The Hi-Jackers (1963) User Reviews

Solid British B-picture

[Leofwine_draca · 6/10 · 26 March 2015]

THE HI-JACKERS is an efficient and entertaining British B-picture which ticks most of the right boxes when it comes to film-making. As a film about truck drivers it's not a patch on the excellent HELL DRIVERS but as a low budget B-movie it's a pleasing timewaster with some good action and an incident-packed plot line to recommend it. Director Jim O'Connolly later helmed the excellent horror flick TOWER OF EVIL.

A youthful Anthony Booth stars as a trucker who finds himself the victim of a gang of hi-jackers who take his truck as well as his load. He swears vengeance on the crew, and the rest of the film is a back-and-forth game between the villains and everyone else pitted against them. The cast is populated by some pretty good character actors who give engaging performances, although the likable Booth gives the best turn. The inclusion of a love interest for the hero drags the pace down a little but for the most part this works well and proves a nice time capsule of the early '60s.

Above average crime caper

[chrischapman-47545 · 7/10 · 13 January 2018]

Although a B movie made on a budget nevertheless it has a well structured plot and rattles along at a good pace. Rooted firmly in the early 1960's, eg before the M6 motorway was built, it has good period external shots and the interior pieces show what was then fashionable furniture, etc. The attitude to women is also evident. My only criticism would be some of the external lighting where the lighting cameraman clearly overdid it! Shame it's only in Black & White. A good selection of actors who seem to be taking their characterisations seriously. Note also the scene at the railway station where they possibly get in the wrong carriage door and some of the real passengers look at the camera wondering what is going on.

routine thriller from Butchers

[malcolmgsw · 6/10 · 31 December 2012]

This is the sort of film that would turn up on the bottom half of a double bill at your local ABC cinema in the 1960s.It is all fairly routine.However it is rather spoiled by plot contrivances.Firstly there is the coincidence that Jacquleine Ellis's ex husband just happens to be a criminal who is banged up in prison.Then the fact that he can not only identify the gang member but can provide his address.Then like all true B movie heroines,instead of informing the police,she goes straight over to Carter's house,peeks in the window sees him,thinks she has made her getaway and is promptly caught by a gang member.Then Booths partner who has given inside information to the gang is caught and spills the beans,and hey presto the gang is caught on the job.Quite a pleasant way to spend an hour.

Yes, a good British B-flick

[naseby · 14 September 2004]

Couldn't agree more, with Daniel. This seemed to wane, as you said only when the obligatory love interest came in (which thankfully, there wasn't a lot of). An independent lorry driver (a young Tony 'scouse git' Booth)finds he has been set-up by his co-partner in the business for a hi-jacking. The love interest Jacqueline Ellis, someone he picked up on her way to London, in his lorry, becomes also involved in cracking the gang that too hijacked Booth's lorry and are onto countless others. Watch carefully, when Booth goes to confront his chum, of an old location of 'Lion Wharf' Isleworth in Middlesex, close to Twickenham studios where the studio work was done. Some good character actors, Harold Goodwin, Glynn Edwards and Patrick Cargill as a sarky article cop make it watchable.

However, a basic but good plot, fine acting especially from Tony Blair's son-in-law. Fairly recently released with Reknown Pictures

'Hi Jack!......How was the hi-jack?'

[kalbimassey · 7/10 · 6 November 2023]

It works on about the level of a middle school creative writing lesson, with students assigned to produce their own crime story.

Cultured, cigar smoking, dome headed, gourmet wannabe Jack Carter (Derek Francis) is the mastermind behind a series of laughably gauche, but surprisingly successful lorry heists.

Likeable, do anything for anyone, anytime, Anthony Booth (prior to finding immortality as Alf Garnett's randy Scouse git son in law) along with passenger Jacqueline Ellis falls foul of the deftly planned...but still laughable hi-jack and his consignment of top quality Scotch soon becomes whiskey in the car, rather than whiskey in the jar!

