Main Cast: Albert Finney, Billie Whitelaw, Frank Finlay, Janice Rule, Carolyn Seymour
Release Year: 1971
Country: UK
Run Time: 85 minutes
MPAA Rating: GP
Plot
Part spoof and part "straight," Gumshoe comes off as an affectionate tribute to the hard-boiled detective films of yore. Albert Finney stars as Eddie Ginley, a Liverpool bingo-caller and erstwhile comedian who has been weaned on the novels of Raymond Chandler and Dashiel Hammett. Fancying himself an ace detective, Ginley quits his job to form his own agency. Before long, he is involved in a complex mystery with decided echoes of The Maltese Falcon and The Big Sleep, replete with femme fatale (Janice Rule) and sinister fat man (George Silver). Armed with little more than a slick line of patter, Ginley plunges into this baffling case, while his level-headed brother (Frank Finlay) and sister-in-law (Billie Whitelaw) try to talk him out of it. Despite its satirical content, Gumshoe turns out to be a fascinating mystery yarn on its own terms. Albert Finney also produced the film, while none other than Andrew Lloyd Webber supplied the musical score. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
George Innes - Bookshop Proprietor; Fulton Mackay - Straker; Scott Christian - Club Artist; Christopher Cunningham - Clifford; Vicki Day - Artist in Club; Bill Dean - Tommy; Ernie Mac and the Saturated Seven - Club Musicians; Harry Hutchinson - Kleptomaniac; The Jacksons; Ken Jones - Labor Exchange Clerk; Jason Kane - Artist in Club; Bert King - Mal; Maureen Lipman - Naomi; Wendy Richard - Anne; George Silver - De Fries; Neville Smith - Arthur; Tom Kempinski - Psychiatrist; Oscar James - Azinge
Credit
Richard Rambaut - Art Director, Daphne Dare - Costume Designer, Stephen Frears - Director, Fergus McDonell - Editor, Charles Rees - Editor, Andrew Lloyd Webber - Composer (Music Score), Roy Young - Songwriter, Bob Lawrence - Makeup, Michael Seymour - Production Designer, Chris Menges - Cinematographer, Michael Medwin - Producer, Harry Cordwell - Set Designer, Brian Brockwell - Set Designer, Bowie Films - Special Effects, Neville Smith - Screenwriter, Tim Rice - Lyricist
Gumshoe is a 1971film, and was the directorial debut of British director Stephen Frears.
Written by local author Neville Smith, the film is set in Liverpool with Albert Finney playing the role of Eddie Ginley. Ginley is a bingo-caller and occasional club comedian who dreams of being a private eye of the kind he knows from films and pulp novels. Having put an advertisement in a local newspaper (the Liverpool Echo) as a birthday present to himself, Ginley is suddenly contacted for what appears to be an actual piece of detective work...
The film has many comic moments as it switches between detective novel and affectionate spoof. It has some shots of Liverpool buildings that have long since been demolished, including the employment exchange on Leece Street.
Gumshoe was the first of two films to be have original music scores by Andrew Lloyd-Webber (the other was The Odessa File, in 1974). Some of the music was re-used in Lloyd-Weber's musical version of Sunset Boulevard (1993).
Despite its relatively lightweight tone, Frears' film is not without its contentious moments. TV broadcasts are nowadays rare because of the important scene in which Ginley uses an insult now considered unacceptably racist. Another scene was seriously (and obtrusively) shortened before release because of its detailed depiction of a heroin-user preparing and taking his 'fix'.
After years of unavilability, Gumshoe was released on DVD in 2009.
