Leofwine_draca THE SHIP THAT DIED OF SHAME is something a little different from Ealing Studios: it's a gritty crime drama about a trio of British sailors who find themselves at a loose end after the war and who decide to go into the smuggling business to make ends meet. What follows is low key and grittily realistic, based on a story by CRUEL SEA author Nicholas Monsarrat. The film has a much higher threshold of realism than most from this era and is thus less gung-ho than some, a character study more than an action thriller.George Baker is the reliable lead, suffering from tragedy and with a mix of drives and emotions to propel him onwards into a life of crime. Richard Attenborough does well in a very oily performance while Bill Owen brings up the rear in an understated turn. Other familiar faces like Virginia McKenna, Bernard Lee, and Roland Culver also appear from time to time. The first half of the film has a light, almost jovial atmosphere at times, but it all gets very dark and very serious for the climax.

malcolmgsw Despite being downbeat and full of illogical ideas not least the title,this film still manages to be entertaining till the rather poor climax.So much of what happens is not properly explained.Why does Attenborough want to go in with Culver,how does Lee know that Attenborough will be at the garage.Why does Cilver shoot Lee,and of course the illogical notion that a boat has a soul.Poor old George Baker doesn't have a happy moment during this film.Everything is gloom.Attenborough plays the sort of role that he must have played dozens of times in the fifties.Incidentally since the craft was a Motor Torpedo Boat shouldn't the title have been The Boat that died of shame?

robertasmith Despie my interest in post war films and all things Naval, I have not heard of this film. How I have missed it is beyond me.George Baker is fantastic as the lead and Bill Owen, known to me as Compo, is a revelation. Richard Attenborough is perfect as always and the roles played by Bernard Lee and Virginia McKenna are small but superb.I must now read the book to see how the author handled the many strands and ending, which is a little disappointing in the film. Few people in today's Britain understand the stress and strain on on those demobbed at the end of WW2 but I suspect that with growing redundancies of front line troops in Afghanistan, the stories and threads explored in this film will strike a modern chord.

macduff50 What's noteworthy about this one for me is that similar vintage Hollywood films often spoil their stories by making their villains remorseful or in other ways kow-towing to the official morality of their times. These characters, by contrast, the bad ones and good ones alike, never hesitate for a moment to do the nasty things we know they will do. What's better, they are pictured as intelligent, for the most part, and able to give the authorities a run for their money. It's not that I think criminality is in any way praiseworthy, but rather that the writer gives us real people, making real decisions, and doesn't throw away the credibility of the characters merely to bow down to the official morality of his times. Particularly good is the character played by Attenborough, who isn't a bad man, but who, through not thinking enough about the choices he's making -- which he rationalizes very cleverly and realistically, so that it takes us a while to even see that that is what he's doing -- gets in far too deep, and then can't get himself out. A marvellous job of acting, and an intelligent and tightly woven script. Not a great movie, but a pretty good one, especially since the "actions" of the boat can just as easily be attributed to the hesitations of the characters, that is, there's no real supernatural force necessarily implied by the script.