Pompous, plum in the mouth detective, Patrick Cargill offers Booth little cheer in terms of recovering his vehicle, or its cargo, but is curious about the absence of his co-driver (Ronald Hines) on the day of the crime. Oddly, Hines bears a striking resemblance to Arthur Kennedy at his most devious and calculating, but minus the westerners gun slinging bravura.

Identified as the woman who knew too much, a couple of gang members attempt to put the frighteners on Ellis whilst she is taking a bath, in a predictably clumsy scene which succeeds only in putting the 'sigh' into Psycho. Responding with some of Grace Kelly's Rear Window resilience she takes matters into her own hands gathering information from ex-hubby and jailbird, Douglas Livingstone. The marriage having failed, due to his life of crime and his painfully boring insistence on including the word 'rich' in every sentence he utters.

Throw in plenty of interesting views of the transport from the early '60's and some modern big band jazz.....and you still have a pretty one dimensional cops 'n' robbers caper. Salvaged, however by its unabashed, unpretentious period charm, 'The Hi-Jackers' is a victory for simplicity, a wholly enjoyable experience.....always assuming that Ronald Hines enjoyed being repeatedly punched.

Nice Little Crime Drama

[boblipton · 6/10 · 27 June 2020]

Independent trucker Anthony Booth gives a lift to Jacqueline Ellis. Almost immediately, the truck is hit by some fellows who want the Johnny Walker he's carrying more than Booth does. They're led by Derek Francis, who learnedly lectures his crew on why they don't carry weapons - if someone dies accidentally, the police will have them for murder - and the tight fiscal leash he keeps his associates on - they'll spend it, and then the police will come around with hard-to-answer questions. No, he prefers to remain an ordinary, decent criminal, and live a long and pleasant life on the outside.

While Booth and Miss Ellis warily fall in together, Booth wonders how the criminals knew to hit him.... and that makes up the rest of this pleasant flick. It's nothing to win any critics' polls, but is a decent way to spend 66 minutes.

The description of the bald headed man would be a help

[kapelusznik18 · 5/10 · 22 April 2016]

***SPOILERS**** Mildly interesting if not confusing British crime caper movie involving a gang of hijacker who've been terrorizing truckers and stealing or hijacking their cargo's on the highways and back roads. Setting up fake accidents on the roads to the big cities the hijackers lead by the bald headed man Jack Carter, Derek Francis,try to take out their next victim independent trucker Terry McKinley, Anthony Booth, who's hauling a truckload of Johnny Walker Red whiskey bottles worth as much as $50,000.00 dollars or pound sterling. Carter and his boys didn't notice that Terry had a passenger that he picked up at a local truck stop Shirley, Jackie Ellis,who unlike Terry who was blindfolded with a sack tied over his head escaped and could identify them.

Terry also later finds out that his good friend and business partner Jim Brady, Ronald Hines, is working for the Cater hijack gang and in fact set him up. This all leads to Shirley getting kidnapped and held hostage by Carter's boys until they pull one one job, a truck loaded with ladies cosmetics, and then check out of the country. We also get the impression that Shirley's behind bars husband Tim, Douglas Livingstone, is somehow also involved with the hijacking team and is blackmailed by Shirley to spill the beans on them to the police. That or else she's testify against him in court on a number of other crimes that he committed that can extend his jail sentence from three months to thirty years!

***SPOILERS****It's Terry and some two dozen police lead by Inspector Grayson, Patrick Cargill, who finally come to Shirley's rescues in the gangs hideout in the country with the head man Carter knowing that he's beat not offering any resistance at all. Unlike his cohorts who fought like hell and got the hell beat out of them by Inspetor Grayson's men as well as Terry Carter saw the writing on the wall and meekly gave himself up, smoking a cheap .5 cigar, with out a fight! The what seemed like out of of the blue scene in the prison with Shirley and her jailbird husband Tim was a bit difficult to follow since it seems to have nothing to do with the story about hijacking. And Tim's non stop babbling about things that seemed to make no sense confused more then clarified his association with the Carter gang if in fact he had anything to do with it at all!

