookkeeper in a factory. His life is enlivened by the presence of Diana Dors who is one high maintenance indulgence for him. But pretty soon she also has Baker's wheels spinning too.

Because she's so high maintenance Morgan is short in his accounts at the factory and an audit is coming. Baker's and Dors's solution is rob the place to cover the theft and incidentally pay off the nasty people Baker owes.

For all his worldliness Baker himself is no professional criminal so when the Mansell Brothers go out to steal everything goes wrong.

Diana Dors was the United Kingdom's answer to Marilyn Monroe. But Monroe even in her most voluptuous role in Niagara had nothing on Diana Dors in Tread Softly Stranger. One look at her you see why Baker and Morgan were goners.

Tread Softly Stranger is worth seeing for one sexy bundle from Britain named Diana Dors.

A small cast working wonders

[Leofwine_draca · 7/10 · 8 May 2016]

TREAD SOFTLY STRANGER is a tense and immersive British film noir featuring a headlining performance from Diana Dors at her most sultry and alluring. The story is a basic love triangle compounded by money worries, which lead to robbery and murder, all set within a grim and run-down northern industrial town. The opening scenes, which show off a fabulous and elaborate rooftop location complimented by Dors and her morning exercise routines, are great and racy stuff indeed.

I always feel that when a British B-movie thriller gets everything right then it's head and shoulders above rival American fare and that's the case here. This tale was originally adapted from a play but the cinematic version gets everything right and in particular the cast is a fine one.

Dors obviously holds the attention with her bombshell performance, but the real star of the thing is the underrated Terence Morgan (CURSE OF THE MUMMY'S TOMB) who propped up many a B-movie with his villainous turns. He has more depth to his character than usual and does very well with it. George Baker - TV's Inspector Wexford - plays the straight role and is very nearly as good, and a young Patrick Allen rounds off the cast.

a must for Diana Dors fans...

[happytrigger-64-390517 · 7/10 · 3 May 2019]

... she's not only so sexy (enjoy her first shot), but she plays well a sensitive young woman, Calico, lost between two brothers : she first was close to Dave (a fragile employee losing his temper to conquer the sweet sexy Calico) but eveything changes when tough Johnny arrives (kind of adventurer, handsome man never losing his temper, he makes me think of Ray Danton). The problem of this movie is Dave's character, always yelling when he panics, neighbours must have heard eveything about stealing and murder, and this is a major fault of the script and direction. But Diana Dors is the main attraction of the movie and the ending is especially gripping. Patrick Allen is also great as a determined parent's victim. With more work in the script and direction, it could have been a better movie, but is still entertaining.

Blind Man's Bluff

[richardchatten · 7/10 · 10 February 2023]

Back in the days when £300 was a colossal sum, Doris Dors showed what all the fuss was about as a high maintenance floozie with the appropriately abrasive nickname 'Calico' and described by George Baker as a "dirty little wharf rat".

Seven years after cameraman Doug Slocombe went up North to shoot 'The Man in the White Suit' he came to Sheffield - masquerading as the grim Northern town of Roughborough - to make this thriller complete with footage of steel foundries and model work full of chimneys belching smoke.

There doesn't seem a genuine Northern accent in the entire film, but Betty Warren is fun as a hard Northern broad with a knockout punch; while an obviously drunk and strangely uncredited Wilfrid Lawson makes a couple of fleeting but highly unsettling appearances.

Diana Dors Best Film

[howardmorley · 8/10 · 10 February 2013]

I consider that this title is the late Diana Dors best film and I have quite a few in my DVD collection.Produced in 1958 when she was at her peak she has a memorable scene when she recounts her lowly slum- like upbringing to George Baker of how she made her way "out of the gutter up onto the pavement".It reminded me of an Oscar Wilde quote by Lord Darlington from "Lady Windermere's Fan" "...some of us may be in the gutter but we are looking up at the stars".1958 was the year that the wonderful "A Night to Remember" was made and I spotted three actors from that film in "Tread Softly Stranger", namely Joseph Tomelty" (Joe Ryan) as Dr. O'Loughlin, Russell Napier (Potter) as Capt. Stanley Lord and Thomas Heathcote (Sgt. Lamb) as a 1st class smoking room steward.Diana was well supported by Terence Morgan and George Baker and I disagree with a previous reviewer, it did not have an Anglicized/American script - I checked the nationality of the two scriptwriters James George Minter/Denis O'Dell before writing this review.The film also had an authentic bleak northern industrial landscape.Remember also we have many Irish people working in our country.

