All the Way Up

I was curious about this movie at first as I have been a movie buff for decades and yet had never heard of it. Once watched I could see why. Lots of 'faces' from the 1970s but none of them portraying any talent. Richard Briers awful. Warren Mitchell is worse. Wish I could unwatch this non funny supposed comedy.

Warren Mitchell only appeared in a few films as a leading man.Sadly this film is one of them.It is a really unfunny film,the director seems to the the view that the louder the line delivery and quicker the delivery the funnier it would be.In tissue he was today deluded.For some reason this film was backedoing by Grenada. There was a long gap before the next one.

Well I decided to hang in there. This is an awful comedy. Nothing can save it: it's not even 1970s bawdy, it's a nothing, it's really dreadful. . . My review is written during the UK's lockdown, so what else is/was a man to do than to stay awake whilst his dog could sleep soundly through this dreadful malaise? No wonder English film stuttered to a halt, needing the taxman to re-start its pulse! . . This nonsense of a film finished late at night (0200) on 2.Oct 2020, that's a lot of number twos and this sums up the film nicely! IT's a really large number two! . . 3/10? Yes for the locations of old north London and the High Street St Albans, that's two out of ten and one for the cars! . . Amazingly the only thing that stirred me was that I couldn't stand the actress that seemingly screamed all the way through! So despite it being hugely unenjoyable she moved me viscerally with my seemingly pathological hatred (well it was late at night!) of one of the bit actresses/actors: take a bow Vanessa Howard.

(She (VH) apparently gave up acting - but sorry I can safely say that acting gave you up, and well before you decided to file to the USA, good decision, bless her RIP!) . . The remaining players were good actors in their lifetime but clearly here they are just nicking the dosh. Warren Mitchell et al., would probably NOT have wanted this shown in their lifetimes. Which is why years after their deaths I suspect that their families can pretend this example (found within the actor's individual canons of work) has never existed! I shall try to do the same thing... . . Goodnight and good riddance! . (In three hours time I will have a dog to walk! Hurrah!) . . ;--)

I can't believe nobody has commented upon this already. It was shown once on ITV and everyone at school seemed to have watched it. Although Warren Mitchell occasionally allows Alf Garnett to show through, it's perfectly in keeping with the character since Fred Midway probably started out from a background like Garnett's. Unlike Alf, however, Fred has no intention of living under a dozen or so Prime Ministers and been poor under everyone. He is a ruthless social climber who will sink to any cheap trick. The opening scene is priceless as it opens on Fred laboriously writing a letter that seems to be about a bereavement but is, in fact, an anonymous letter to his boss implicating a work rival in an adulterous affair with the boss's wife. Promoted in his place, Fred embarks on a scheme to elevate his family (newly-moved out of his terraced house and into the suburbs) even further, in the words of the Scaffolds' title song "All the way up, and a little bit higher". A priceless cast of comedy actors helps along the fun with Richard Briers as one of the many chinless wonders he played during this period before The Good Life changed his career forever and the pricelessly pompous Bill Fraser. Vanessa Howard proves what a shame her career did not develop further owing to the collapse of the British film industry as she proved she could play sex kittens with claws in this and the films she appeared in for Freddie Francis and Amicus. One memorable scene has the squabbling Midway's realising that their neighbours can hear their noise and instead put on a great show of laughing - they attack the screen laughing manically - an image not easily forgotten. In the end, just as it looks as if Fred's schemes have come to naught, he latches upon the shapely figure of Valerie Leon's PA for boss Frank Thornton and comes upon the obvious conclusion - and the closing image of Fred laughing in triumph is a truly chilling sight. A shame the British film industry couldn't keep turning out low budget comedies like this unless they had TV connections.

This is based on the stage play Semi-Detached, a great success for Leonard Rossiter in the early sixties, though it flopped on Broadway and again in London despite this time having none other than Laurence Olivier in the lead. The film opens promisingly; in a cleverly constructed scene, an anxious looking Fred Midway is burning the midnight oil, seemingly the picture of a put upon, conscientious employee, struggling to complete his paper work, only to be celebrating seconds later with his devoted but utterly obnoxious wife on the completion of a poison pen letter designed to remove his boss and step into his shoes. This sets the tone for the rest of the movie, but after 25 minutes or so the fast-talking Fred and his wife and daughters, all social-climbing venal charmless grifters, start to outstay their welcome, becoming increasingly hard to stomach as it goes on.

Some of the best British comedy has traditionally been very dark and I can imagine Rossiter being hilarious on stage in the role, but here Warren Mitchell, despite giving his all, can't make the character anything but repellent. It's not entirely clear if this is all a grotesque parody of the sort of ideas and ethos most strongly associated with Margaret Thatcher in later decades - with his ruthless ambition, self-improvement books and car worship, Fred is an almost prototype Thatcherite caricature - or whether, God forbid, we are supposed to laugh along with him. In either case it's all very strained and mostly unfunny. What a waste of excellent comedy actors Bill Fraser, Richard Briers and Frank Thornton into the bargain.