London at the turn of the century. Three men are on a mission from the IRA to steal all the gold in the vaults of the Bank of England. Norgate, their leader, discovers the bank's weak spot: an old forgotten sewer straight under the vaults.
Production
Actual Bank of England refused filming; sets are gloriously detailed fakes.
Direction
Guillermin squeezes genuine tension from Victorian infrastructure.
Acting
O'Toole steals scenes he's barely in; Ray's American IRA man is weirdly cast.
Director
John Guillermin
Aldo Ray
Charles Norgate
Elizabeth Sellars
Iris Muldoon
Peter O'Toole
Capt. Monty Fitch
Kieron Moore
Walsh
Albert Sharpe
Albert Tosher Sparrow
Joseph Tomelty
Cohoun
John Le Mesurier
Green
Miles Malleson
Assistant Curator
Colin Gordon
Benge
Andrew Keir
Sergeant of the Guard
Hugh Griffith
O'Shea
Arthur Lowe
Bank Official (uncredited)
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
This was Peter O'Toole's first significant film role; he'd explode into stardom two years later in Lawrence of Arabia.
The film quietly reflects 1950s British anxiety about Irish republicanism, made palatable by setting it in 1901 and making the IRA thieves oddly sympathetic professionals.
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