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The Blue Lamp (1950) More at IMDbPro »

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16 out of 18 people found the following comment useful :-
Very realistic, 9 June 2005
10/10
Author: loza-1

This was made just five years after the end of the second world war. Some old folk I spoke to as a kid told me that when they were kids there were no gangs of youths on the streets: there were gangs of men. After the second world war, we began to see the emergence of youth crime. It has grown since then, practically spiralling out of control.

When we look at this film from the frame of reference of the early twenty-first century, this film where the London underworld joins with the police to track down the killer of a policeman looks unreal. If you have read any of the reminiscences of police officers of the period (such as Robert Fabian's "Fabian of the Yard") you will see that this sort of relationship between the police and the underworld is right on the button. This is the sort of thing that would have happened.

The type of policing that this film portrays belongs to a bygone era, when criminals often didn't have cars to make their getaways. It also shows the advantage of the beat copper, who knows his beat so well that if there is anything unusual he notes it down, and if there is any trouble, he has a fair idea of who is causing it. And the pair played by Jimmy Hanley and Jack Warner showed perfectly the inexperienced learning from the experienced. The situations, such as the costermonger being continually told to "move along there" are real for then but not for now, when police work, once done using discretion, is now, like everything else, done by bureaucracy.

The film is shot in north London, in the Paddington, Maida Vale and Westbourne Park areas. P C Dixon's beat is round by the Grand Union Canal in an area known as Little Venice. The police station is the old Paddington Green station, which has since been knocked down and replaced by a new one on the Edgware Road.

What you must not do is watch this film and judge it by today's standards. I am old enough to know that the social conditions portrayed in this film are as realistic as it gets; and so is the way the police operate.

An excellent film.

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11 out of 13 people found the following comment useful :-
A London i remember, 20 September 2005
6/10
Author: malcolmgsw from london

When the Blue Lamp was released i was around 3 years old.I therefore do remember the London that it shows.To me the film is more interesting in what it reveals about the London of 1950 than the actual story.It shows the Metropolitan Music hall in the Edgware Road.It was in the last few years of its life before the A4 cutting a swathe into London meant that it was demolished for "progress".Music Hall by this time was in its last throes and what was left would be rendered extinct by the arrival of ITV.We see the Colloseium in Harlesden.Every High Street had cinemas like this.If you look carefully you will see that they were showing "Granny Get Your Gun" a 1940 "B" feature with May Robson.So it was probably a second run house.There are the bomb sites.I remember that in certain parts of London,particularly the East End there mere were more such sites than actual buildings.The streets do not have a great deal of traffic as there was little traffic at that time.So a film of some sociological interest

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14 out of 19 people found the following comment useful :-
Benign & grandfatherly - or just complacent?, 20 November 2001
Author: vaughan.birbeck from Solihull, England

Most crits of The Blue Lamp take the view that it shows the good old British copper as the embodiment of all society's virtues: honest, loyal, and imposing a firm but fair discipline. The major threat to social order comes from undisciplined youth. When order is disrupted, all social elements join forces to enforce discipline and restore order.

I believe a closer look at the film reveals something rather more disturbing. I actually find George Dixon a rather unattractive character! He isn't above using strong-arm tactics on a prisoner (Alf Lewis) and tells Andy Mitchell to finish his tea before rushing to investigate a case of wife-beating ("'E don't kill 'is missus off that quick!"). He is also sarcastic to his colleagues: when a member of the police choir complains about having a frog in his throat, Dixon says sourly he should let the frog do the singing.

More seriously, Dixon fails to appreciate what the modern police are up against. When another officer is coshed during a jewel robbery young Andy Mitchell is rightly concerned, seeing it as an escalation in violence towards the police. Dixon waves the incident aside, the officer "has a good hard head" so no harm was done.

As a result, when faced with Tom Riley wielding a pistol, Dixon thinks traditional respect for police officers and his personal air of authority will win through. The look on his face after being shot isn't pain, it's stunned disbelief.

For me, The Blue Lamp stands as a warning about the turmoil lurking beneath an apparently placid, orderly society and the methods that will be needed to keep things under control. The old ways are no longer enough.

