Read this because of the film. Can see its appeal to film producers - sexy rugged setting (Canadian rockies), hooky set up (terminally ill man investigates dead grandfather's obsession with oil), some romance, baddies, a dam burst.
I had trouble telling the characters apart, the chapters were too long, needed more dialogue, Innes shows off his research. But it's not a natural ripping yarn.
These Norman Wisdom films are getting me down. This one starts with a decent idea - love sick Wisdom is about to kill himself and decides to enlist in the Navy - but what follows is slapshash. There's two extended sequences which don't lean into the navy idea - him mountaineering and at the end launched into space.
Michael Caine and Oliver Reed can be glimpsed.
Bright comedy which like so many British comedies from this era is about some thieves - Terry Thomas and some old ladies. It's based on a play and feels like that at first but gets better once it's up and running.
Spoof of I was Monty's Double even has Clifton James cameo as himself. It stars Brian Rix in a double role - he did a lot of stage plays. His magic escapes cinema. The movie's determination for laughs did eventually win me over and the film got better when the stakes were life and death.
This sounds like it will be fun - the story of ENSA, who performed to the army during the war - but it misses the mark. The cast irritated me, the jokes died, it lacked atmosphere and love of performers. Michael Relph wasn't a good director (Basil Dearden produced this one). Sid James adds some spark but people like Alfred Marks are annoying.
Maybe if you know and like the comedies you'll enjoy this. It just felt wasted on these actors.
Thing pick up at the end, like the last 20 minutes, when the team encounter Germans under Marius Goring and there's a funny subplot about James trying to get the rights to Lili Marelene. Too little too late.
Mario Zampi comedy has a decent central idea used for Ruthless People has some interesting actors like Terry Thomas and Sid James but lacks zip. George Cole tries to be Peter Sellers. Brenda de Bazie is fun as the wife. Decently plotted just not that fun for me. Maybe needed to be in colour.
This Norman Wisdom is a little different - a new director, Bob Asher, and it's a musical, really, with Wisdom going to work for pompous singer Jerry Desmonde who mimes to Wisdom's songs. June Laverick is really dull as the girl but Hattie Jacques is fun as Wisdom's singing teacher and the star is full of energy.
Procedural which was a hit - helped by colour photography and a racy angle, the death of a girl who turns out to be black. This shows the power of a who dunnit - even when you're annoyed by the smug police (Nigel Patrick deserves a slap as does Michael Patrick) and the varying quality of the acting, you wonder whodunnit.
And the world is so new and different - jazz clubs, black doctors, all that.
Yvonne Mitchell's fame indicates she'll have a big role. Earl Cameron has wonderful gravitas.
Good on Rank, it tried to make a decent film here. Corsica steps in fairly well for Malaya, there's some terrific sets, Peter Finch and Mary Ure. The movie doesn't quite work. Feels rewritten. Lacks a cohensive emotional thrust. Finch is a decent doctor, tries to keep the peace in the Malayan Emergency. Struggles.
The antagonists are the white plantation owner (Michael Hordern) and a Malay politician (Marne Maitland - the latter has real status here even if he is treacherous.
The movie can't quite personalise its conflicts. For instance Robert Flemying's white official should have been a hunky guy in love with Mary Ure. Give Ure more of a choice - show her glamorous life in London. The sympathy goes to Natasha Parry, as the Malay nurse in love with Finch.
But the film keeps falling into Rank traps. Not giving women characters anything to do - Ure just lecutres at the end. Make her a nurse, have her shoot someone dead, fight with Parry. Parry just loves Finch and is killed - I hate this bummer stuff. Ure should have died.
Excellent war movie which takes its time but is so moving because of the bravery of its real people and sadness of the ending. Lewis Gilbert later said Diana Dors would've been mre suitable and that would've been a career adjusting role for Dors but Virginia McKenna is very good, especially in the last act. The material is strong.
Paul Scofield makes a splendid impact as her officer who loves her - I think this part is fictitious.
Rare "A" film from Tempean Pictures is actually pretty good - a long range patrol movie, with various Brit types. There's tired conflict between casual Michael Craig and by the book John Gregson, but everyone can act - there's also Richard Attenborough, Percy Herbert. Location filming in the desert helps.
