Accident (12A)

Dirk Bogarde and Stanley Baker star in a study of masculine malaise among the academic elite told through the elliptical rhythms of Harold Pinter's’ script and cool and penetratingly detached direction of Joseph Losey.

The almost vacuous dialogue marks the strained politeness that conceals Stephen and Charley's virile panic. Bogarde and Baker, one a smug scholar, the other all braggadocio, are perfect dupes for their own phallic failings. Losey loses the ornate conceits of previous films in favour of a visual style as detached as its subjects are sullied.

Accident is a crash course on how to make a great film.

Cinema Rediscovered on Tour is a Watershed project in association with Wiper & True and collaboration with principal sponsors Park Circus and StudioCanal. With support from BFI Audience Projects Fund awarding National Lottery funding.