This is a big screen version of a BBC TV play. Anthony Newley, whose string of Top 20 pop hits had just come to an end, puts in a surprisingly good performance as Sammy Lee, a strip club compère whose gambling debts land him in trouble with gangsters. Newley was a quirky actor and takes some getting used to. Always nice to see Julia Foster who plays a doting innocent, and there are memorable cameos from Warren Mitchell and Miriam Karlin as his brother and his sister-in-law. Set before strip clubs and gambling were entirely lawful, the film is in black-and-white which enhances the period atmosphere. Jazz fans may care to note that the original music is composed by tenor saxist Kenny Graham.

Mr A.Newley was an actor,singer,writer,lyricist supreme.Not a Jack, of All Trades,rather a Master of All Trades - a true Renaisssance Man of the English Theatre. The term "National Treasure" is bandied about and bestowed upon almost anybody who appears a lot on TV,but Mr Newley was truly a National Treasure before the concept was invented. He stole films from stars as diverse as Robert Mitchum and Rex Harrison and was so good in the 1986 remake of "Stagecoach" that he was hustled out of the story at the halfway mark for fear of appropriating Messrs Willie Nelson and Johnny Cash's thunder. "The small world of Sammy Lee" dates from a time when he was peaking with"Stop the world,I want to get off",which he co - wrote and starred in. Set in a Soho surrounded by members of the first and second oldest professions,a world long bulldozed and speculated out of existence,he plays Sammy Leeman, a third - rate gambler and chancer who is being chased over a debt by some old - school villains. As always Mr Newley dominates the screen by sheer force of personality,a slick,silver - tongued womaniser,the sort of man considered today perhaps as pond - life for his attitudes(see Laurence Harvey in "Expresso Bongo" made in much the same milieu). Today it can be seen as a beautifully photographed,tightly directed minor masterpiece about a hustler on the run and talked of in the same breath as Jules Dassin's 1948 "Night and the city",itself an acknowledged classic of the genre. Nobody in it thought for a minute they were doing anything but a routine low - budget Soho movie,but by that curious alchemy that occasionally affects films with humble ambitions(see Mr Newley's "Idol on Parade")"The Small World of Sammy Lee" emerged as at least the equal of many British New Wave films of the era that have received extravagant praise for the last half - century sometimes out of proportion to their merits. If Tony Richardson or Lindsay Anderson had made it,it would be up there on the pantheon.

I remember the Soho shown here so well.I used to walk through Soho on the way to the cinema.It has changed so much since this film was made.Newley gives a marvellous performance as the huckster trying to raise what would now be £5500 to pay his gambling debt or face a beating.Soho was in the grip of gangsters at this time and Could be a violent place The camerawork was superb.You get the impression that Newley is being filmed from a hidden camera.Probably his best role.