Late role for Robert Donat about a vicar given only a year to live. Without his presence, it wouldn't be up to much.
Script: Eric Ambler
Director: Charles Frend
Players: Kay Walsh, Adrienne Corri, Denholm Elliott, Walter Fitzgerald, Vida Hope, Reginald Beckwith, Cyril Raymond, Jean Anderson, Frederick Piper, John Salew
Ian Carmichael and Patricia Bredin are the opposing candidates in a by-election who fall in love, much to the consternation of their supporters.
Script: Sidney Gilliat
Director: Sidney Gilliat
Players: Alastair Sim, Richard Wattis, Eric Barker, Moyra Fraser, Jack Hedley, Gordon Harker, William Kendall, Leslie Dwyer, George Benson, Frederick Leister, John Salew, Irene Handl, Jeremy Hawk, Eamonn Andrews, Gilbert Harding, Carole Carr, Josephine Douglas, Hattie Jacques, Erik Chitty, Olaf Pooley
Neutral Norway - and the ukulele player in a big band is shot dead during a performance. British Intelligence arrange for replacement to be sent to investigate a ring of spies passing information about British shipping to the Nazis. However, in the blackout an innocent concert party member is mistaken for the new player and, before he knows what's happened, he's shipped off to Bergen.
Of course, the innocent abroad is George Formby; and armed with only a toothy grin, his ukulele and his invincibly gormless charm, he'll round up the spy ring, help capture a U-boat, get the girl and still have time to sing a few songs.
Let George Do It was designed to be an up-to-the-minute patriotic morale booster. The up-to-the-minute bit didn't quite work out since between the trade showing and general release Norway was invaded, so a title card was hastily inserted saying "The greater part of this story takes place in Norway . . . before the war spread". The audience didn't care since they made this one of the biggest hits of the year.
The main reason for the film's success was, of course, its star. Formby was at the height of his career and this film is a beautifully crafted vehicle which shows him off perfectly. As the ukulele player in a band his songs can be integrated into the narrative without seeming forced, the accidental-spy plot gives a lot of scope for his brand of naive blundering, and the anti-Nazi struggle provides the patriotic kick the times required.
This latter element is shown most clearly in the dream sequence where George balloons over to Germany. He hops off at a Nuremberg rally and bops Hitler in the eye. It's one of the most iconic moments in British cinema and even sixty years later it's still outrageously cheeky and strangely satisfying.
The critics, as well as audiences, loved this film and they were right. It's entertainment all the way and deserves a place among all those realistic films such as Way to the Stars and Millions Like Us as one of the finest pictures of the war.
Script: John Dighton, Austin Melford, Angus Macphail, Basil Dearden
Director: Marcel Varnel
Players: Phyllis Calvert, Garry Marsh, Romney Brent, Bernard Lee, Coral Browne, Helena Pickard, Diana Beaumont, Torin Thatcher, Hal Gordon, Donald Calthrop, Ronald Shiner, Albert Lieven, Percy Walsh
Director John Baxter had two passions: Music Hall entertainers and the Working Class. J.B. Priestley's tale of locals trying to take control of their town's entertainment hall gave him the perfect opportunity to combine the two. Alastair Sim takes the lead as a Czech professor who gets involved in the struggle but it's not one of his better performances. Fred Emney steals every scene he appears in.
Script adapt.: John Baxter, Barbara K. Emery, Geoffrey Orme. (o.a. J.B. Priestley)
Director: John Baxter
Players: Edward Rigby, Patricia Roc, Oliver Wakefield, Annie Esmond, Marian Spencer, Olive Sloane, Charles Hawtrey, Aubrey Mallalieu, Wally Patch, Eliot Makeham, Ian Fleming
Dirk Bogarde is the man with the memory loss suing Paul Massie for libellously accusing him of being an impostor. The star has a good role but the drama is wildly improbable.
Script: Anatole de Grunwald
Director: Anthony Asquith
Players: Olivia de Havilland, Robert Morley, Wilfrid Hyde White, Anthony Dawson, Richard Wattis, Martin Millar, Millicent Martin, Toke Townley, Richard Dimbleby, Richard Pearson, Sam Kydd, Robert Shaw, Joyce Carey
Only The Archers could make a war film with a sympathetic German and an incompetent British officer. And only they could make a film with such verve.
Written, produced and Directed by Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger
Players: Roger Livesey, Anton Walbrook, Deborah Kerr, Roland Culver, James McKechnie, Albert Lieven, Arthur Wontner, Ursula Jeans, John Laurie, Reginald Tate, A.E. Matthews, Carl Jaffe, Valentine Dyall, Muriel Aked, Felix Aylmer, Patrick Macnee
Whatever happened to Derren Nesbitt? There was a time when you couldn't turn on the telly without seeing him as guest villain in The Sweeny or The Saint. Here he is at the start of his career, this time playing an innocent man who a lynch mob think is a serial killer. Maybe they had a premonition of his future performances.
Script: Malcolm Hulke, Eric Paice
Director: Terry Bishop
Players: Julie Hopkins, Howard Marion Crawford, Carmel McSharry
Film version of the radio sitcom in which Ben Lyons, Bebe Daniels and their children Barbara and Richard play Ben Lyons, Bebe Daniels and their children Barbara and Richard. Sweet, fifties fun.
Script: Val Guest, Robert Dunbar
Director: Val Guest
Players: Hugh Moreton, Horace Percival, Doris Rogers, Molly Weir, Gwen Lewis, Arthur Hill, Belinda Lee
It's wartime, and a woman is injured by a bomb. Cue lots of fantasy sequences for Anna Neagle.
Script adapt.: Miles Malleson. (o.a. Harold Purcell)
Director: Herbert Wilcox
Players: Errol Flynn, David Farrar, Kathleen Harrison, Peter Graves, Helen Haye, Scott Sanders, Jennifer Mitchell, Alan Gifford, Gillian Harrison, George Margo, Alan Taylor, Hetty King, Sean Connery
Standard backstage musical with "Street Singer" Arthur Tracy falling for chorus girl Anna Neagle. Tracy and Neagle get loads of songs but the highlight for nostalgia buffs is Jack Buchanan doing Goodnight Vienna.
Script: Laura Whetter
Director: Herbert Wilcox
Players: Tilly Losch, Jane Winton, Ellis Jeffreys, Muriel George, Antony Holles, Ralph Reader, Alexander Field, William Freshman, Helena Pickard, Queenie Leonard, Ronald Shiner
English intelligence officer tries to keep a nuclear scientist out of the clutches of a bunch of Nazis.
Curious basis for a musical - but then they did dump the original book. They had sense enough to keep the songs, highlight of which is the kitsch classic Pedro the Fishermen. This film is believed missing.
Script adapt.: Jack Whittingham (o.a. Harold Purcell, Harry Parr-Davies)
Director: Paul L. Stein
Players: David Farrar, Patricia Burke, Richard Tauber, Walter Rilla, Lawrence O'Madden, Austin Trevor, Paul Bonifas, Harry Welchman, Esme Percy, Noele Gordon, John Ruddock, Joan Seton, Allan Jeayes, Ralph Truman, Martin Walker, Michelle de Lys, Jan van Loewen, Uriel Porter, Hannah Watt, F. Wendhausen, Morgan Davies, Leo de Pokorny, Stephane Grappelly, Lorely Dyer, Halamar and Konarski
