Sands of the Desert

Charlie Drake became a star through his work on TV.Firstly on children's TV with Mick and Montmorency and then The Worker.His origins were in the music halls and his speciality was slapstick.Given that he was short and could sing one assumes that Associated British were trying to see if he could rival the box office success achieved by Rank's Norman Wisdom.Now I am not a Wisdom fan but Wisdom was far superior to Drake.It also appears that Rank spent more money on Wisdom than Associated did on Drake.Everything about this film is shoddy.The film is studio bound with poor acting and a truly awful script.Drake tries the facial tics that worked for him on the small screen but they are simply excruciating.If there was ever any humour in this film now it has evaporated so that the film is virtually unwatchable.

Charlie Drake, the small, red haired, fat trying comedian, is Sands, a travel agent in this film written and directed by John Paddy Carstairs. Carstairs made some great films for Norman Wisdom, but he struggled a lot to make anything of the strictly middle school comic (as in Adam Sandler) Charlie Drake. Sands is sent to the middle east to establish a resort in an area contested by two local tribal leaders, one with a secret oil contract, after another travel agent is assasinated. There are long scenes of big healthy girls in the harem, the boys in year 7 would have liked that. Product placement - Cinzano.

It seems to follow the misadventures of a Charlie Sands, a short man in a bad wig.

The plot revolves around his antics in some unspecified desert country where he's trying to set up a holiday camp. The humour is mostly slapstick and the acting is rather poor.

It's a real stinker. Go outside and watch the grass grow for a couple of hours. Don't bother.

You will love the ending when suddenly THE END appears on the screen.