When George Baker burnt the stolen money and flushed the embers down the sewer and disposed of the revolver I thought the brothers may have succeeded in their robbery, but of course the censor stepped in like they did in the 1950s to ensure we citizens kept on the straight and narrow.Overall I rated it excellent and it kept my interest all through and I rated it 8/10

A good crime drama

[DavidYZ · 6/10 · 4 May 2017]

This is a film noir crime drama about a slutty femme fatale who manipulates her partner and his brother into committing a robbery at her partner's workplace.

The story is good, as is the acting. However, the lack of Yorkshire accents in characters who are from working-class / underclass backgrounds is a major flaw. It's unbelievable that Diana Dors' very glamorous character would choose to live in poverty with a man whom she's not fond of.

There's no indication of how the film's title relates to the events and characters within it.

We've gotta get out of this place.

[ulicknormanowen · 8/10 · 15 October 2020]

This is first class British thriller , with a firm screenplay which almost looks like a Greek tragedy: whatever they do ,the brothers' fate is sealed: Johnny brings the money too late,had he come an hour earlier,nothing would have happened and Dave would have carried on with his routine life ; the final unexpected twist (brilliant) may well be the symbol of fate (perhaps inspired by the French realisme poétique school).

All happens in a drab industrial landscape ; smoke and chimneys everywhere; Calico wants to get out of this place and dreams of Paris and Italy ;sultry femme fatale Diana Dors is also a victim as she tells Johnny about her racy past :the only thing going for her is that she attracted the opposite sex; her acting is all right (but not as outstanding as her performance in "yield to the night" ) ;good performances come from George Baker ,as the gambling and protective sibling and from Patrick Allen , a Nemesis who plays with the brothers cat and mouse to avenge his father.But Terence Morgan ,at least to my eyes ,is the stand out : blinded by his passion for Calico , he's got no hold on the events : after the tragedy , racked by remorse, he sees this "old man" , the invisible witness, everywhere ; the scene when he enters his office the death after packs a wallop ; and his tormented face will haunt the viewer long after the ending.

Great suspense in the scene of the box where the brothers hid their loot.This movie will keep you glued to your chair till its last picture.

A Loud And Obvious Score Hammers An Otherwise Superior Thriller

[boblipton · 6/10 · 24 October 2020]

George Baker is the nervy brother, with a touch for picking the right horses. Terence Morgan is the smart brother, who has a job as a clerk in the big plant in town. Diana Dors is the promiscuous young woman whom Morgan wants, enough to embezzle three hundred pounds from the office. Now he has to replace it. Baker is out scrounging the cash up, when Miss Dors gives Morgan a gun and tells him that if all the money is missing, his theft won't show up.He heads out. Baker returns with the money, then takes off after Morgan. Before they can leave, the night watchman comes in and Morgan winds up shooting him.

The performances are very good, but I found it far too melodramatic with the obvious triangle, and Miss Dors oozing cheap and greedy sex appeal out of every pore beneath her tight-fitting outfits. Likewise, Tristam Carey's score seems to think the audience is a bunch of morons, who can't see what's going on right in front of them, so he helps them along with lots of bass, kettledrums, and clashing cymbals. That lack of respect makes what could have been a great kitchen-sink film noir into just a good one.