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7 out of 7 people found the following comment useful :-
Post-war classic of British cinema, 15 October 2005
9/10
Author: James Byrne from Lincoln, England

*** This comment may contain spoilers ***

THE BLUE LAMP, voted Best Film of the Year in 1950 by the British Film Academy, is a semi-documentary homage to the post-war Bobby on the beat. PC Dixon shows a young rookie, Andy Mitchell, the ropes and offers him lodgings under his own roof. Two young hoodlums rob a cinema, and one of them, Tom Riley, shoots Dixon, who later dies in hospital. After his accomplice Spud is killed in a car crash, Riley is finally apprehended in the White City Stadium; the police are helped by the criminal underworld, and the bookies using their tic-tac code. THE BLUE LAMP is famous for two reasons, it made a star of Dirk Bogarde, and introduced Jack Warner to the character of PC George Dixon, who later appeared in 430 episodes, (1955-1976) in the BBC favourite "Dixon of Dock Green". The location shots are a breath of fresh air, real policemen were drafted in to control the crowds during the shooting of these scenes. The cast are excellent, particularly Bogarde and Warner, with three exceptions. Peggy Evans goes way over the top as Diana Lewis, the hysterical moll of Bogarde. She screams, and screams and screams her lines. The young couple who witness Dixon's shooting at the cinema, and disagree with each other on every subject, are just plain ridiculous. If only Bogarde had shot them instead of good old Jack Warner. Also, the little girl, Queenie, who finds the discarded revolver, and answers 'no' to every single question of Jimmy Hanley, is quite obviously not a child prodigy. It was great to see Sam Kydd pop up at the exciting White City climax as the bookies assistant. Basil Radford appeared in the movie by accident. Scenes were being filmed in a billiard hall near Piccadilly Circus when Basil went in looking for a game, and ended up in a scene with a background group of extras. THE BLUE LAMP is always a pure joy to watch, and is justifiably regarded as a post-war classic of British cinema.

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7 out of 8 people found the following comment useful :-
Excellent police drama, 27 June 2005
9/10
Author: Chris Gaskin from Derby, England

I taped The Blue Lamp when Channel 4 screened it one afternoon and found it very good.

It is about the normal life of Paddington Green Police station in London and the police have more work on when a murderer strikes. Worse still, one of the murderer's victims is PC George Dixon. These murders turn out to be connected with a series of robberies on shops and the search for the killer is stepped up. He is caught at the end in a greyhound stadium.

The Blue Lamp gives you an idea on what life was like at this time (1950) and it is great to see the old buses, trolleybuses, cars and other vehicles in the background. Very atmospheric at times too.

The cast is lead by Jack Warner as PC Dixon and is joined by Dirk Bogarde (Doctor In the House), Jimmy Hanley, Robert Flemyng (The Blood Beast Terror), Bernard Lee (long before he appeared as M in the James Bond movies), Gladys Henson and Dora Bryan (who can now be seen in comedy Last of the Summer Wine). Great parts from all.

Despite him being killed off in this, Jack Warner went on to star as PC Dixon in the long running and successful TV series Dixon of Dock Green.

The Blue Lamp is British drama at its best. Excellent.

Rating: 4 stars out of 5.

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5 out of 6 people found the following comment useful :-
British neorealism?, 30 January 2000
Author: Dibyaduti Purkayastha (tipup@hotmail.com) from New Delhi, India

One of the few British efforts to make the kind of 'gritty city' movies that the Americans did so well (Ritt, Cassavates, Kazan). Tibby Clarke wrote this before his (imho) finest work - 'The Lavender Hill Mob' & the climactic chase sequence of TLHM has its more sober counterpart here. This particular chase sequence would definitely rate as one of the best for the '50s. The social commentary in the beginning about old crime vs new crime (old money/ new money) jars the more politically correct '00 ears, but it definitely adds to the charm.

The most interesting performance is definitely the hugely talented Dirk Bogarde's. As the psychotic thief/ killer he sends a shiver down your spine even today. The pathetic slouch with the cold, cruel eyes stands as far apart as possible from the staid & begonia-sprouting policemen of the New Scotland Yard. And the sound of passing trains that overlaps his fits of rage? Brings back (unwelcome) memories of Jean Gabin in 'La Bete Humaine' - hv I spelt that right?

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5 out of 7 people found the following comment useful :-
Scotland Yard hunts down cop-killers, 22 January 2003
8/10
Author: Paul Myers (paul-myers) from Oxford, England

Seminal UK crime film from the 1950's that made a matinee idol of Dirk Bogarde as the young crook. The film served as useful propaganda for the police to show how far crime fighting and criminology had come since before the second world war.

