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Amazon.co.uk Review
Remembered dimly as Peter Sellers' only venture into "serious" acting, Never Let Go has a lot of other things to recommend it, mostly because it manages to include a lot of the lurid elements that gained it an X certificate in 1960. It has a near-demented melodrama plot, as two desperate obsessives collide in a bizarre feud. Richard Todd, doing meek and put-upon, is a sales rep for smug Peter Jones' cosmetics firm whose life is turned upside-down when his Ford Anglia, bought on hire purchase and uninsured, is stolen by teddy boy Adam Faith. Looking like an inhabitant of Royston Vasey in The League of Gentlemen, Sellers plays a grinning, jumped-up spiv who runs a legitimate garage which is a front for the car thieves and is sugar daddy to teenage tartlet Carol White.
Typical of Sellers' demonic rottenness is a scene in which he breaks down-and-out Melvyn Johns' heart by stamping on his beloved terrapin. "Peanut" Todd's crusade to get back his motor (catchphrase "what about my car?") brings trouble too: he gets repeatedly beaten up, abandoned by his wife (Elizabeth Sellars) and dragged to the edge of madness for a final punch-up in a garage. With a delightfully sleazy, jazzy John Barry score, lots of local colour in the caffs and gaffs of criminal London circa 1960 and a parade of welcome character actors (John le Mesurier, David Lodge, Noel Willman, Nigel Stock), this has its soapy spells, but it's a fascinating relic.
On the DVD: Never Let Go's menu plays under Faith's theme song ("When Johnny Comes Marching Home Again--Oh Yeah Oh Yeah!"). The print is slightly letterboxed but looks a few generations away from the master with some careless transfer work that greys shadows and overexposes some scenes. --Kim Newman
Special Features
English
Region 2
Region 2
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
12 of 12 people found the following review helpful
Format:DVD
I bought this DVD for a bargain price from an Amazon seller, and was very pleased with the picture quality considering it is a budget release. This film is a fantastic period piece with three great lead actors, Richard Todd, Peter Sellers, and a very young Adam Faith. Among the supporting cast is the always superb David Lodge.
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful
Format:DVD
An ambitious (and ruthlessly unpleasant in real life)Peter Sellers throws himself so completely into this serious role as a vicious criminal garage boss that he lived the part whilst the film was being made and scared his family half to death as a result. Sellers tries a bit too hard and is rather melodramatic at times. Richard Todd is more convincing as the little man who fights back when his car is stolen. The only laughs come from the minor(especially those playing policemen)character's RADA accents. A really good old fashioned B Picture to watch on a wet Sunday afternoon!
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful
Format:DVD|Amazon Verified Purchase
And that's the problem. Sellers in the role of a criminal car "ringer" is quite convincing - bullying, sadistic, by the end of the film, almost maniacal - except you keep expecting him to trip over the furniture. The film dates from an era when the principal "good guys" and the higher echelons of the police force were expected to have "cultured" accents. The police inspector's strangled vowels verge on the ludicrous/laughable. Elisabeth Sellars (as wife of second rate cosmetics salesman, Richard Todd, whose stolen Ford Anglia is the subject of the film) is just too beautiful to be true in their crummy little flat . . . but that was par for the course in 1960. Everybody smokes . . even Nigel Stock as Seller's "ringer" mechanic. He smokes while he's operating a cellulose paint spray-gun. Could have blown Todd's car and himself to smithereens! The story proceeds at a good pace, but should be seen (if you can!) in the context of its era - I saw it twice as a teenager. The "set piece" acts of retribution - by the young car thieves and later by Sellers himself - against the old newsvendor now look cliched. But generally, the suspense is well held and the final confrontation between Sellers and Todd is (or certainly seemed in 1960) both suspenseful and exciting. Note how Seller's first cruel act, when he slams the radiogram lid onto Adam Faith's fingers, becomes his nemesis when Todd - almost accidentally - slams the car door on Seller's hand in the final (very well directed) fight scene. Adam Faith, Carol White and David Lodge support convincingly . . . rather a pity that they are eased out of the story inconclusively in the final scenes. Black and white - the bras as well as the film! And wheyhey . . those full-on gob kisses!
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
Really good film
We enjoyed watching this film, having not seen the film myself I took the chance and was really pleased with it. Read more
Published 9 months ago by Ms. Nicola J. Booth
A truly nasty film for nasty times
Captures the raw materialism and gangsterism of the 60s.A really nasty ending where half dead salesman gets his car back after fighting rockers pimps gangsters and the police. Read more
Published 14 months ago by Bozo
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