Worth it for atmosphere and Dors

[lucyrfisher · 2/10 · 1 April 2010]

The script is unremarkable and the direction leaden. But it's worth watching for the setting in a genuine industrial town – not just for the factories spewing smoke (which are no doubt now "heritage centres", art galleries and yuppie flats if they haven't been levelled), but for the shabby rooming house where the brothers and Diana live. The Victorian decor and furniture is still there 50 years later. You can't tell from this film that George Baker is a good actor, and Diana isn't asked to do much more than pose around (but she looks gorgeous and I love her clothes, apart from those embarrassing shorts she makes her first appearance (just) in). But I can't help feeling this is an American script transferred to Britain. I'm sure "up north" didn't have hostess clubs in the 50s, or so many Irish people: the nightwatchman, his son Paddy and the landlady are all Irish. In fact no one has a northern accent, and Paddy's girlfriend has a ridiculously posh English accent that is probably dubbed on. The plot is the same old "We've got a suit-case full of money but it's no use to us, we'd better burn it/put it down the toilet/let it blow away in the wind."

Jolly good.

[bombersflyup · 7/10 · 27 October 2019]

Tread Softly Stranger is engaging and enjoyable, though much of it surface level.

Dave's pretty much one note, the same with Calico, not to say that they're bad. The film's qualities lie with the plot, atmosphere, Diana Dors' beauty and Johnny who's terrific, played by George Baker. However Johnny's actions on arrival are despicable, encroaching on his brother's girl. It's quite predictable that the old man will be blind, but I like Johnny's reaction. Paddy Ryan's a decent secondary character also. The thugs at the race track saw Johnny collecting money, odd they didn't take it.. feels like I missed something there.

Strong B British noir with open, tempting Dors... and blind justice!

[adrianovasconcelos · 8/10 · 28 November 2023]

I confess that I know nothing about Director Gordon Parry. As far as I can tell, the rather good FRONT PAGE STORY, starring Jack Hawkins, is the only other film he has directed that I have watched.

Both films have strong, structured stories, but TREAD SOFTLY, STRANGER has the advantage of Diana Dors in the greatest form ever, even managing to deliver a credible performance. That said, plaudits must go to George Baker and Terence Morgan for playing two brothers understandably smitten with Dors - a temptress who wants money and gets them to steal for her, even if one (Baker) only does it to help his brother out of a tough situation and can clearly see Dors for the gold digger she is. Morgan is more impressionable and becomes a puppet in her horny hands, despite knowing that she does not love him but loves his brother instead.

Baker leaves London because of a bad debt and seeks refuge in his backwater birthplace, Rawborough, a small railway stop town with a factory that keeps spewing fumes, like a smouldering hell consuming its residents, some of whom question Baker's return from "lovely London" to dingy Rawborough. The brighter of the two brothers, Baker sensibly destroys the money that his brother stole from the factory where he works... too little too late. From the moment the brothers broke the law, and in particular when an old factory security guard is accidentally shot dead, the gods of Greek tragedy (and the British production code which wanted no bad examples to encourage the already rising crime rate) predetermine punishment for them.

Baker has the smarts to know that police need proof in order to charge them, but panicking Morgan cannot resist blind justice.

Dors' final declaration that she will wait for Baker floats off with the breeze swirling around the rooftops of the bedroom she rents.

Solid chiaroscuro cinematography from the excellent Douglas Slocombe, arresting script from Minter and O'Dell.

Definitely worth watching. 8/10.

This one should have stayed forgotten.

[MOscarbradley · 1/10 · 19 October 2016]

Probably the only good thing you can say about this British crime movie is that it makes excellent use of its North of England locations, (it was filmed mostly in Rotherham), and has some good, atmospheric photography by the great Douglas Slocombe. Otherwise, it's pretty terrible as femme fatale Diana Dors, (far from her finest hour), urges down-on-their-luck brothers George Baker and Terence Morgan to robbery and murder. It is atrociously scripted (by producer George Minter and Denis O'Dell from a play by Jack Popplewell), directed (by Gordon Parry) and acted (by the entire cast)and has largely been forgotten. It should have stayed that way.