Tony Giani is a Soho pimp who preys on young provincial women who come to London seeking work. Marissa Cooper, one such girl, has just arrived in London. Giani spots her and offers her a job in the Golden Bucket, a nightclub. In her innocence, she does not realize the club is a front for prostitution. When she tries to escape from the pimp's control, she is set up by Giani and his brother Angelo and arrested by the police. Investigative journalist Lloyd Buxton persuades her to give evidence against the brothers leading to their imprisonment and her freedom.
It was based on Daughter of Desire a 1956 British play by "Deborah Bedford" the nom de plume of a novelist. Director Andre Van Gyseghem said it was "fast moving and didn't pull any punches."[2] It was produced by Raymond Stross who tried to give it cinematic treatment.[3]
The play toured through Britain in 1956 starring Janet Munro and was key to her career. Variety wrote Munro was "cast as a respectable girl trapped into prostitution. She skillfully conveys the difficult characterization of a youthful femme on the downward path after falling for a plausible type who offers marriage."[4]
Production
The film was based on the Messina vice gang who operated in the West End of London.[5] Its original title was Women of Night, then Not for Love, before becoming The Flesh is Weak.[6][7] The success of the film enabled the producer and director to raise finance for A Question of Adultery (1958).[8]
Reception
Box office
The film was a box office success – according to Variety it was the fourth highest grossing film in England.[8]
It is not listed in Kinematograph Weekly as one of the most popular British films of 1957 but the magazine said the movie was "enjoying a triumphant West End run".[9]
Critical
The Monthly Film Bulletin wrote: "A crudely melodramatic film dealing with, but not one feels very gravely concerned about, the real life problem of organised prostitution. There is some rather loose and high flown talk regarding a change in the law and licences for the streetwalkers, but in the main the film has to do with the downfall of a Graham Greene-style boy gangster, played with appropriate menace by John Derek. The direction is brisk and there are some lively impersonations by Vera Day, Shirley Ann Field and Patricia Jessel among les girls. Also to be enjoyed is Harold Lang's droll performance as a jaundiced gang-member"[10]
Filmink argued Derek "actually seems to be trying here and it’s one of his best performances – the film turned out to be a sleeper hit at the British box office."
[11]
References
^"The Flesh Is Weak". British Film Institute Collections Search. Retrieved 4 January 2024.
^"Newsman's notebook". Nottingham Evening News. 2 May 1956. p. 6.
^"Theatre notes". Liverpool Daily Post (Merseyside ed.). 17 August 1956. p. 4.
