criminilarity

After loving Make Mine Mink for my entire adult life and more, I decided I'd watch some more ensemble films about funny criminals starring Terry-Thomas and scripted by Michael Pertwee. The Naked Truth (1957) is about a bunch of frankly awful people with terrible-ish past secrets who are being blackmailed by a tabloid journalist of sorts (more of a blackmailer, basically) who conspire to kill him with hilarious consequences. The black comedy aspects of The Naked Truth are upfront; it begins with some real suicides off-screen then our protagonists try to top themselves but fail amusingly. It's such a tangled farce it doesn't even really seem to have any 'acts' (not that I'm very scientific about these things) but just sprawls all over the place till suddenly it's done. But nicely done with Peter Sellers, Joan Sims, Peggy Mount, Shirley Eaton, Dennis Price and as mentioned T-T. I don't want to spoil the ending for you in case you ever see it but one of the oddest things about it is that the first twenty minutes provides frequent opportunities for a fabulous final line (the 'I'll see myself out' bit) which would have been so perfect in the final scene to the degree that I thought 'this is a ridiculously obvious set up' and... obviously no-one else thought so (or they just forgot). 

Too Many Crooks gives us George Cole, Sid James (as 'Sid' - yay!'), Joe Melia and Bernard Breslaw as the crooks and T-T as the rich man whose wife they accidentally kidnap. Full of famous comedic actors on the rise and, I suppose, decline. 

I often think we are spoiled in the 21st century where narratives are generally 'tied off' better and characterisation seems more full (though as per the gas on Venus, maybe you had to be there) and perhaps people in the late 1950s could hold onto a number of tropes that just made things make sense in the way they don't make sense 60 years later. In Too Many Crooks in particular we have the odd character of the wife Lucy who Terry-Thomas' character tells us early in the piece was rough and tough in the war but has since become meek and mild, for no reason except apparently (and illogically) she loves him. Once she realises he has left her to her fate with the blackmailers as he wanders around with one or a few blonde women (I actually couldn't tell if it was one or a few but maybe we weren't meant to care) she becomes a furious and calculating criminal herself and extorts most of T-T's money out of him. Sorry to spoil but what I really don't understand is why she then apparently reconciles with him at the end. It might be that it doesn't matter and it's just a funny film. Which it is.

Bernard Bresslaw actually gets the best lines in this movie - much better than Sid James or Joe Melia, who are both wasted here, and George Cole, who ineffectually plays someone ineffectual and is hard to care about either way. T-T (as Billy Gordon) is definitely the star and it's a joy seeing him being taken down more pegs than you thought imaginable. Brenda de Banzie as Lucy Gordon really relishes her bizarre two personalities (three, I suppose, counting the last scene).  

Old British films are depressing about humanity in ways it's hard to override but once you click into gear with the excellent character acting they often work. Both of these movies are presently on youtube (The Naked Truth in a compellingly out-of-sync version) and I recommend. Would like to know more about Mario Zampi, who directed both and was dead at the age of 60 within four years of making the second one. 

I went looking on AbeBooks to see if some bright spark had written a fabulous book about Mario Zampi I could order now to receive in May next year or something, but all I found was this, which would be fun to own but expensive at something like $150. 

(Later observation - the people who did these posters were remarkable. All these free components that could or were reassembled. If you have the crooks pointing their pistols in weird diverse directions it doesn't matter where Terry-Thomas or random blonde chick are running.)