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The Green Cockatoo

5.9

/10

419 people rated

1947•1 h 5 m•United Kingdom

A young girl is travelling to London to find work. Arriving at the station, she meets a man who has been stabbed by a member of a gang of crooks involved with greyhound racing.

Crime

Drama

Thriller

Cast (15)

Green Cockatoo Club Patron

Charlie - the Bartender

William Dewhurst

Train Passenger

Hotel Majestic Proprietress

Police Constable at Green Cockatoo

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User Reviews

user7970863431306

23/11/2025 06:41

The Green Cockatoo

paulallan_junior

23/11/2025 06:41

The Green Cockatoo

Altaf Sugat

07/05/2024 16:00

This has some good ingredients to make a jolly, if not exactly, menacing murder story - but it's all just way too fluffy and talky. The doey-eyed Rene Ray is "Eileen" who arrives into London very late one night. At the station, she encounters "Dave" (Robert Newton) who offers to show her an hotel where she might pass the night. What she doesn't know, is that her good Samaritan has fallen foul of some crooks and a station fracas ensues and he is mortally injured. Before he croaks, he gives her a message to give to his brother "Jim" (John Mills) in the eponymous nightclub. She meets the brother, but a rather unlikely series of mishaps befall the pair as they are being sought by the police and the hoodlums. Aside from some singing and dancing that one wouldn't normally attribute to John Mills, the thing is entirely procedural with little by way suspense or peril; and saving a rather curious performance from Frank Atkinson as the butler "Protheroe" would be instantly forgettable.

Felix kwizera

03/08/2023 16:00

A gangster, Dave (Robert Newton) who double-crosses some other gangsters finds himself in desperate trouble in "The Green Cockatoo." Warned by his brother Jim (John Mills) to get out of town quickly, Dave goes to the train station. He has an altercation with the gang and is knifed. He latches onto a young woman, Eileen (Rene Ray) who has just arrived in London from a small town. He tells her that he can bring her to a good place to stay, and she accompanies him. You really have to suspend disbelief that a young woman would just go off with a stranger. And it gets better. Once she's in her room, and he has left, he suddenly returns. I'd be screaming my lungs out. However, she sees that he's hurt and agrees to help him. Unfortunately, he dies, and the landlady thinks she did it. Before he dies, he gives her a message for his brother at the Green Cockatoo. With the police and the gang after her, she finds The Green Cockatoo. She doesn't know anything about Jim, a song and dance man there, and to get away from her followers, she starts wandering around the upstairs of the club. She meets Jim, not realizing he's the man she's looking for. Despite Eileen's strange behavior in the beginning, this is a fun film. John Mills is delightful singing and dancing. In one scene, as he attempts to hide Eileen from the police, he says she is his new performing partner. He sings "Smoky Joe" - all she has to do is say the words "Smoky Joe" when he pauses. It's hilarious. She is supposed to not be able to sing, but you can tell by her off-key "Smoky Joes" that she actually had a good voice. Recommended - nice British noir from 1937.

THE EGBADON’s

03/08/2023 16:00

At the start of his career, Robert Newton connected with producer Alexander Korda, who introduced him to film audiences in 1937 with small parts in a few movies. He played a barrister alongside Laurence Olivier in 21 Days Together, which was shelved for three years, shared a scene with Vivien Leigh in Dark Journey, acted with both in Fire Over England, and was in I, Claudius, which was shelved for thirty years. It was his memorable, likable role in The Green Cockatoo that propelled him to the next batch of films. By 1939, he was a star. Robert Newton starts off The Green Cockatoo in confident, Cockney swagger. He doesn't seem at all like an inexperienced actor, and as you watch him, you've completely forgotten that John Mills got billed above the title in the opening credits. He's a bit of a bad boy, and when he crosses his gambling cohorts, he receives the ultimate punishment. He's only onscreen for fifteen minutes, but since he was so magnetic during his scenes, and since he's talked about by the other characters the rest of the movie, it feels like he had a much bigger part. Alas, we have to say goodbye to Bobbie. The good news is John Mills takes over and is just as magnetic. He punches bad guys, flirts around with the beautiful romantic lead, Rene Ray, and is more energetic than I've ever seen him. Plus, when he gets mad and his hair gets mussed, he's awfully cute. But more importantly, he does a very good job in this obscure movie as a completely different character than he usually plays. He plays a performer in a nightclub, and he sings and tap dances, showing talents no one knew he had! Rene Ray is given a difficult part: her character is incredibly stupid, but she has to make the audience root for her anyway. She's very pretty, and that doesn't hurt, but she manages to convince the audience she has very good intentions. Even though I didn't agree with what she was doing, I was rooting for her anyway. Obviously, I liked this movie, so I'll recommend you give it a watch. It's only an hour long, so you might want to pair it with another flick for the evening, like Odd Man Out. But it's very entertaining, and you get to see John Mills tap dance!

