Carry on Abroad

Lots of people dismiss this as one of the weaker entries in the 'Carry On' series, but I think it represents the typical storyline and characterisations which showed the team at their best.

Here, Sid James, Kenneth Williams, Joan Sims, June Whitfield, Kenneth Connor, Jimmy Logan, Barbara Windsor, Charles Hawtrey, Peter Butterworth, Bernard Bresslaw, and Hattie Jacques liven up proceedings when they take a holiday in the most horrendous hotel and resort there is to stay in.

With a character name like 'Stuart Farquhar', Williams gets the brunt of a lot of the jokes with the hotel host (Butterworth) constantly mispronouncing all or both. And throw in a rainstorm, a bowl of punch, some monks, randy husbands and stuffy wives, and busty blondes, and you have the ingredients for a 'Carry On' success!

To begin with, I had previously caught a bit from this one on TV while channel-surfing when in London in September 1999! Like CARRY ON DOCTOR (1967), this is another multi-title offering: CARRY ON ABROAD, OR WHAT A PACKAGE, OR IT'S ALL IN OR, SWISS HOLS IN THE SNOW! While this is essentially a second-tier "Carry On", it proved to be consistently enjoyable – which is why I went for a higher rating than I had myself anticipated; even so, there are a bit too many gay stereotypes here and it's marred somewhat by the flat TV-style look.

Incidentally the hotel shenanigans which take up most of the running-time anticipate the FAWLTY TOWERS (1975) TV series. By the way, this turned out to be Charles Hawtrey's final "Carry On" – unfortunately, he doesn't get to do much…but, then, neither does Kenneth Williams as the tour leader (he's even given an unconvincing romance with a pretty young colleague). On the other hand, Peter Butterworth is at his best as the multi-purpose hotel manager who speaks in broken English (with Hattie Jacques as his massive and grumpy backwoods wife). Among the guests are Sidney James, who's married to Joan Sims but his eyes are constantly on Barbara Windsor!; Sims herself draws the attention of gallant but henpecked Kenneth Connor. There are also a number of youngsters thrown into the fray, as well as a manly Scot, and a group of monks (one of whom, Bernard Bresslaw, is allowed to strike a friendship with one of the girls – her companion, incidentally, is played by Sally Geeson from Norman Wisdom's WHAT'S GOOD FOR THE GOOSE [1969], which I watched recently).

As I said, many hilarious gags revolve around the run-down condition of the unfinished hotel – but the scene shifts halfway through to an outing in town (which turns into a massive scuffle and lands the group in jail); the climactic farewell party, then, sees the hotel – literally on its last legs – as it's flooded and crumbling around them. CARRY ON ABROAD (on which a certain Sun Tan Lo Tion served as technical adviser) is one of the more satisfying latter-day efforts from the gang – but, ultimately, it's a notch below classic series titles such as CARRY ON COWBOY (1965), CARRY ON SCREAMING! (1966) and CARRY ON...UP THE KHYBER (1968).

The Carry On team tackle that other British staple of the 1970s, the package holiday to the Med for some sun, sea, and a bit of 'how's your father?'; the result is another seriously silly caper full of low-brow humour and cheap titillation that is more fun than doing a drunken flamenco on a tapas bar table. Olé!

Kenneth Williams plays travel guide Stuart Farquhar (Stupid what?), who leads a troupe of happy-go-lucky holidaymakers to the resort of Elsbels. With Sid James, Charles Hawtree, Joan Sims, Babs Windsor, Kenneth Connor, and Bernard Besslaw amongst the travellers, hilarity is most definitely on the agenda, especially since the hotel they are booked into is not only seriously understaffed, but also isn't quite finished being built.

Having left their inhibitions back in England, the Gang proceed to drink, fight and flirt their way through the week, getting in trouble with the local police, partaking of a suspicious looking aphrodisiac purchased on an excursion, and partying while the hotel collapses, all of which allows for plenty of smutty innuendo, daft slapstick, and a spot of welcome T&A from Carry On regular Windsor, babes Carol Hawkins and Sally Geeson, and total hottie Gail Grainger as Williams' sexy assistant Miss Plunkett.

7.5 out of 10, rounded up to 8 for IMDb.

RANKING: one of the best of the modern-dress ones. The humour is a bit more smutty than in some but it's not dirty - it's still funny.

TYPICAL: Like all their non-historical films since CAMPING, they're all the exact same story but with different names. By 1972 when they made this, they'd got the recipe just right, it just clicks. Whilst hardly the height of sophisticated wit, every single line of the script seems to be a silly smutty double entendre. It's almost clever! One of the running gags is a local drink which makes you see the young ladies in their underwear - it's that sort of humour so if If you like this type of thing, this will be perfect for you. Unlike the last few films they did, this one's genuinely funny because it's silly and smutty rather than rude and offensive.

SEXY LADIES: The other essential of a Carry On film is saucy, sexy ladies and in this one we have them in abundance. The man (definitely a man) who did the casting must have particularly enjoyed that job. What's really surprising is how weirdly charming and innocent the gratuitous nudity is! Somewhere on set someone must have been told to ring a bell every five minutes signifying that whichever young lady was in frame at that moment they had to get their boobs out. The worthy winner of this 'adult' musical chairs game is usually Barbara Windsor. Her frequent toplessness is however never seedy and never vulgar, it's always done for laughs which makes her so endearing.

A hilarious low budget romp for the carry on team. This film sends up both foriegners and Brits. The new idea of package holidays was a rich vein for comedy in the early seventies (see also the brilliant 'Are You Being Served' film), a time when most British people had never been abroad before (except perhaps during the war), so there was much scope for humour.

Amazingly the British weather held up long enough for the island of Elsbels (Camber Sands) to look convincingly like a mediterranean resort (well...in winter anyway!) but a large number of scenes are indoors anyway, so it doesn't matter. All the usual smut, innuendo, and gags about falling down hotels are there, and I defy anyone not to chuckle a few times. The only slight downside is the rather poor acting by Kenneth Williams' assistant, but she is extremely 'easy on the eye' so gets away with it.

My favourite scene is when the prison guard gives the gang the 'fine old British gesture' of two fingers up, to which Kenneth Connor replies 'Damned FILTH!'.