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IMDbPro

The Horse's Mouth

  • 19581958
  • ApprovedApproved
  • 1h 37m
IMDb RATING
7.0/10
3.6K
YOUR RATING
The Horse's Mouth (1958)
Comedy
An ill-behaved, lovably scruffy painter, Gulley Jimson, searches for a perfect canvas, determined to let nothing come between himself and the realization of his exalted vision.An ill-behaved, lovably scruffy painter, Gulley Jimson, searches for a perfect canvas, determined to let nothing come between himself and the realization of his exalted vision.An ill-behaved, lovably scruffy painter, Gulley Jimson, searches for a perfect canvas, determined to let nothing come between himself and the realization of his exalted vision.
IMDb RATING
7.0/10
3.6K
YOUR RATING
    • Ronald Neame
    • Joyce Cary(novel)
    • Alec Guinness(screenplay)
  • Stars
    • Alec Guinness
    • Kay Walsh
    • Renee Houston
    • Ronald Neame
    • Joyce Cary(novel)
    • Alec Guinness(screenplay)
  • Stars
    • Alec Guinness
    • Kay Walsh
    • Renee Houston
  • See production, box office & company info
    • 43User reviews
    • 21Critic reviews
  • See production, box office & company info
  • See more at IMDbPro
    • Nominated for 1 Oscar

    Photos

    Alec Guinness, Renee Houston, and Kay Walsh in The Horse's Mouth (1958)
    The Horse's Mouth (1958)
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    Top cast

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    Alec Guinness
    Alec Guinness
    • Gulley Jimson
    Kay Walsh
    Kay Walsh
    • Dee Coker
    Renee Houston
    Renee Houston
    • Sara Monday
    Mike Morgan
    • Nosey
    Robert Coote
    Robert Coote
    • Sir William Beeder
    Arthur Macrae
    • A.W. Alabaster
    Veronica Turleigh
    Veronica Turleigh
    • Lady Beeder
    Michael Gough
    Michael Gough
    • Abel [Bisson]
    Reginald Beckwith
    Reginald Beckwith
    • Capt. Jones
    Ernest Thesiger
    Ernest Thesiger
    • Hickson
    Gillian Vaughan
    • Lollie
    John Adams
    • Police Officer
    • (uncredited)
    Chris Adcock
    • Workman
    • (uncredited)
    Andy Alston
    • Workman
    • (uncredited)
    Timothy Bateson
    Timothy Bateson
    • Clerk to Borough Surveyor
    • (uncredited)
    Jim Brady
    Jim Brady
    • Workman
    • (uncredited)
    Victor Brooks
    • Foreman
    • (uncredited)
    Peter Bull
    Peter Bull
    • Man in Taxi
    • (uncredited)
      • Ronald Neame
      • Joyce Cary(novel)
      • Alec Guinness(screenplay)
    • All cast & crew
    • Production, box office & more at IMDbPro

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    Storyline

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    Did you know

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    • Trivia
      When Nosey offers Bisson a bowl of stew, Michael Gough's voice on the soundtrack says "Buzz off!" but his lips form the words "Drop dead!" Presumably the line was changed when Mike Morgan died suddenly before the movie was released.
    • Goofs
      (at around 12 mins) Gully Jimson is served a pint of beer in the pub. The amount of beer in the glass varies inconsistently in subsequent shots.
    • Quotes

      Gulley Jimson: Go and do something sensible, like shooting yourself! But don't be an artist!

    • Connections
      Featured in The Rotten Tomatoes Show: Dinner for Schmucks/Charlie St. Cloud/Get Low (2010)
    • Soundtracks
      Lieutenant Kije
      by Sergei Prokofiev (as Prokofieff)

      Arranged by Kenneth V. Jones

      Conducted by Muir Mathieson

    User reviews43

    Review
    Review
    Featured review
    6/10
    Painting The Town
    Alec Guinness not only stars in what amounts to a one-man show as aging, struggling London painter Gulley Jimson, he also wrote the script. Funny he got an Oscar nomination for the writing, and not for the acting.

    As Jimson, Guinness is a memorably growly, seedy type, testament to the artistic impulse of man running afoul of polite society. Even his nasty Fagin from "Oliver Twist" was affable company; Jimson tells off his young admirer Nosey (Mike Morgan) with a convincingly hoarse "Go do something sensible, like shooting yourself." It's all for laughs, of course, except when "The Horse's Mouth" gets mildly serious, mostly when Jimson holds forth on his vision of art.

    "Half a minute of revelation's worth a million years of know-nothing," he tells his companion Coker (Kay Walsh).

    "Who lives a million years?" is her sharp reply.

    "A million people every 12 months."

    "A Horse's Mouth" isn't always so smart. Walsh plays her part too shrill, Morgan his too moony, and the artist who provided Jimson's paintings, John Bratby, uses too much red. After establishing Jimson, Guinness's script doesn't do much with him. He paints some walls, gets into some trouble, and sails away, leaving others to bear witness to his "genius".

    What I like most about this film, other than Guinness's fine acting and occasional scenes here and there that feature his character to good effect, is the vivid picture you get of London circa the late 1950s, double-decker buses with hoardings for Gordon's Gin and Ty-Phoo Tea on their sides. Also, director Ronald Neame finds interesting angles to frame the film from in order to give the on-screen action (rarely painting itself, but frequently static conversation shots) a bit of vitality, and often outside with lively streetscape backdrops.

    This is like a David Lean movie once removed. Neame was Lean's cinematographer in his early days, Guinness was Lean's favorite actor, and Walsh was Lean's ex-wife. Even Anne V. Coates, later the Oscar-winning editor of "Lawrence Of Arabia", snipped this as well.

    She deserved her Oscar; not so Guinness his nomination here. As a comedy, "The Horse's Mouth" is a bit of a miss. A scene of Jimson ruining a rich couple's penthouse apartment is painfully unfunny, especially when a sculptor friend of Jimson (Michael Gough) arrives out of nowhere to add to the mess. Most of the other business in the movie, like a struggle between Jimson and his ex-wife for a portrait of her he needs for painting money, feels like chopped-down scenes from Cary's novel mined for easy laughs, at some expense to story.

    I didn't care much about Jimson by story's end, but I did enjoy his company, or rather that of Guinness playing Jimson, staring at a charwoman and fixated by her feet, "...old women's feet...thin, flat, long...clinging to the ground like reptiles". Like much else in regard to the movie, I'm at a loss to what it means, but I value the experience. That counts for something with art.
    helpful•16
    1
    • slokes
    • Oct 21, 2009

    Details

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    • Release date
      • November 11, 1958 (United States)
      • United Kingdom
      • Criterion (United States)
      • English
      • French
      • Italian
      • Spanish
      • Cantonese
      • Norse, Old
      • Portuguese
    • Also known as
    • Filming locations
      • Wormwood Scrubs Prison, Du Cane Road, East Acton, London, England, UK
    • Production company
      • Knightsbridge Films
    • See more company credits at IMDbPro

    Technical specs

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    • 1 hour 37 minutes

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