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27 out of 28 people found the following comment useful :-
Brilliant low-budget thriller, 17 June 2001
10/10
Author: curlew-2 from North Charleston, South Carolina

An absolutely excellent thriller from the golden age of British SF filmmaking. Relying on tension and character rather than special effects, the film depicts a fevered manhunt for a scientist threatening to blow up London with a small A-bomb. Whereas other films would've easily dropped into stereotype, this film took the trouble to depict all the major characters as three-dimensional. Not to be missed.

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21 out of 22 people found the following comment useful :-
Intelligent And Thought Provoking, 20 January 2005
8/10
Author: Theo Robertson from Isle Of Bute, Scotland

Someone gets hold of an atomic bomb and decides to resort to blackmail . Boy I haven't seen a movie like this for almost a whole week . Can't story tellers think up something new ? Hey wait a minute the blackmailer is a white English guy called Professor Willoughby and SEVEN DAYS TO NOON was made in 1950 !

What can I say about this underrated British masterpiece ? It gives a whole new meaning to the word " Groundbreaking " , every time you see a movie like TRUE LIES featuring a bunch of nutters trying to nuke a city you know where they got the idea from . What makes SEVEN DAYS TO NOON stand out from the movies that followed it is the way it's written and directed . it'd be so easy for Willoughby to be a complete raving headcase but he's written in such a way you'll believe he existed in real life , he's someone who became a scientist to improve the lot of humanity and because of politicians he finds his work being used for destructive means . Do I see hints that this character influenced Nigel Kneale when he wrote his Quatermass stories ? Willoughby's well thought out arguments are interesting even though you might not agree with them .The scenario is helped even further by casting Barry Jones in the role , Jones being an actor who I'd no knowledge of hence I wasn't watching a well known face doing an acting performance I was watching a scientist with serious internal dilemmas . The reality is heightened even further by the Boulting brothers directing in the style of a documentary very similar to the way Fred Zimmerman later directed DAY OF THE JACKAL

As much as I've praised it there are one or two flaws . One is I couldn't take seriously the idea that the government would announce the truth and then evacuate London . Of course Willoughby not being a terrorist is essential to the plot , he won't detonate the bomb if alerted but again the government of the day would know this so why evacuate ? Think about it: Would he be more likely or less likely to press the button if there's ten million Londoners still in the city . I also found Prof Willoughby's ultimate fate very contrived

One other point of interest of this movie is that you're aware of how everything is different in Britain over the preceding decades . They'd be no need to stick posters all over London because television has become the medium for communication , ration books disappeared in 1952 and Britain still had a big enough army to spare four divsions to search for one man , so as a period piece alone SEVEN DAYS TO NOON makes interesting viewing

As a footnote the montage scenes of the soldiers combing London for Willoughby were reused for Hammer's cinema version of THE QUATERMASS EXPERIMENT . What makes this even more interesting is that the screenwriter of SEVEN DAYS TO NOON James Bernard ( Who won an Oscar for this screenplay along with Paul Dehn ) composed the music for THE QUATERMASS EXPERIMENT

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18 out of 19 people found the following comment useful :-
Brief review, 9 November 1998
Author: Glenn Andreiev (gandreiev@aol.com) from Huntington, NY

An excellent suspense thriller! Kindly old Prof Bullington (Barry Jones) gives the British government an ultimatum- unless they cease all atomic testing by the weekend, he will set off an A-Bomb in the center of London. Andre Morell heads the task force to find "the needle in one helluva haystack." Done in a documentary style that shoves the details and urgency of a great manhunt onto the audience. However, the human element of the story (i.e what Bullington's daughter has to go through, the dear sweet ol' actress Bullington holds captive, and the mass evacuation of London) is not lost for a millisecond. Superb acting (Especially by Morell and Jones) and writing. Do not miss!!