Fantastic B-Crime from Butchers

[TheFearmakers · 9/10 · 21 November 2019]

Writer/director Jim O'Connolly should be well known for two films where the cult status went to someone else: In BERSERK, Joan Crawford gets credit while stop-motion guru Ray Harryhausen and his dinosaurs ruled THE VALLEY OF GWANGI. But O'Connolly's by himself in creating two really neat, tight and entertaining B&W post-noir crime flicks derived from the British b-picture company, Butcher's, in the early/mid 1960's...

The first being THE HI-JACKERS starring Anthony Booth as an independent truck/lorry driver: victim of the titular gang faking accident scenes on the rural roadside and then stealing the cargo: in his case, cases of Johnnie Walker Red...

The essential eye candy is cute-as-a-button ingenue Jacqueline Ellis as a rogue young lady, the likes the truckers deem "Mystery," who Booth picks up at a diner before getting robbed. Their chemistry has the kind of relaxing, lived-in coziness where you want them to hook up, but they're almost too perfectly suited to, too soon...

On the other side are THE HI-JACKERS themselves: you might initially think they're actually highly professional policemen, or even classy college professors on a field trip roadside picnic...

Led by non-violent sophisticated heavy Derek Francis with two thugs from O'Connolly's followup, SMOKESCREEN, Glynn Edwards and David Gregory, they're an eclectic lot, calling the boss "Gov" and, eventually holed up at a rural estate, seem to have all the time in the world... that is, until the ingenue riskily moves in, providing a burst of 11th hour suspense, though more serene than edgy...

This fine little curio is an involving jazz-scored crime flick that, no matter what side's being centered on, moves along with well-timed action sequences blanketed by more intelligent than pulpy bouts of page-turning dialogue.

run of the mill but efficient

[DanielKing · 4 January 2003]

Strictly run-of-the-mill British crime yarn which exerts its own modest charm. Booth is actually quite charismatic and gets across the world weary nature of the long distance lorry driver. We get intriguing glimpses of the lay-bys and cafes these men exist in but it is never really dealt with is any depth. The same is true of the underworld; there are indications that operations are run by an intelligent middle class men who employ no hope working class men to carry things out. The gang includes one black member whose race is never mentioned. We get a sequence where the girl visits her ex-husband in jail and asks him for information, which he provides, perhaps showing there is no honour among thieves, although the gang seem pretty loyal to their boss. There are hints of a network of criminals and indications that crime among the haulage industry is rife. The film makes good use of its locations and the film only begins to sag when the narrative shifts to Booth's flat where the obligatory love interest takes place.

Very Entertaining Caper

[crumpytv · 8/10 · 31 March 2021]

British B movie of its day, but for all that it was enjoyable. The action and acting was a bit wooden but a fresh faced Tony Booth puts in a good performance.

It was a bit tongue-in-cheek at times; Carters house name - Dunrobin.

Some familiar faces from 1960s/70 TV.

Better than the Average B

[a.roberts · 19 April 2000]

Yet another late night treat from ITV. Rather above the British second feature norm (no difficult task), it boasts a likeable lead performance from Anthony (father-in-law of Tony Blair) Booth, genuine location footage and a witty villain. Even Vauxhall police-cars make a change from the usual Wolseleys.

I wonder if the PM screens this epic at Downing Street functions?

Enjoyable cops and robbers caper.

[plan99 · 8/10 · 23 March 2024]

It was tough being a lorry driver back then with little in the way of creature comforts in the slow and noisy vehicles. Few motorways and to top it off the danger of being hijacked.

It had the look of a 1953 film and not 1963 but this just made it look more gritty and the transport cafe looked great, back then they were for lorry drivers only and the travelling public were likely to be barred from entry. Me and a friend had to talk our way into one as late as the mid 70s.

Well worth watching with a good plot and good acting all round. Different to see nice Dave from Minder as a very nasty baddy.

Routine but watchable b-pic from the Butcher's studio.

