Rhubarb

Two years after The Plank. Eric Sykes wrote and directed Rhubarb.

A near silent comedy about Reverend Rhubarb who quietly slips his congregation in church for a round of golf with Inspector Rhubarb (Eric Sykes.)

The game does not go quiet as smoothly as expected. PC Rhubarb (Jimmy Edwards) is hovering about especially when he spots a likely flasher.

Maybe a bolt of lightning might shake things up.

This time Eric Sykes fails to get a hole in one. The Plank worked as a slapstick.

Despite a cast that includes Hattie Jacques, Kenneth Connor, Graham Stark. This is not as fresh or funny. People exclaiming rhubarb frequently gets irritating.

RHUBARB is, like THE PLANK, an almost-silent short featuring Harry Secombe, Jimmy Edwards and Eric Sykes. They start out as police but end up on the golf course, and the hook is that there's no word of dialogue other than the repeated 'rhubarb'. I enjoyed this one at the outset but found that once the action moves to the golf course it becomes increasingly repetitive and there's only so much humour you can get out of people hiding in the bushes and tossing golf balls around. A pity because the cast are on form and there are welcome cameos and minor roles for the likes of Kenneth Connor and Hattie Jacques, always welcome.

Like much of Sykes' work what it lacks in funniness it makes up in charm.

The IMDb ironically describes the language this film is in as English, when there's actually even more English in the films of Jacques Tati which obviously inspired it. However it contains a very English view of religion when a vicar's sermon consists entirely of the word 'rhubarb'.