Serious Charge is a 1959 film now most notable for being Cliff Richard’s screen acting début in a very minor supporting role, playing a layabout teenage musician called Curley Thompson. The film was adapted from a stage play written by Philip King. One of the teenage delinquent gang members was played by another 1950s rock and roll star, the uncredited Jess Conrad in an early acting performance. The unmarried vicar Reverend Howard Phillips , newly arrived in a parish, accuses a local 19 year old thug and petty criminal of being partially responsible for the recent death of a... teenage girl . In retaliation and as an attempt to divert attention, the teenager accuses the vicar of molesting him. His invented story is substantiated out of spite by another local woman still furious that the vicar rejected her amorous advances. Unfortunately for the vicar, the woman is a highly respected member of the community, her father being the parish’s previous clergyman. The film features musical performances by Cliff Richard and the Shadows, still called the Drifters at the time. Richard plays the thug’s younger brother.
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| Release date: | 1959 |
| Directed by: | Terence Young |
| Runtime: | 99 Minutes |
| Music by: | Lionel Bart |
| Cinematography: | Georges Périnal |
| Genre: | Musical |