Maid for Murder

I am adding reviews of all films I've seen that lack one at time of writing, here is the brief note I made at the time.... 'Good British comedy about a couple of poor brothers who's stately home has been left to a foreign cousin, what's the solution murder or marriage? Good.' It appears a fairly obscure title, mine is the 16th vote, though the director and many cast members will be familiar to anyone who knows British comedy of the 50's & 60's. I have no memory now of the film, but I did see it some 31 years ago in May 83, on BBC1, UK TV, check it out if you get a chance. I need to pad, the director Robert Asher is best remembered for his work on a number of Norman Wisdom films.

Brothers Bob Monkhouse and Alfred Marks have been written out of the will. Everything has been left to their second cousin, a convent-reared girl. They consider marriage, but neither of them seem very interested in the subject. Instead they decide to murder the woman. When it turns out to be Anna Karina, however, they become heterosexuals, when not botching their various murder attempts.

It's a very funny black comedy of the lowest variety, with plenty of sight gags, camera trickery, and out-and-out pratfalls. Hattie Jacques is on hand as a journalist, and Peter Butterworth is very funny as a doctor who has forgotten everything he knew about medicine, including the difference between a head and a foot. Miss Karina is present to wear an amazing strapless evening gown, to be very sweet, and to serve as the impervious target of the two inept would-be murderers.

Promising start has two idle brothers (Bob Monkhouse, Alfred Marks) living in genteel poverty in their hideous old manor house in Lambering, UK. They have no money but they do have a butler (Dennis Lotis). When a relative dies, they expect to inherit a fortune but discover the money has been left to a distant and unknown cousin in Corsica. They devise several plots to murder her, assuming she'll be an old hag. When Anna Karina shows up as cousin Toni, their thoughts turn to marriage instead. But she has other ideas.

Sort of a take on the classic comedy THE LADYKILLERS, the brothers go through a series of inept murder attempts of which the beauteous cousin seems unaware. Only fitfully funny, especially since Karina and her character are not funny at all. Things liven up a bit when a loony reporter (Hattie Jacques) pops in to get a story for her magazine, but she's not in enough scenes.

Bright supporting bits from Graham Stark as the dour photographer, Peter Butterworth as the myopic doctor, Clive Dunn as the chemist, and Pat Coombs as the lady at the railway station. That might be Dennis Lotis singing the horrid theme song. Story is based on a play.

This very broad comedy features several guffaws and one or two solid laughs. The premise is old hat: Douglas and Francis (Alfred Marks and Bob Monkhouse), two idler brothers of the stereotypical British upper-class variety, suddenly find themselves cut off without a penny in their late grandmother's will, in favour of a Corsican cousin, Toni, they have never met and whose existence they were previously barely aware of. Immediately dismissing the notion of actually working for a living, the brothers decide that their only viable options are reacquiring control of the estate by either marrying or murdering their cousin on her impending visit to the hereditary family manor on the English coast.

Initially deciding that murder is the more palatable of the two options, they find themselves vacillating somewhat, when Toni arrives in the person of the beautiful and seductive Anna Karina. From there events proceed in a predictable fashion as Douglas and Francis, without a whit of subtlety between them, alternate between trying to murder and romance Toni, as circumstances keep shifting beneath their feet, leading up to the totally foreseeable finale.

Tossed into the mix is a typical assortment of eccentric British comedy supporting characters: Hattie Jacques as a blustery journalist, Graham Stark as her silent, dour photographer, Peter Butterworh as a myopic, deranged country doctor and Clive Dunn as a confused and klutzy shopkeeper.

All the performers deliver exactly what is required of them, doing their best to work with the tried and true, but ultimately tired material. However, it really isn't the lack of originality that is the main failing of the production. Indeed, to a certain extent, the familiarity is both expected and comforting - the audience knows what kind of movie this is going to be from the moment the opening credits roll and can settle back at ease with it. What really lets the whole production down is Robert Asher's ham-fisted direction. Asher seems to have had no faith in the inherent humour of the material or the skills of his performers and his resulting attempts to force laughs with silly, insipid and embarrassing visual gags and groan-inducing "whacky" sound effects, not only display a lack of directorial inspiration, but a deficiency of good taste.

Certainly not a great movie, but one that is quite indicative of the era of film making that spawned it, SHE'S GOT TO GO is recommended more for fans of British comedies of the type represented by the CARRY ON series (of which Bob Monkhouse was an alumnus and Hattie Jacques and Peter Butterworh were regulars) than those of the Ealing Studios variety.

Now I could never stand Bob Monkhouse. However I found Alfred Marks screamingly funny, especially on his chat show appearances So here we have one plus and one minus making a definite minus.

This was one of a number of films made at the time where the main plot point was murdering a relative for some good reason.

Based on a play one has to assume that audiences found it funny. If they did this film adaptation does not recreate anyof the fun times had in the theatre.