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16 out of 16 people found the following comment useful :-
Worth watching - more than once, 29 January 2007
7/10
Author: lucy-19 from London

A wonderful picture of London in the 50s, and an insight into the way people behaved, and were treated, during the war - patient crowds sitting on railway platforms waiting to be evacuated (Come along, ma! No, lad, you can't take that chicken!). I can't see or hear the married couples calling each other "darling" that another reviewer complained of - there's an engaged couple and he calls her "darling" about twice. Watch out for Joss Ackland as an eager copper and Jonathan Cecil as a young officer. The aging "actress" is simply wonderful and the relationship between her and Prof. Willingdon quite touching. ("He was a gentleman and I treated him as such - as he did me!") Lovely to see Joan Hickson as a cat-loving landlady, living in a house untouched for fifty years and crammed with Victorian nicknacks. What would they be worth now!

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10 out of 10 people found the following comment useful :-
A great fifties thriller., 16 November 1999
7/10
Author: RayB

An absorbing tale, well-told.

The big picture - London being evacuated, Prime Ministerial meetings, military operations - are contrasted with the anti-hero's attempts to evade detection among the city's ordinary people. His encounters with a seedy land-lady (brilliantly played the late Joan Hickson), and a fading second-rate actress, are depicted in fine detail.

But the film never gets bogged down - whenever the pace threatens to slow-up the scene cuts to racing police cars, thundering army convoys, or shrieking steam trains.

Carefully photographed set-pieces, solid acting all round, and a tense climax. Top stuff.

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8 out of 8 people found the following comment useful :-
Still effective and thoughtful after 55 years, 18 July 2006
7/10
Author: richard-meredith27 from United Kingdom

The Boulting Brothers stray from their usual cheery British comedy films to make this effective and thoughtful thriller. Leaving the plotting to one side, it is remarkable as, at that time, the Government was laying the basis for the U.K.'s independent atomic deterrent and the effects of Atomic and Nuclear testing were never discussed. (ask the poor soldiers who watched the tests in Australia!) The issue is never resolved, and in the end the Professor can't make his case publicly.

Part of the film shows the evacuation of London. It harks back to the great evacuations of 1939/4 and invokes the same spirit. Oddly enough, Wartime studios had not portrayed the Home Front (other than nods to Fire Services or War-Work)and perhaps this is a belated look back. It does show one incident that would never have passed the wartime censor's pencil- the shooting of looters.

Other cultural notes: How easy it was for the studios to clear London even then the most traffic congested city in England, and to get the army to lend hundreds of personnel (and demonstrate their efficiency). And the great attraction of the old 1950's films: glimpses of bomb sites, long lost street scenes and forgotten buildings.

Watch it and remember its been 55 years since this film was made and 7/7. I don't think the genre was attempted again. Instead Studios turned to Sci-Fi ( a thin disguise for the external Russian menace).

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11 out of 15 people found the following comment useful :-
Effective thriller, tense apart from weak cockney caricatures, 11 May 2003
Author: bob the moo from Birmingham, UK

Leading British atomic scientist Professor John Willoughby post a letter to the Prime Minister, gets on a train to London and then disappears. The alarm is raised when the letter arrives and is a threat to the security of London. Willoughby has tired seeing his work used for destruction and has given the Government 7 days to announce the end of their atomic weapons programme or else he will detonate an atomic device somewhere within London. As the deadline approaches a desperate search goes on for Willoughby.

It is strange to find a film from so long ago that has actually become more relevant as the years have gone on, and this is one of them. As the idea of a terrorist attack by a small nuclear device in the centre of a major city becomes much less of a sci-fi fantasy then this film becomes even more tense. The plot here is more of a comment on the arms race than anything else, but it's central premise is one of tense reality now. In fact the church-based climax will ring a bell as it was photocopied for the climax of `The Peacemaker' with George Clooney only a few years ago.

It could have been a lot tenser by making it more emotionally charged but it still holds it's own. What does take away from it a little bit is an abundance of cockneys adding local colour. They were clearly used to try and make it feel very realistic but sadly they are, to a man, cheeky chappies – all cheerfulness and rhyming slang. They aren't characters and it sucks the tension out of the middle section of the film by having them to the extent they are. Another weakness is the film's focus on Willoughby and less on those trying to stop him. The film does this to help make it's point but the fact that the audience know where he is etc takes away from our fear of him. Also less time with the authorities means that the sense of panic and deadline is more vague.

