Going Gay

I'm inserting reviews for films that lack one... this showed last month on satellite station talking pictures, but no one else has taken the plunge so here goes... A couple of English chaps touring the continent both fall for the same girl, who they try to make into a musical star, that's about it plot wise! In the cut 1 hour version it doesn't outstay it's welcome, there are a few musical numbers, but the only notable name involved is Naunton Wayne who played 'Caldicott' one half of the cricket mad pair of characters, that featured in a few superior British films in the decade ahead; I will watch any old British film that comes my way, on that low level of expectation this is OK! But I couldn't help thinking, 1933, the Americans were making 'Flying Down to Rio'! But though I have great fondness for British films, they nor anyone else ever got close to the standard of the great American musicals.

The other Englishman abroad is Arthur Riscoe in the first of two comedies with songs by imported Italian director Carmine Gallone in which Riscoe and Naunton Wayne (looking hardly any younger than he did in 'The Lady Vanishes' but here wearing glasses to make him look nerdier) arrive in Vienna and scheme against each other to get to first base with Romy Schneider's mother's Magda rather as Bing & Bob did with Dorothy Lamour the 'Road' movies.

(SLIGHT SPOILER COMING: Like the third season episodes of 'Batman', the film ends on a cliffhanger when our heroes board a plane for London at the end only to discover they've accidentally caught a flight to Venice; thus setting up the second and final Jack & Jim jaunt, 'For Love of You'.)