clanciai Review of A Prize of Gold

A Prize of Gold (1955)

Pushing only harder on the more the adversities keep piling up

[9/10 · 18 April 2022]

There is a remarkable cast here with a bunch of first class actors all in rogue roles, one worse than the other, while the original intention was good enough but got forgotten on the way or rather overrun by the greed of all the other rogues. Donald Wolfit is seldom seen as a rogue on screen, and here he is actually a rather pitiable one, not willing at all from the beginning to enter the racket but gradually getting more and more involved in worse and worse complications and adversities, which was the last thing he bargained for. Richard Widmark is always excellent in any role, especially rogue roles, and here he is a rather careless army official posted in post war Berlin, where he happens to run into a charming blonde German teacher of children in an improvised school set in the ruins of a bombed palace, they fall in love, and there are consequences. It's only for her sake that he messes himself up in an impossible racket, jumping at the slight chance of some success against all odds, and only pushing harder on the more everything goes wrong. George Cole as the honest British soldier has a very sympathetic role and is the one who gets hardest hit. Nigel Patrick finally shows off in elegance and stalwart persistence in the mounting disaster of a perfect general shipwreck and at least escapes punishment. It's a nail-biting thriller putting the audience on the rack as well as all the actors, while lovely Mai Zetterling is the only one who truly gets away without even guessing the size of the enormous troubles of all the others.