user6234976385774

03/08/2023 16:00

Rene Ray is a young girl who goes to London to find a job. Unfortunately she runs into Robert Newton who is being hunted by a gang of gamblers he double crossed.Newton had been stabbed and dies in Ray's hotel room leading the police to think she killed him. Ray goes to find Newton's brother, played by John Mills, and he takes pity on her unaware at first that she is being sought for the killing of his brother. Moody crime film based on a Graham Greene story looks at times to be the the brother of another Green adaptation The Third Man. Shot with dark shadows that make London's poorer sections look like Harry Lime's stomping ground this is a great film to look at. Had it been made ten years later it would have fit very nicely into the Film Noir catalog. I really like the look and feel of this film a great deal. The problem with the film is that there are long stretches where not much happens. The plot of a wrongly accused woman is something that Hitchcock would have turned into a tightly wound thriller. Here its a meandering mood piece with the audience waiting to see what happens when John Mills finds out the lady he is falling for is accused of killing his brother. There are some nice action pieces, but mostly its a good deal of talk and emoting. Its not a bad film, its just not a particularly exciting one. I'd wait to see if this turns up on cable.

zinebelmeski

03/08/2023 16:00

The movie is about one gangster being murdered by other gangsters over a dog race fix. The thing is the murdered man named Dave Connor, played by the always interesting Robert Newton, is much beloved by his older brother, Jim Connor played by John Mills. As he is dying Dave conveys a message to a young woman he has just supposedly befriended (he actually used the girl to get away from the thugs) for Jim naming the murderer. Dave tells her he can find Jim at the Green Cockatoo which she does but does not realize it's Jim as now the police are after her and she has her own problems. When I rented this video from Amazon I hadn't realized that I had already seen the movie until the Smokey Joe scene came. I like that little ditty and thought that this scene was especially good. If I ever knew I had forgotten that John Mills started out his career as a song and dance man and I though his performance quite engaging. The gangsters who murdered Dave were sufficiently menacing and the couple of fights scenes were quite realistic (I read somewhere that Mills took up boxing after he was frequently bullied at school). After the first fight scene I was particularly struck by the fact that the gangsters used knives and not guns. It seemed so strange. I do agree with other reviewers that Mills' accent changed throughout the movie and often sounded way too uptown for the character he was suppose to be playing. The whole dog racing issue put a pallor over this movie for me. If it weren't for that I would have rated this higher if only because of Mills' singing and dancing.

Oumychou

03/08/2023 16:00

I've just seen this film tonight and since nobody else appears to have done a comment, I'll do it while it's fresh in my mind. Briefly, the story concerns the murder of Robert Newton who has double-crossed a gang who fix greyhound races. (The track seen briefly in the film appears to be Hackney.) John Mills plays Newton's brother and Rene Ray the girl who is wrongly suspected of the murder. I'm sure John Mills will be the first to agree that his accent varies wildly throughout the film- he seems to be doing a sort of James Cagney character with a bit of posh West End and cockney thrown in. Robert Newton comes out best although he dies early on. Bruce Seton plays a bad guy; we're used to seeing him as a policeman. The action sequences are well done, (they were obviously trying to make the film as tough as possible) but the talk goes on far too long between the fights.

user1017981037704

03/08/2023 16:00

What stands out most of all from this film are the credits.The film was directed by William Cameron Menzies at Denham just after "Things To Come".It was from a Graham Greene story.It was photographed by Mutz Greenbaum(Max Greene) who was one of Herbert Wilcox's favourite DOPs and the music was by Miklos Roza,one of the numerous Hungarians brought over to work in the UK by his compatriot Alexander Korda.So not your average quota quickie.I first saw this when i hired a 16mm print in the 1960s.I saw it again yesterday.I have to say it is fairly entertaining.A young Robert Newton for once not overplaying.A young John Mills reminding us that he started out as a singing juvenile lead.His performance is a bit off key.He seems at times to be in a Warners crime film of the thirties doing his Cagney impersonation before doing his Gordon Harker impression.A really enjoyable reminder of a now moribund genre.

Jamie Lim

03/08/2023 16:00

The credits of this mediocre little thriller are impressive: scenario by Graham Greene, direction by William Cameron Menzies, music by Miklos Rozsa. But whatever interest may have been in Greene's original story has been washed away by clichés, Menzies' direction is brisk but uninspiring, and the best part of Rozsa's score is by Eric Coates. Also, a babyfaced John Mills is completely unconvincing as a tough guy (and his singing and dancing aren't up to much either), and Rene Ray does virtually nothing with the role of an innocent country girl who no sooner sets foot in the big city than she is falsely accused of murder. At least it's short.