[jamesraeburn2003 · 4 May 2010]

A young lorry driver called Terry McKinley (Anthony Booth) picks up a young runaway called Shirley (Jacqueline Ellis) en route to London with a consignment of whiskey worth £20,000. As they make their way down a quiet country b road, they are set upon by a gang of hijackers lead by Jack Carter (Derek Francis) who make off with the lorry and its valuable goods. Shirley who managed to escape is able to get a good look at Carter and is able to give a description to Inspector Grayson (Patrick Cargill). Terry invites Shirley to stay with him at his London flat and we learn that his business partner, Jim Brady (Ronald Hines), is working for Carter's gang. He tipped them off as to what valuable goods he was carrying and the route he was taking. Unfortunately, Brady learns that Shirley is able to identify his boss and later that night, Terry and Shirley receive a visit from a couple of Carter's thugs who deliver a sinister warning. By now, Terry strongly suspects his old friend Brady and drags him off to the police where he is forced to tell them of the gang's whereabouts. Meanwhile, Shirley visits her ex husband, Tim, who is doing time at Wormwood Scrubs. She threatens to tell the police about other crimes he was connected with, which could put him behind bars for longer unless she tells him where the gang are hiding out. She goes to Carter's house in Hampstead but she is overpowered by the gang. But fortunately, Brady has cracked and informs Terry and Inspector Grayson that the gang are pulling off another job, a lorry carrying £30,000 worth of cosmetics. As it happens the lorry is being driven by one of Terry's mates, a guy known as Scouse (Harold Goodwin). Terry and the police trace the gang to an abandoned farm but not until after they have hijacked the truck but in time to save the goods and rescue Shirley...

A routine b-pic thriller from Butcher's, Britain's poverty row studio who churned out numerous pot boilers such as this. Anybody who has seen a great number of them will probably agree that many were pretty awful. This one is utterly routine in terms of its plot but it is kept watchable thanks to brisk paced direction by Jim O' Connolly here working from his own screenplay who even throws in a few effective directorial touches, which you would not expect from such a routine production. Derek Francis is good as the gang leader, Jack Carter, who as well as planning ingenious hijacking methods also has a passion for cookery. "I find it creative rather like art or sculpture" he tells one of his accomplices. "I took it up when I was in Parkhurst and I ended up cooking for the prison governor and I think he was sorry when I left". Anthony Booth enjoys himself in the lead as Terry and he goes through his role cheerfully. He clearly enjoys the opportunity to do the odd fight scene and jump through a window (without the glass I might add) and knock a couple of hoodlums for six. Jacqueline Ellis is very competent as Shirley but the love angle is very blandly worked out and you cannot really imagine her character falling for Terry. There is an amusing little scene where Scouse approaches a road block, which he assumes to be the hijackers so he drives straight through it so pleased with himself that he narrowly avoids a deadly collision with a tree. He is surprised when he learns that it was a genuine road block. But later he approaches another one and assumes this one to be genuine as well so he stops and - you've guessed it - this time it is the hijackers!

Superb British B noir: excellent direction, acting, photography, script

[adrianovasconcelos · 9/10 · 1 April 2023]

I have just recently watched THE TRAITORS (UK 1962), which was coscripted by Jim O'Connolly, who does more of the same in THE HI-JACKERS (UK 1963) plus directing a wonder of a B flick in terms of visual and dialogue fluidity, extremely effective cinematography, and high quality acting from all, down to the smallest part.

This is certainly one of the best products ever to come out of Butcher's meatgrinder studio, and I was glad to see that John Douglas was responsible for the jazzy and catchy musical score, as he had had the same remit in the aforementioned THE TRAITORS. The latter had also benefitted from the presence of stunning Jacqueline Ellis, who has an even more substantial role here and delivers with adroit charm and lovely eyes.

Male lead Booth was never a memorable actor, but he does his part confidently, with a humorous vein, and he's a pleasure to watch, as is Derek Francis as classy criminal kingpin Jack Carter.

The relationship between Booth and Ellis is commendably restrained, suggesting real love budding between those two.

All in a compact 66'. To be honest, I loved it.