I Like Money

(Based on a play) Mister Topaze is a poor but honest schoolteacher with an avaricious boss (Leo McKern) and chased by his boss' daughter (a very funny Billie Whitelaw).

When he loses his job after not changing the grades of a student from a good family Topaze is taken in by a couple of crooks (Herbert Lom, Nadia Gray) who use the honest teacher as a front man for their underhanded schemes.

After that the teacher goes on a learning curve.

This is Sellers' sole directoral effort and that's too bad because he has a good eye for framing the wide screen, especially out in Paris and its environs. Sellers is surrounded by talent (including also Michael Gough and John Neville) and he's happy to take on the quiet role anchoring the movie and leave the flamboyance to others (especially Lom, Whitelaw and McKern).

Unfortunately, the role of Topaze is an actor-killer. The same play was filmed before with the great John Barrymore and he was surprisingly dull. I can't imagine employing that word for Barrymore, nor for Sellers. Yet it is true.

The thing about Sellers is his amazing ability to be quiet. Watch the first two Clouseau movies or "Being There." Sellers' being both fascinating and hilarious in stillness is a revelation.

Sellers is also, arguably (or I'd say not so arguably), the best slapstick artist since the Silent era. His subtle strengths (and, yes, his slapstick could be amazingly subtle), especially in the early 1960s, were wonderful. But he gives himself little to do in that direction. He might have thought it a betrayal of the character, but making Topaze a trifle clumsy in the patented Sellers way, working his special magic with inanimate objects so the simplest thing is menacing, would have been a boon to the character, making him at least a tiny bit interesting.

"Mister Topaze" fails in two areas. First, the lead character is simply uninvolving, even with Sellers playing the part. Second, the ending, while realistic, is too bleak.

Sellers always pretended there was no he. Actually, if only half the stories about him are true, he probably feared introspection. Mister Topaze (the character) is possibly a reflection of the way he visualized himself: a man who is invisible if he's not playing a part.

Or is that over-analyzing a movie I find well-directed with a superb cast but which I thought dull? Am I trying to justify finding Peter Sellers (Peter Sellers!) uninvolving?

This movie is a must for Sellers buffs, but that's as much as I can say for it.

I liked the song "I Like Money." And I liked Sellers' direction. But if I find the movie sad it's more because it's such a beautiful failure.

This obscure Peter Sellers film directed by himself begins poorly. We are introduced to the self righteous small town schoolteacher, played by Sellers, and it seems to go on and on without being amusing, or if occasionally vaguely amusing, certainly not funny. An amazingly young Billie Whitelaw doesn't help, seeming unable to rid herself of her theatrical bent. And here perhaps lies the basic problem in that this was a stage play and much of the activity would have probably been acceptable on the stage whereas it probably needed someone with greater experience than Sellers to shake this up and give it more life. As it happens things are never as bad as at the start and gradually things get less bad. By the very end we have a gloriously presented Sellers in complete cynic mode ready to go and it ends. Masses of extras n the Blu-ray and the prospect of seeing it again without fear of it sinking into the mire make me look back just a little more favourably and feel a bit sorry for Sellers who apparently felt so bad at the films reception that he thought he had bought up all copies and destroyed them. Clearly the BFI had a copy stashed away.

The only film that Peter Sellers ever directed was this comedy set in the Paris of the not-too-distant past and based on a Marcel Pagnol play that was filmed several times before, though this version, produced and written by Pierre Rouve, is chock full of well-known English character actors pretending they're French. In hindsight, it might feel like a strange choice for Sellers' directorial debut, and sole effort, but at least he's got the plum title role of "Mr. Topaze". A mild-mannered and scrupulously honest school master who loses his job because he won't give a rich man's son a better grade. As it happens, said rich man, (Herbert Lom), is also a crook who then employs Sellers to act as a 'front man' for his crooked business.

It's shot in Cinemascope which doesn't really suit the material but on the plus side those character actors do throw themselves into the very old-fashioned material but it's certainly never as funny as it thinks it is. Sellers reputedly hated it, so much so that he tried to have all the prints bought up. It's not a bad film as such and at best it might be described as a curiosity and so out of step with other comedies of its time, it is, at least, of more than passing interest but ultimately it's that supporting cast, (Leo McKern, Lom, Michael Gough, Martita Hunt, John Neville and a surprisingly good Nadia Gray), that saves it. It might have been better with a different director, (Sellers was clearly not up to the job). I suppose you could call it a cult movie and now that it's resurfaced maybe you should seek it out.

This is truly a very interesting film. It's not a masterpiece, but it's worth watching this film if you like Peter Sellers.

So, Sellers is not only an amazing actor, but also succesful as a director...Not surprised. What a talented chap! Sadly, the film is not as popular as it deserves to be.