Caravane

Nostalgic visit to wartime British cinema for old timers - younger viewers will only see the corniness. All through, I was kept watching by set-ups that promised the effects that could have helped me buy this melodrama of romantic love (Granger, Crawford) seriously spiked by dastardly Price in Regency England and Carmen's Spain - but that, in the end, delivered a mixture of laughable action and turgid dialogue. Price's scenery-chewing performance is wonderfully over the top.

This is quite an entertaining melodrama than really belongs to the devious, cowardly Dennis Price as dodgy aristocrat "Sir Francis Castleton" who is out to steal the fair maiden "Oriana" (Anne Crawford) from her beau Stewart Granger ("Darrell") who is on a mission to return a valuable necklace to Spain. The plot has plenty going on, twists and turns, robbery, amnesia and betrayal - and luckily a bit of Jean Kent as the mischievous Gypsy "Rosal" who has a sultry quality (but who dances with two left feet). Crawford is fairly sterile as a heroine, the dialogue is a bit on the gloopy side and the staging at times too theatrical for the settings - but it is still an engaging team effort with plenty of comeuppances to be had at the end...

It is a real hoot to see Dennis Price being as suavely evil as possible.Robert Helpmann as his slimy servant not to mention Jean Kent as the gypsy dancer.They rather put in the shade Anne Crawford who is quite prepared to marry when she believes Granger to be dead,and Granger

who is happy to marry to keep her happy.So everything you would expect from a typical Gainsborough film.

Dashing Stewart Granger and sneering Dennis Price love the same blonde maiden from childhood. But Granger ends up wounded with amnesia in a gypsy CARAVAN and linked to a flamenco dancing hot momma. And the blonde maiden is hooked up to dastardly Dennis. Will prim blonde maiden and dashing Stewart end up together, even though there are several countries between them, or will true love fail to triumph?

Most of the mid-40s Gainsborough Gothic romances I've seen have some slight restraint which labels them as British. Sure, there is villainy a-plenty, and firm jawed heroism from Granger and others. But, things don't really get silly. (Well, maybe in Uncle Silas, but that movie really is sui generis).

Well, here, nobody is really taking this thing seriously. Dennis Price, in particular, seems inspired by Tod Slaughter (but with one bout of demonic laughing, alas), as he marries our heroine, and then subjects her immediately to a variety of over the top indignities. The gal playing the hot blooded, flamenco dancing gypsy senorita also has amped up the hot blooded Latin thing to eleven, and is rather fun. The scriptwriter (and, I expect, the original "famous" novel) does not bother with trying to make much sense, and the film, heaven knows, may be better off for that. However, unceasing self-mockery is always a dangerous thing for a genre film, and it is a bit hard to care much about the goings on when the film's creators don't seem much invested in them.

Good for a laugh when Dennis Price is on screen, but Gainsborough did this sort of thing much better elsewhere.

Wild Gainsborough melodrama adapted from the purple pen of Lady Eleanor Smith with marvellous camp performances from Dennis Price and Robert Helpmann. There is also an athletic performance from Stewart Granger, while Anne Crawford follows in the distinguished footsteps of Phyllis Calvert & Patricia Roc by offering us the blandest of leading ladies. Jean Kent, however, is on hand as a spirited travelling woman. Kent can't sing and she can't dance, but she certainly is a lot of fun, even if she does lay on the sex appeal with a trowel. Almost sixty years on it is easy to see why this series of melodramas were so popular. If you can leave your critical faculties to one side, this is one to enjoy.