I make films to appeal to the lowest common denominator. That's why I'm still in business...

Lockdown continues and I am becoming strangely obsessed with rubbish old films.  The other day I came across "Fire Down Below" which I remember from rainy afternoons in school holidays back in the 80s.

The plot is very simple Robert Michum and Jack Lemmon are two smugglers who potter around the Carribean fighting over Rita Hayworth.  Mitchum wins.  There I've saved you two hours.  My God this film is long ... or it seems like forever... Actually it's only 115 minutes but they draaaaaaaaaaaaaaag....

I went to Sainsburys and back and missed no plot at all and I'm sure this wasn't because I've seen it before... but a couple of things I didn't notice from before... Albert R. Broccoli future producer of the James Bond films cameos in it ...and indeed produced it.  And Bernard Lee later to be the first M has a role as  Doctor Sam Blake who offers to cut Robert Mitchum's legs off when he gets trapped under a girder which is about as exiting as it gets.

Spoiler:  In the end he escapes with both legs.

But the thing I really remember this film for is the locations which are beautiful and their vivid contrast with the grotty and claustrophic boat.  Also Edric Connor's unspoken disapprobation of the unfolding situation.

Made in 1957 the film was a financial failure that never quite broke even.  As a result the producers Irving Allen and Albert R. Broccoli who were then running a production company called Warrick Films reduced their production schedule to one film a year because in the words of Mr Allen "In five years costs have doubled and earnings have halved. When those two graphs meet you're out of business".

Allen and Broccoli eventually fell out over money and because Broccoli wanted to make the Bond films as his next project which Allen regarded as going too down market.  An odd point of view really since he once expoused the philosophy...

"If somebody sends me a literate script do you know what I do with it? I throw it in the waste paper basket, that's what I do with it. I make films to appeal to the lowest common denominator.  That's why I'm still in business while the other arty-farty boys are not. 

I just want to make pictures to make money. That is a rat race and you can't afford to be a rat in a rat race... 

If I'm not tough I'm going to have my brains eaten out. 

The art of surviving in this business is never to let on whether you've got fifty million bucks or fifty cents... 

I wouldn't see my own films. 

I've got more taste than that. 

Does Barbara Hutton buy her jewelry at Woolworths?"