Review of Gideon of Scotland Yard

There really were policemen like George Gideon and I would be very surprised if the late John Creasey didn't know several of them.He was one of England's most prolific crime writers using a plethora of noms de plume including J.J Marric.under which he wrote the "Gideon" novels which were quite highly regarded in their day. If you married a cop in the 1940s and 50s you knew what you were getting into.Pre war ideas of dedication and service hadn't quite been extinguished and flickered on in professions like policework,nursing and General Practice medicine. With no Political Correctness to worry about,no "targets" to meet,no budgets to constrain them,detectives were able to set about solving crimes in a relatively uninhibited manner and were rather good at it.George Gideon was no exception.His conduct might seem unacceptable half a century on both at work and at home but in his world it was unexceptionable. Mr Jack Hawkins makes him human rather than superhuman ,capable of an ill - judged action but overall on the side of the angels. The "Day" in the title is certainly overflowing with incident.Robbery and murder seem to be the norm even in the days of "Preventive Detention",the birch and Capital Punishment. This is an absorbing British procedural with first - rate performances. Despite some persuasive arguments elsewhere on the site I don't believe it bears the hallmarks of Mr Ford's best movies,but I suspect he had fun making it.And maybe - like a lot of Americans at the time -he ended up believing our unarmed, underpaid policemen were wonderful.