What a Whopper

I saw this film today and must say, it made me laugh. It didn't aim to be a major box office smash and it wasn't, but it was fun and relaxing to watch. I was amazed and glad to see so many great names appear, and it made a nice change to have a plot that wasn't so complex that it gave you a headache. I enjoyed it greatly and i know my cousin of eleven years old enjoyed it too!

I saw this film advertised in the paper but with no review. So I taped it off BBC2 then watched it having just seen that it had Adam Faith and Sid James in it. I would rate it as a 12 because although there is no swearing or actual sex scenes in it;the humour is mostly innuendo. This film is not mentioned in 1)the Virgin film guide

2)Halliwells Who's Who in the movies

3)Leonard Maltins movie & video guide. Which I have found to mean films they want to forget which are generally gems.Another example being "Langrishe go down" with Dame Judi Dench. Besides the afore mentioned "What A Whopper" also had Wilfred Bramble Charles Haughtrey, Spike Milligan and Clive Dunn make for an impressive if refreshingly UNPC mild comedy.

Heart-throb pop star Adam Faith ("Tony") is a struggling author who cannot get his book about the famed Loch Ness monster published. It purports to be a serious work and naturally all the publishers know there's no such beastie. Determined to prove them wrong, he and some pals fake some photos and soon the world and it's wife is heading to verify the sightings. Now as a Scot, this irked on a couple of levels - not least Faith's appalling attempt at the accent and director Gilbert Gunn's determination not to use any Scottish actors at all, as far as I could see. Sidney James as the Highland hotel owner really did take the proverbial biscuit. Despite these rather obvious, doubtless budget-driven clangers, at times it's actually quite a fun, light-hearted, wheeze but it's really let down by the fairly stilted acting across the board which is almost as ropey as the stereotype-ridden script. Needless to say, the filming never left the home counties and as for the theme song - well, least said. It does have a nostalgia value - simple comedy around an even more simple story, but it's still not very good.

"There's something funny going on", mutters Terry Scott's policeman to his colleague Gordon Rollings. Well, I'm not sure about that, but "What a Whopper!" is at least mildly diverting, mainly for the pleasure of spotting the stars in the extraordinary cast. It is also noteworthy for the screenplay by future "Daleks" scribe Terry Nation, music by Laurie "Avengers" Johnson and for Adam Faith's quite dreadful theme song, which is arranged by none other than John Barry!

The film itself is innocent seaside postcard humour, full of comic misunderstandings. Charles Hawtrey plays a beatnik artist (!), Spike Milligan is a befuddled fisherman and Sid James a Scottish publican, although he wisely makes no attempt at a Scots accent. There is also a rare big screen outing for Freddie Frinton's famous sozzled aristocrat performance. This film is truly a souvenir from a bygone age, when the idea of an inebriated man driving from London to Scotland was funny and when outrageous sexism was tolerated. The treatment of women in this film makes the "Carry On" series positively 'PC' by comparison!

I don't see why this film as so many bad reviews, It's a pleasing British comedy of it's era (1961) with a cracking cast.

It's the type of film you'd get on BBC2 on a wet afternoon when I was a kid.

How can any film with Sid James, Spike Milligan (Who seems to be in the wrong film...), Charles Hawtrey not be an easy pleasing nostalgic view?.

Maybe I'm of the last generation that appreciates this type of film...I hope not.