It is hard to believe that this passed for mainstream entertainment 50 years ago as this big screen version of the popular long running ITV series contains enough racial slurs, offensive language, bigoted views and inappropriate behaviour to send millennials and the woke brigade into a complete meltdown. By today's standards it is a very problematic situation comedy about two warring neighbours constantly trading insults about their colour, creed and general differences in a game of unpolitically correct one-upmanship which was watched and adored by millions who thought nothing of it at the time.
While the comedy is now out dated and a product of the 1970's it's not quite as offensive as at first it may seem. Sure there are cheap gags, low brow humour and racial stereotypes in abundance but the black characters always give as good as they get from their white counterparts and the humour is spirited rather than oppressive. The white protagonist Eddie Booth often comes off worse as his racial name calling, tyrannical outbursts and small minded attitude is often to his own detriment.
In real life Jack Smethurst and Rudolph Walker were friends but they do what the script asks of them in portraying relentlessly bickering neighbours, often put in their place by their respective wives Kate Williams and Nina-Baden Semper, to make them see the error of their ways. There was never any malice or racial hatred intended in Vince Powell's scripts (who was also responsible for the sitcom Mind Your Language 1977) but it did hold up a mirror to a British society coming to terms with the immigration policy of successive Governments at that time with the integration of ethnic groups moving into working class areas causing some societal and cultural conflict.
I grew up watching the TV series so the comedy here is not as jarring for me and I love it when comedy shows get the big screen treatment, however plot wise this doesn't stray too far from the TV series like some movie versions do, although there are more scenes shown at their factory workplace, but all the elements that made the TV show a success are present here.
Flush from the success of three On the Buses movies Roy Skeggs, the producer of Hammer Films, successfully adapts another British TV sitcom on a low budget with a no frills workmanlike production as Hammer, the company typically known for horror and science fiction, continued to diversify into comedy to compete with the likes of the Carry On series and Confessions films with similar bawdiness and saucy postcard humour, most of which featured well known British comedy actors. Here we have the likes of Patricia Hayes, Arthur English, Bill Pertwee, Melvyn Hayes and Bill Fraser making guest appearances.
The humour in Love Thy Neighbour is certainly not for everyone and anyone under the age of 40 should proceed with caution.