The addition of a female character would have too. Weird how there was a bunch of desert war films around this time eg No Time to Die, Ice Cold in Alex.
Vincent Ball plays an Aussie.
The movie isn't bad yet frustration with continually playing war films led to Craig and Attenborough making The Angry Silence.
Dull Rank film about a boy and his dog in Austria. Gruff dad is Donald Pleasance who is so odd it's not fun to see him melt. Jean Anderson isn't bad. Austrian setting after World War One is a novelty. But it's not much. Probably needed to be in colour.
Regarded as one of the best Norman Wisdom films. He's less weak and pathetic in this more a working class cocky boy and also a German general. Quite fun, just felt long. Honor Blackman is the girl.
A lovely surprise - from the works of Richard Gordon who did the doctor books only it wasn't from Ralph Thomas and Betty Box and Dirk Bogarde didn't star. John Gregson is a ship's captain being pursued by women and dealing with several adventures and troublesome passengers.
The film is more sexually sophisticated - horny passengers want to get married, the pursuer is gay, there are leggy women. The ship is going to Australia and Aussies Bill Kerr and June Jago are loud Aussies on board.
Jack Lee directed with a nice light touch. Fun movie.
Interesting film. Slice of life warm stuff about John Gregson a dustman and hurley player whose landladies want to root him. He moves to a house and falls for Muriel Pavlow.
Quiet, senstivie a little wonky. The novel was set in Newcastle but they set it in Ireland.
John Gregson is very affable. I liked Pavlow in this. Barry Fitzergerald is in it.
This isn't bad. Better than Jacqueline.
Norman Wisdom discovers a betting scheme and gets involved with bookies. Margaret Rutherford is fun in a too-brief appearance, and bookies are entertaining, including Leslie Phillips. The women are dull - Rank starlet Jill Dixon, Delphi Lawrence.
In black and white not colour - Rank saving some money.
Phil Leacock and Neil Paterson had a successful film in Nova Scotia so went back there, although the novel was set on Maine. The Little Kidnappers had splendid casting - this not so much. It's a woman's picture with Betta St John pursued by three men - sleazy Patrick McGoohan, no good charmer William Sylvester, true love Michael Craig.
Nothing wrong with that formular but you've got to give good stuff - a real star, glamour, pretty things to look at.
They don't do that here. Betta St John isn't up to it. All the crap roles given to potential Rank Organisation greats like Diane Cilento, Kay Kendall, Diana Dors and it goes to St John who is pretty and nice and fine but not a star.
Sylvester isn't handsome enough - McGoohan and Craig are. They miss Dirk Bogarde or Anthony Steel.
The pace is slack. This needed to be full blooded. Sex, passion, like Gainsborough. More Canadian feel or at least sense of community. Not there.
Gainsborough would've made this well in the 1940s - or needed to be made a few years later with more sex
I wanted to like it more than I did because it was so great to Rank making a black comedy, a spoof of scandal mags with Dennis Price's publisher blackmailing some lovely actors, including Terry Thomas, Peter Sellers and Shirley Eaton. There's a few too many characters - some consolidation would not go astray. Sellers is fun, ditto Eaton - and everyone really. It doesn't quite nail it but is fine.
A thriller from Rank, aiming at the international market and trying to turn Michael Craig into a big star.
Doesn't work, despite some decent action, great colour and locations and not bad cast.
Why doesn't it work?
- undercover story (a lookalike) but doesn't really exploit it - no fun of contrast.
- the person he looks a like is killed off, he should've still be alive and cause trouble
- didn't lean in to the concept - the fun/danger of being a crim
- he's not in enough danger... always reporting back to Geoffrey Keen
- no ticking clock and rising stakes. Who cares about currency. Just make it a bomb.
Just badly plotted.
Colour, action, movement, songs. John Paddy Carstairs always has something going on. Maureen Swanson is a bright love interest. Norman Wisdom is warm and sympathetic as the rich and shobby bossy him around.
Swanson is too hot for him but that's okay. There's a soccer game, some songs, a bratty kid. It works whereas the Frankie Howerd comedy didn't.
