Payroll is a British crime flick based on a novel by Derek Bickerton, and it is the story of a heist and its effects on all the people involved. What surprised me most is the fact that the film is so obscure! How come so few people have seen this? It's suave, sophisticated and entertaining; and it also has a great director in Sidney Hayers. It's certainly a film in need of urgent rediscovery! The film differs from many other films in its class because it focuses on the planning of the crime, the crime itself and then the effects it has on many people involved with it. The main character is Johnny Mellors; a streetwise criminal who is planning to rob the payroll of a factory. However, his plans are thrown into disarray when the firm hires a new company to guard the payroll; complete with an armoured van. The crooks decide to proceed with the crime anyway, and put a meticulous plan together to snatch the loot. However, things don't go exactly according to plan which has repercussions for everyone involved.

The plotting of this film is very good and director Sidney Hayers keeps it flowing well at all times by providing a constant stream of action. The characters presented are all interesting in their own right and the interactions between the various members of the gang are good. Things are kicked up a notch by the involvement of other parties too; as well as the central criminals, we also focus on their inside man, the police and the widow of a man killed during the robbery who is out for her own revenge. The style of the film is very sixties and feels very cool throughout, which is a big bonus to the film and gives it a real slick edge. Things remain entertaining throughout and things are left open enough to ensure that we never really know where it's going to go; by the time the ending comes, there's still several possible ways for it all to end and the ending itself is made up of many twists and turns. Again I have to reiterate my surprise at the obscurity of this film - it's certainly good enough to have a bigger following and I would certainly recommend it to anyone that considers themselves a fan of crime thrillers!

I've seen half-a-dozen films at least on the subject of a payroll heist, and as long as they are all different, they can be good in their own way. What makes this one stand out is the hard-boiled atmosphere of the company and the streets surrounding it, involving the clever plans that we'd to the actual theft and the tension that occurs before, during and after what takes place. It's violent and gritty, and you do get to see some blood (in black and white that is),and then you get to see the revenge that comes out of a head of a widow of one of the participants.

From the inside, there's clerk William Lucas who has become forced to participate because of a self-centered wife (Françoise Prévost),all of a sudden finding himself threatened by Billie Whitelaw ("The Omen"),the widow of the driver of the payroll truck whose coldness in that horror classic has made her a legendary film villainess, and she's equally as treacherous here although this time her motivations are clearly understandable. Prévost is the real villain here, so cold towards her husband that the idea of prison for him probably seems like an escape.

Michael Craig, Kenneth Griffith, Tom Bell and Barry Keegan are the key members in the heist, with Lucas the mastermind behind the scenes, nervous over how everything will turn out because he is not there. This is another one of those great British dramas that shows the darkness of the working class oh, and the use of location footage makes it a stunning atmosphere to be a part of. This has elements of drama and desperation that you don't rarely see in American films from this era, and once again, this is a film that seems way ahead of its time.

I recall catching this as a kid on a now-defunct Sicilian TV channel; besides, my dad owns the paperback edition of the original Derek Bickerton novel (published in conjunction with the film's release). Clearly influenced by the seminal French noir RIFIFI (1955),this caper flick may not have the necessary qualities to attain equivalent classic status but it is proficiently handled nonetheless (in the recognizable style that characterized hard-hitting British cinema of the mid-1950s and beyond i.e. till the advent of the Swinging 60s). Of course, PAYROLL is highlighted by a heist sequence (meticulously planned in advance) – though, in complete contrast to the one seen in the Jules Dassin film, it is a brusque, messy and violent job! Typically, too, the gang is a very unstable outfit – Michael Craig is the brains (appropriately tough and rugged but perhaps too young to carry the requisite world-weariness of the role, he largely comes across as unsympathetic instead!),heavy-set Barry Keegan the brawn (thus the first to bite the dust),Tom Bell the hot-tempered member who even challenges Craig's leadership, Kenneth Griffith the mild-mannered nervous type who invariably sows the seeds of their downfall, and William Lucas as the obligatory 'inside man' (an exemplary employee who then snaps at the critical moment). Up to here, the plot is routine, that is to say, predictable; the film's coup, then, is in presenting two complex female figures: Francoise Prevost plays Lucas' ambitious (and obviously bored) foreign wife who flirts with Craig, strikes a bargain with him (when she realizes the nature of his association with her hubby),and whom she even tries to double-cross (though he has the last laugh); Billie Whitelaw actually starts off in the colorless role of housewife (of the payroll guard killed in the robbery) but who subsequently turns – believably – into dogged and resourceful avenger! For the record, though a police investigation into the crime is conducted, it reaps little to no results: the gang brings about its own doom through mistrust, greed and foolishness: Griffith and Bell perish in quicksand, while a dazed and exhausted Craig typically 'buys it' at the finishing line (the open sea) thanks to Whitelaw's vigilante tactics. PAYROLL, therefore, supplies the expected quota of action, thrills, hard-boiled dialogue and moody location shooting; all in all, it stands as director Hayers' most satisfying work after the splendid occult horror piece NIGHT OF THE EAGLE aka BURN, WITCH, BURN! (1962)…though I should also be re-acquainting myself presently with his rare adventure film THE TRAP (1966),whose memory has similarly been relegated thus far to a long-ago Sunday Matinée' childhood viewing on local TV.