However these are minor complaints because the film does work quite well and delivers a fair amount of tension. People who were wowed by `28 Days Later' use of empty London streets would do well to check out the same here – it is eerily effect to see Big Ben and Tower Bridge devoid of any movement. I know that in 28 Days Later they used digital film to set up very quickly to get their shots and then reopen the roads – I wonder how they managed to do it so convincingly here?

Overall this is not as tense or exciting as it could have been, mainly because it is also trying to make a bigger point. However it is still pretty tense and very effective. As the threat of terrorist attacks from within cities becomes more possible it is hard to view this film without feeling some apprehension and fear. The thing I kept asking myself was, if we were given the same situation for real in the UK could our Government really deal with it as efficiently as the fictional Government did – evacuate the city and keep law and order? Now that's scary.

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6 out of 6 people found the following comment useful :-
Boulting Brothers Masterpiece, 11 September 2006
9/10
Author: clive5 from United Kingdom

Seven Days To Noon is another masterpiece from the Boulting Brothers and, as you would expect is superbly written and directed.

The much-under-rated Barry Jones is simply wonderful as the kindly professor with a moral dilemma. The cast succeeds in maintaining the tension nicely and Andre Morell is particularly convincing as the Superintendent, however I feel the most impressive part is the documentary-style photography, which allows the viewer a most interesting and revealing snapshot of post-war London.

Anyone who enjoys the classic English dramas of the 40s and 50s will love this.

Not to be missed.

Please somebody bring it out on DVD soon!

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8 out of 10 people found the following comment useful :-
Class act film making from half a century ago, 19 July 2006
9/10
Author: Critical Eye UK from Lake District, England

*** This comment may contain spoilers ***

Gawd knows what planet some reviewers here are living on if they think this movie belongs to the sci-fi genre.

Of course it doesn't.

It's in a league of its own, a 'protest' movie made before CND was thought of and a film with a social conscience long before other UK film-makers had awakened to the realities of the new world (i.e., nuclear era).

There's nothing 'sci-fi' in 'Seven Days To Noon' other than the fact that the writers fictionalised the ease with which a nuclear device could be carried around the streets of a city back in 1950. The issues broached by the movie are all too real, and given the way that at this particular moment in history, when the populace at large was still woefully ignorant of nuclear war (remember, both the US and UK Governments consistently denied that anyone ever died of radiation at Hiroshima; it was the blast-effect wot did it, guv) the movie must rank as one of the bravest made by any British studio.

Obviously, it has dated. Obviously, the characterisation and dialogue is out of the Ark. But in 1950, we really weren't that long out of the Ark anyway, our collective simplicities pretty well mirrored in the Cockney stereotypes which people the film.

Verdict: a lost gem of British film-making -- but never, ever, an example of science fiction.

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5 out of 5 people found the following comment useful :-
Twelve O'Clock High, 19 January 2008
8/10
Author: writers_reign from London, England

*** This comment may contain spoilers ***

Despite a long and active career, which included amongst other things supplying the off-screen 'voice' of Lord Haw Haw in Twelve O'Clock High and creating the role of Socrates in the Broadway production of Maxwell Anderson's Barefoot In Athens, Barry Jones was relatively unknown to cinema-goers in 1950 which made him an ideal choice for Professor Willoughby who, well-shod in London, intends to detonate a nuclear device in its centre unless the Prime Minister agrees to issue a statement prepared by Willoughby. This is one of those British films that DO stand up half a century later which is not, of course, the same as saying they are without flaws - for one thing we never see Willoughby until he has stolen the nuclear device, left home, wife and daughter and made his way to London. What we feel the loss of is a sense of seeing him being slowly driven from brilliant scientist and nondescript family man to someone prepared to unleash devastation on a great capital city. Joan Hickson and Olive Sloan are both solid in support as is Andre Morrell, charged with the task of finding Willoughby but others characters, Willoughby's daughter, his colleague and son-in-law-in-waiting are cheapest cardboard cutouts. Overall the pace is the thing that keeps it interesting, that and the period 'feel' of a lost London. Definitely worth a look.

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