It's Great to Be Young!

It's delightfully old-fashioned,but it's full of Joie De Vivre and it's really much fun to watch!

This grammar school is really too good to be true :all the pupils are very nice,very polite but they have a tendency to favor jazz music over classical ,predating ,in their own modest way ,the sixties'youth ,when England reigned over the whole musical world .

Mr Dingle,wonderfully portrayed by John Mills ,is a teacher with whom we do need education.When the new headmaster arrives ,none of his colleagues supports him ,not even the gym teacher (and however his subject is not considered a serious one either). In the next decade,Dingle would have embraced the Beatles without a moment's hesitation.He's not only a teacher ,he is also the confidant (wait for the "flash"),and ,even without their instruments ,his class can play infectious music -in an extremely well-directed scene.

Imitating the beginning of the French Revolution,the students after a "singing strike" and a conspiracy of silence ,lock themselves in the gym to support their teacher who has been unfairly dismissed (and has become the toast of the local pub).

Plenty of fun with Mr Dingle!

This film is a lighthearted and lovely British romp into comic book musical comedy. It reflects perfectly the attitude and behaviour of English children of the post war 50's. John Mills plays the main character, Mr. Dingle, a history and music teacher at Angel Hill School, whose ambition is for children to love and understand music. This is his best ever acting role; the passion and feeling that he puts into it makes Dingle appear as a normal yet special human being. He is ably supported by Cecil Parker (Mr. Frome)his well meaning but non-understanding headmaster. Jeremy Spenser, Dorothy Bromley and a very young Richard O'Sullivan take leading roles as Dingle's "Angels". The good feeling that I had when I first saw this film, in about 1957, has remained for more than forty years. Thank you Sir John and all concerned. I only wish that my teachers had been like Dingle.

I saw this movie when it first came out. I was in my early teens and so just the right age for it and oh it seemed so romantic! I managed to get an ep of some of the music - wish I knew where that ep got to, I've lost it. But I never managed to see the movie again until quite recently on TV - it's been shown a few more times since.

I was never a real jazz enthusiast however so much as I enjoyed all the fun and games at the school with the young musicians and their impressive teacher played by John Mills in a such lively youthful performance that nicely presages his later great dramatic talents, the music itself didn't stay in my memory. Only a year or two later we young people were stunned and delighted by the first rock 'n roll - I heard Rock Around the Clock for the first time in a Hancock's Half Hour, believe it or not, which very amusingly guyed Blackboard Jungle, and I was enthralled - by the music as much as Hancock, ie. Next came Elvis and Heartbreak Hotel, and the music and style and youthful behaviour of It's Great to be Young morphed into energetic rock dancing and Elvis's sexy gyrations.

It's Great to be Young is a splendid period piece now, one of the last gasps if you like of the pre-beat music generation but still enormous fun.

It's Great to be Young, (1956) is a narrative of a co-educational school and its pupils excepting their rights. Look further into the sub-text to find it is more about an evolving education system. Moreover it is a comment on the grammar school system. In this era, as is the case nowadays, the grammar school system was designed for more academically able pupils. In other words, a school for the children of the middle class who can avoid paying the education fees of expensive private schools at the expense of the tax payer.

In this film it is notable that the boys are asked questions by the teachers on the subjects of history, Latin and music, whilst overlooking the girls on such questions. Instead girls are encouraged to pursue romance and domestic duties, such as knitting.

Overlapping this dark side of the British education system is the upbeat, energetic, effervescent feel to it, with great performances, good acting and a fine cast of players, including the great Sir John Mills, and a very young Richard O'Sullivan.

It is in many respects a time-piece of traditional school teachers, and education, with corporal punishment and conservative attitudes verses the post-modern jazz, the pre-rock 'n' roll era.

A film that is upbeat, if a tad cheesy, with its dark comments on the British education system.

IF you were at school in the 1950's then watch this film if you get the opportunity. It's a lovely look at British school life in that era. The music throughout is great too. John Mills and Cecil Parker do a superb job in their respective roles. Wonderful nostalgia pieces like this should be treasured, and hopefully it will be released on DVD in time.