1951
Directed by Charles Crichton
I have been looking forever for this film (okay, maybe a year) and couldn't find it. For whom it may concern, this movie is available to rent on iTunes. Although I really would not bother.
Another Ealing studios British comedy. Oh dear. Did not laugh once. You are a disgrace to the force, Alec Guiness!
So this time Obi Wan Kenobi stars as a boring man who supervises the transfer of gold bullion to different banks. He decides that he wants to steal the gold so executes a plan in which the gold is transformed into Eiffel Tower replicas. There is a nasty scene where two men run down the Eiffel Tower and the camera twirls around in a nauseating fashion. I say it was nasty because I watched it in the car on the way to Thanksgiving festivities and I already have a tendency of getting motion sickness. Damn limeys.
Anyway, the most remarkable thing about this movie is that Audrey Hepburn is in the film for about ten seconds. It is always cool to see famous people in movies before they make it big.
This movie is in no way offensive or awful but it isn't funny. Call me crazy but I think a comedy should have a few laughs.
RATING: **---
Interesting Facts:
Considered to be Hepburn's first appearance in a major film.
To avoid missing the American market, the studio followed the Hayes code.
A special committee was formed comprised of employees of the Bank of England to devise a way that people could steal gold. The committee came up with the idea of disguising the gold into towers.
You really do not like British humor, do you? Well, humor is a very personal thing. I liked this one though not even close to the beast of the Ealing comedies.
ReplyDeleteI should add a word of support to keep the British end up, as Roger Moore would have put it. Very good. I also took the time to watch Passport to Pimlico when I noticed it wasn't on the list. It's easy to forget sometimes that for every film on the list there are five more which could easily have been included had the editor flipped a coin a different way.
ReplyDeleteAlec Guiness was particularly good.
Damn Hays code ruins things sometimes, doesn't it? Most obviously it bolts on "moral" (Ha!) endings to films that would have been better off without them, or at least with something smarter and more ambiguous. Further more, it takes away all the thrill of not knowing how the film will end. Instead of watching wondering if they will get away with it in the end, my meagre ration of suspense instead has to come from wondering how the plot will be obliged to catch them.
I think I've made a similar comment before in respect of Ealing comedies.
ReplyDeleteI get your point - they are rarely laugh out loud funny.
No, they are better than that, more subtle, deeper. They are meant for watching with a faint smile, but a nice warm feeling.
They were made in an era when us Brits needed comforting, they have good observational, self deprecating humour but with a decided touch of anti establishment social criticism. There is a lot to them under the basic humour - the extreme end of the spectrum to, say, 'American pie'
So perhaps you 'had to be there at the time' to appreciate all that? Maybe.. The same could be said about American teen comedies, which, to us, are utterly devoid of any humour at all - just cringe making embarrassment and despair.
(Thought of the day, which I invite Dessie to come back on .. "do you only get Ealing humour if you spell it with the u?") (And consequently, you only find 'Porkies' funny if it's humor?)
Hmmm, I don't necessarily think so. But funny is in the eye of the beholder so no one can really comment too well on the exportability of their own national sense of humour.
DeleteI feel that there's loads going in in these movies and that, in many ways, they could be made in the US today with aun updated style and be successful. Why does it need punchlines? Because it's technically a comedy? It's also a crime movie, so we could equally well criticise it for its lack of violence and explosions?
With each new Ealing film, I keep hoping that I will look on here and find Amanda saying "You know, these things are starting to grow on me".
Porkies I find quite interesting. It's low-end fare, for sure, yet there's also some genuinely thoughtful stuff in there like the boy getting abused by his drunken father. And, when we've finished tut-tutting, can we really claim that the Mike Hunt scene is any less funny than Moe in The Simpsons demanding "Why can't I find Amanda Huggenkiss??!!"
You've got to feel sorry for Amanda, haven't you? She writes a brief blog post about a film she didn't like and five years later she's getting ganged up on by a couple of old English farts telling her "The problem with you kids is you don't remember the war!"
DeleteYou are absolutly right .. sorry Amanda!
DeleteHaha that's okay...I feel sorry for myself too.
Delete'Explaining a joke is like dissecting a frog. You understand it better but the frog dies in the process.'
ReplyDeleteDiscussing why Amanda - and me - didn't find this film funny is pointless. Comedies are supposed to make you laugh. If they don't; the fail. Period. Ok, this is just a personal view but personal blogs are for personal views.
I agree Alex. Humor is so subjective, it's hard to write about comedies on here. I think it depends on a lot of things too: age, gender, culture, etc.
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