The full resources of the metropolitan police are brought to bear in the search for two young crooks who murder a police officer during a robbery at a cinema. Incidentally, Jack Warner's character, George Dixon (the policeman who is murdered in the film) was resurrected years later, as the central character in the BBC television series 'Dixon of Dock Green'.

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3 out of 4 people found the following comment useful :-
It's a Fair Cop, 19 February 1999
7/10
Author: anonymous from York, England

A classic British drama depicting an unfeasibly decent police force getting to grips with the emerging post war phenomena of teenage delinquency. The main character Sergeant George Dixon and actor Jack Warner later featured in a long running British TV series, Dixon of Dock Green.

Interesting today more for its documentary-style sequences of an austere and bomb damaged London rather than the moralistic tone of the plot. A young Dirk Bogard features as a restless young thief, finding himself out of his depth and in possession of a gun. With girl in tow, his path inevitably crosses that of the benign and grandfatherly figure of PC Dixon with disastrous consequences. Naïve by modern standards, but the gunning down of an unarmed police officer doubtless shocked audiences of the day.

The disgust of police colleagues and the Cockney underworld are clumsily overstated to add spice to the pursuit, but the final scenes where Bogard is cornered in a greyhound track generate tension of the highest order.

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1 out of 1 people found the following comment useful :-
a good reflection of the times, 18 January 2008
8/10
Author: anthonyrwaldman from United Kingdom

I first saw "The Blue Lamp" when I was a youngster at the Mile End Empire cinema in East London. At that time I thought it was a really good film. However, I saw it again recently on television.

It is still a good film. It takes place in post-war London. It was a time of severe austerity, rationing and people just making do. However, it was a time of public order and most crime was petty. Most men has done military service and women had been marshaled into war work and accepted discipline easily . The youth movements, play centers, and a large network of youth clubs kept teenagers busy and out of trouble and military conscription looked after the older male teens. There was a"teddy boy" problem but it was easily contained and minimal. Unlike today, people could walk the streets and feel safe and there were no no-go areas in London. Furthermore,football teams such as Arsenal, Spurs and Chelsea attracted large gates of over50-60,000 and there was never any crowd trouble. The metropolitan police was at the grounds to play music at half time and that's about all they did. The "Blue Lamp" does however,highlight a few policing problems. There was a serious working class resentment against the police. There was a feeling that many police officers had "done well" out of the war through contacts with the black market. Other police officers they thought had had a good war by being exempt from military service. Also it was thought that the police ware harassing people for petty things (the barrow boy for example). This resentment is shown in the film by the little girl who finds the murder weapon and does not want to talk to the police about it. She is not shy but says that her father says " all coppers are ....." The police interfere in peoples lives. A seventeen year old is picked up for leaving home and given a "talking to" even though she is old enough to get married and is holding down a job. Many of these police officers are not from London and do not know the community or its culture. One is from Wales and another Andy is from Maidstone. It is apparent that the police do not really have the consent of the people they are policing. The George Dixon character has been a police officer too long and is somewhat cynical about the job. His murder by psychotic killer played wonderfully by Dirk Bogarde shows the dangers faced by an unarmed police force. Lastly, I don't really understand why the B.B.C. resurrected George Dixon from the grave when they already had a "beat copper" series on the radio called P.C. 49. This radio series was very popular and there was a cartoon strip spin- off which appeared in "The Eagle" comic. Also there were two successful films made: "The Adventures of P.C. 49 and "A Case for P.C. 49." It could have easily been adapted for television.

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An enjoyable film of a time gone by., 9 April 2009
7/10
Author: jerbar2004 from United Kingdom

This film is well made and tells the story well. Of course it is dated now but does have a bases of fact especially in police procedure and the fact that there was young men gangsters about because don't forget this was just after the war. All the policeman are like able and as the film goes by you find yourself caring what happens to them. What PC Dixon gets shot it is truly upsetting although most people know that the character when on to be one of the most watched 60's BBC television shows in the form of Dixon of Dock Green. The London shown in the film is a London that I remember lots of war damage and open spaces. I like the old road signs and shop sign which places in its time and space. London just after the war, and was soon to change. Worth a look just for this.

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