The cover of this new BFI release (out soon on Blu-ray, Apple TV, Amazon Prime and - in a bit - on BFI Player) may only mention STRONGROOM (newly remastered in 2K) but be assured that as a bonus you also get another superb Vernon Sewell-directed thriller THE MAN IN THE BACK SEAT as well. So let’s take a look at both.
STRONGROOM is a seriously decent little 79 minute B picture about a bank job gone wrong, resulting in the bank manager and his secretary being trapped in the vault. The robbers concoct a plan to free them but then the only one able to do it is almost immediately killed in a car accident. Should the others go back and risk being caught? Or leave the prisoners there to die and risk being caught and hanged?
The leads (Derren Nesbitt, Colin Gordon and Ann Lynn) are all very good but the best bit is the writing, which quickly starts piling disaster upon disaster in such a breathless way that by the time the baddies are loading their van with oxy-acetylene equipment and the police are hot on their trail all you're wondering is if the two stuck in the vault might actually die. You’ll have to watch the film to find out.
THE MAN IN THE BACK SEAT was made before STRONGROOM and also features Derren Nesbitt and Keith Faulkner, who got on so well with Vernon Sewell that he cast them in STRONGROOM the following year. They are two crooks who plan to steal the takings from a greyhound racetrack. The only problem is the bag is handcuffed to the man they beat senseless to get it. How to remove it? First they have to get him to a place where they can do it, which is how he ends up as the title character. This is great, tense stuff that by the end transcends the crime genre into something approaching pure horror, and the film is one of the best of a series of Leslie Parkyn - Julian Wintle crime pictures made at Beaconsfield Studios in the early 1960s.
Extras on the BFI’s Blu-ray include a new commentary track from Josephine Botting and Vic Pratt on STRONGROOM and another from them on MAN IN THE BACK SEAT, a two part audio interview with editor John Trumper that's spread over the two films, Footpads - a one minute British crime film from 1896 (!), Donovan Winter’s 1957 heist short THE AWAKENING HOUR (21 minutes) and a couple of public information films - AFTER DARK (14 minutes) from 1979 about road safety and A TEST FOR LOVE from 1937 (27 minutes) which is about the perils of STDs and is on here because it was directed by Vernon Sewell. The first pressing of the disc also includes a booklet with new writing on the film from James Bell, Barry Forshaw and Tony Dykes.
STRONGROOM and THE MAN IN THE BACK SEAT are coming out from the BFI on Blu-ray, Apple TV, and Amazon Prime on Monday 23rd February 2026 and on BFI Player on Monday 23rd March 2026
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