Vice Versa

English comedy tends to fall into one of two types. The first involves the clever and often risqué use of the English language. The second involves physical or slap-stick humour. The best English comedies successfully combine both types and the 1948 version of Vice Versa is just such a comedy. To see the great Roger Livesey cavorting as a young boy is alone worth the price of admission. It is arguably easier for a young person to act old than it is for an old person to act young, mimicry being easier than regression. To carry either role off is, however, no mean feat. Anthony Newley is brilliant as the young Dick Bultitude imitating his fathers sophisticated and worldly ways. It is also great fun to watch the young Petula Clark years before she became a famous pop star. If you want to watch both the 1988 version of this story starring Judge Reinhold as well as the 1948 version, I would strongly recommend you see the 1988 version first. You will enjoy the 1988 version. The 1948 version of Vice Versa is however the definitive one. After seeing it you will be spoiled for all others.

In the tradition of films like TURNABOUT and FREAKY Friday, VICE VERSA attaches the theme to a couple of males this time, in a British comedy written and directed by Peter Ustinov that tries too hard to be clever, but succeeds, instead, in being exceedingly foolish.

ANTHONY NEWLEY is a Victorian schoolboy who trades places with his stuffy British father by wishing on a magic stone from India. Newley brings his father's knowledge and stuffiness to the school that he returns to, much to the bewilderment of his classmates and professors. The father, ROGER LIVESEY, adopts childish preferences rather than smoking his favored cigars and confounds his household servants.

You have to be a fan of overly broad, non-subtle British humor to fully enjoy this comedy. Most of it is beyond silly, however delightful the performances are. Especially absurd is the confrontation of battle swords in a duel over a young woman, played for zany humor but somehow missing the mark.

None of it can be taken seriously, so your enjoyment of the story will depend entirely on whether or not you favor this sort of humor. Newley does a decent enough job as the young boy and Livesey seems to be enjoying himself in a comic role, looking and sounding an awful lot like Nigel Bruce behind his scruffy mustache.

Anyone with a sharp eye will notice that so many of the story ingredients are used in FREAKY Friday, but American style.

Too overdone for my taste.

VICE VERSA (1948), a sort of proto-FREAKY_FRIDAY story about a father and son switching places, is a delightful British comedy in the vein of, perhaps, KIND HEARTS AND CORONETS (1949), brought to you by theatrical Renaissance man Peter Ustinov, who wrote, produced, and directed the film (but does not appear on-screen).

The action is set around the turn of the century and involves a magic wish-granting stone, stolen from a temple in India. When young Dick Bultitude protests being sent back to his boarding school, his blustery father (holding the stone) makes an off-hand remark about wishing to be young again. Soon the elder Bultitude finds himself in the body of a schoolboy, the spitting image of his own son. And Dick grabs the stone and wishes to be grown-up, filling out the body of his middle-aged father. Understandably, everyone mistakes Dick for his father and vice versa, sending the father off to school in the boy's place and leaving the son to manage the father's affairs at home.

The dual performances by the two main actors are superb, with an adolescent Anthony Newley (later to star in DOCTOR DOLITTLE and write songs for WILLY WONKA & THE CHOCOLATE FACTORY in a varied entertainment career) doing a spot-on imitation of Roger Livesey's Bultitude Sr. and Livesey in turn acting believably childish as a boy in a man's body. Each actor gives such a distinctly different performance after the body swap that it's no trouble believing that Newley IS a fifty-year-old man or that Livesey IS a boy of fourteen, despite the absurdity of it all. And from there the hijinks are a lot of fun.

Ustinov's film has a wonderful flair for comedy, from the charmingly old-timey title slides to the bookending narrative device that breaks the fourth wall, inviting the audience into the Bultitude home. The literate script uses stuffy British propriety to humorous effect, particularly through the characters of Paul Bultitude (the father) and James Robertson Justice's strict headmaster Dr. Grimstone. There's also a madcap farce of a duel and a subsequent courtroom scene that's a riot.

Very entertaining - in a silly kind of way. Anthony Newley knocks most other child actors into a cocked hat, and Roger Livesey is very endearing: neither overplay their parts as so often happens in this kind of yarn. If you appreciate light-hearted vintage English comedy you will surely enjoy this one - I thought it superb - but don't watch it if your movies need to be in colour or have relevance to something as it's just a bit of pure fun. This said it holds the attention throughout due to it's fast-paced antics and great characterisations. Hope it's out on DVD somewhere as would love to own a copy.

Peter Ustinov is a witty literary man. His first love is the theatre, which is a form of literature and he has always tried to bring this love to the cinema. This film is based on a picaresque novel he has made immortal. Its parent-offspring body-swap theme was reprised, pilfered, borrowed and plagiarized in an untold number of similar films (and novels) with titles like "Freaky Friday" (all three versions), "Vice Versa" (1988), "Big" (1988), "18 Again!" (1988), "Like Father Like Son" (1987) and "Dream a Little Dream" (1989). Because of its cast, rhythm and wit, this film owes much to the Ealing comedies and to Powell & Pressburger's "The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp". Everyone in it shines and makes the dialogue sound like it was written by Oscar Wilde on marijuana. Even little Petula Clark bravely holds her own opposite Anthony Newley (who also wrote the music), Roger Livesey and James Robertson Justice, whose blustering personality makes this film a true comedy of hypocrisies. The film is full of audacious set pieces that send up the very concept of Britishness and propriety. Its charm is of course untranslatable in any other language. As a screenwriter and filmmaker of intelligence and invention, Ustinov shows he is easily the equal of René Clair and Sacha Guitry. A must-see.