One Exciting Night

This was the last film of a brief film career of Vera Lynn who at the time of writing is still going strong at 99.She is an iconic singer but she is not an actress,so she is at rather a disadvantage trying to carry the film as the leading lady.The producers were rather tempting fate by using the title,particularly since it does not live up to the contents of the film.The best part of the film are the musical numbers,none of which are memorable or formed part of her later repertoire.The story is rather witless and is typical of films made in the wartime.The version on the DVD is 70 minutes long and it has to be said that this is a small mercy.

The title suggests an Old Dark House comedy thriller, but despite a wartime backdrop the baddies are crooks after a stolen Rembrandt rather than the usual enemy agents. Vera Lynn wears harsher makeup than in her previous film 'Rhythm Serenade' and a much uglier hairstyle, but in the adroit hands of veteran comedy & thriller director Walter Forde finally blossoms as an actress. She's aided by a well mounted production handsomely photographed by the great Otto Heller, well matched by a likeably offbeat performance by leading man Donald Stewart and with a fun supporting cast of eccentrics, of whom I particularly enjoyed Mary Clare's contribution.

The plot gets more and more outrageously complicated as it progresses in a way that recalls Forde's silent comedies (Stewart even looks a bit like Forde), complete with one of those preposterously lifelike rubber masks that often feature in thrillers (the one in this film being slightly less unbelievable than usual) and even contriving to strand Vera on a window ledge at one point. Great fun.

Young singer Vera Baker (Vera Lynn) comes to London to entertain a group of RAF personnel on leave. At Waterloo Station, a pick-pocket (Cyril Smith), on the verge of getting caught, sneaks a stolen wallet into her bag. The wallet contains a cloakroom ticket to a mysterious package belonging to Michael Thorne (Donald Stewart), a former theatrical producer, which the nefarious Mr Hampton (Frederick Leister) hopes to claim as his own.

Vera, meanwhile, has been sacked after an impromptu performance at the United Nations Welfare Service. Discovering the wallet, she tries to return it - and impress its owner with her singing abilities - yet both get set upon by Hampton's men.

The package, she learns, is a Rembrandt painting which has been sent to Thorne for safe keeping. Hampton then hires Vera to perform at a cabaret. On the night of the show, he captures Thorne and tries to kill him with the help of a doppelgänger. Vera's efforts to rescue the imperilled producer leave her standing on a window ledge and in danger of dying herself...

An amiable romp with six musical numbers (most of which are performed with a band in view), One Exciting Night is a comedy-adventure without enough laughs or thrills to justify its place in either genre. The last of three wartime vehicles for popular British singer Vera Lynn, known as 'the Nation's Sweetheart' for the achingly poignant 'We'll Meet Again' and patriotic 'The White Cliffs of Dover', it's light on action and focuses mainly on farce.

The plot is mildly engaging but much too convoluted, a sub-Wodehousian blend of light romance and criminal machinations which too often takes a back-seat to the songs. Lynn, here a wholesome, toothily attractive twenty-something, is charming and personable in a role which, perhaps unfortunately, requires her to be oblivious of the surrounding danger for much of the film. A far better version could have been made with her as an enterprising amateur sleuth in accord with the mystery, yet as it is she does no detective work whatsoever.

Even the last-reel jeopardy is half-hearted, lacking any concerted effort to excite or surprise, while the late introduction of one of those miraculous face-masks, so often seen in the Mission Impossible films, makes things all the more outrageous. The film ends, too, on a slightly anticlimactic note as the villains aren't arrested and - most distastefully - the male lead seems to settle on Vera because his true love is already married.

Nonetheless, if one doesn't ask too much of it, One Exciting Night makes for a warm, whimsical, occasionally even fleet-footed film, with at least a couple of enjoyable songs: 'It's Like Old Times' is a wistful, pop-ballad sing-along while 'You Can't Do Without Love', a call for household recycling in aid of the war effort, is a fun little ditty despite playing more like a public information announcement. Of course, it's all somewhat unlikely, and only in the 1940s could the plot of a feature film depend on somebody returning a lost wallet. If that happened to any of us today, it really would be one exciting night.

Vera Lynn was a wonderful singer with a beautiful voice, with some great songs under her belt, her most famous being "We'll Meet Again". Stand corrected on having said about the number of films she did, only three of them had her in the lead role.

'One Exciting Night', out of her films where she played the lead, is the best of them and a big step up from her previous film 'Rhythm Serenade'. Richard Murdoch is rather dull and the film drags in the middle. Otherwise 'One Exciting Night' is well above average as a film that showcases Lynn as quite a capable and charming actress as well as a singer.

She sings wonderfully here, and the musical numbers while not among her best do nothing to squander her talents.

It is also the best looking of her films, the photography is pretty beautiful. The script is quite good too and balances well. The story is the least thin and contrived of her films, apart from a draggy mid-section, and also the least heavy-handed.

Lynn has a good supporting cast on the whole. Donald Stewart is a likable leading man who complements Lynn well. Frederick Leister is fun, while Cyril Smith very nearly steals the show.

All in all, Lynn's best film and quite pleasing. 8/10 Bethany Cox

Not so exciting, really, but an entertaining enough diversion. Vera Lynn, the Forces Sweetheart, was a sweet girl with a good voice, but she was no movie star and would have struggled as an actress were it not for her voice. As it was, this was the last of three films she made during the war to boost public and military morale; her importance in that respect can't be overlooked, and despite her so-so acting skills, it's not difficult to see why the nation took her to its heart.