The Big Money

I've just attended 'Ian Carmichael in Conversation' at the National Film Theatre in London (8 Dec 02). He was very wary of discussing this film, describing it as 'a mistake'. He said that he and Bryan Forbes had attempted to rewrite the script, but this was discarded. According to Mr Carmichael, the film was put away as unreleasable for five years, when another director thought that he could salvage footage of a race meeting at Ascot for insertion into a Norman Wisdom picture. He told Rank that with a bit of work, he could make it releasable - and there it is.

The Ealing comedies from England traveled well and built an enduring love overseas for British humor on screen, as did many an Ian Carmichael comedy into the '60s. But this big-deal production from Pinewood Studios laid an egg: a parochial sort of humor that missed the target. It's ironic that a film with this title (and script) aimed for the big money, with wide-screen filming in Technicolor! Ian's stammer and slapstick fall flat, the story is weak, and other than staring at beautiful leading lady Belinda Lee the movie is hard to watch. I did appreciate briefly seeing the great Jill Ireland in an early role.

Ian Carmichael comes from a respectable family -- father James Hayter has never been caught, although he has been a pickpocket all his life. Carmichael, however, dreams of the big money, and one day, pursuing his trade of snatching unattended baggage, he achieves his dream, in a suitcase full of small notes. He displays them proudly to his family, but Hayter points out they all have the same serial numbers, obvious forgeries, and that's a specialist's job. Carmichael doesn't care. He's going to enjoy them, one pound at a time, so he's kicked out, despite the protests of his mother, Kathleen Harrison.

Carmichael falls for pub assistant Belinda Lee, who is much taken by the money he throws away; she has no problem spending the money, and Carmichael is too besotted to care. He also has Robert Helpmann, ringleader of the counterfeit gang on his trail.

It's a rare misfire by dependable director John Paddy Carstairs. Carmichael spends his time split evenly between being an idiot and jittering, and Miss Lee is stupid and predatory. I grew tired of the pair of them well before the movie's 85 minutes were up. With the only non-idiot, non-money obsessed character being Hayter, there wasn't much fun here. Apparently the producers agreed. It sat on a shelf for two years, until the Boultings made Carmichael a star with PRIVATE'S PROGRESS.

With George Coulouris, Renee Houston, Jill Ireland and Leslie Phillips.

An English comedy made 64 years ago, still valid today in 2020, which is still funny. There are many successful scenes and Belinda Lee looks splendid. John Paddy Carstairs, the same one who made sparkling comedies with the super funny Norman Wisdom, managed to be funny with this film too, at least it made me laugh. What a pity that Belinda Lee died so young, at only 25 years old!

In the 1950s Rank,along with other film producers,were trying to find ways to attract audiences back to the cinema.Having fallen out with Fox over Cinemascope,Rank turned to the short lived Vistavision,to add to Technicolour to attract customers.The fact that this could not disguise the poverty of the script didn't escape them and the film was shelved for 2 years.The best scenes are those at the beginning featuring Carmichael,Harrison and Hayter.After that the film is on a downward spiral.Nearly every actor with a major part is miscast.Carmichael is clearly unsuited to the part.For some reason his hair is made up with a teddyboys quiff.The part would more suit someone like Brian Rix.Diana Dors would certainly have made more of the part than Belinda Lee.Alas Robert Helpmann is just awful as the chief of the gang and would have been better played by Sid James.The climax in the hotel is about as unfunny as you can get.No wonder Carmichael didn't want to discuss it.At a time when he was a rising star of cinema this film could have put him back years.