Quinteto da Morte

Where did they dig up Katie Johnson? How she balances the act of a sweet old lady who is respected yet still patronized with the toughness of a strong woman who upholds justice is a joy to watch. All the while completely unawares of the true danger surrounding her. Her performance is simply great and side-splittingly funny. The rest of the cast display their usual talents, particularly the fumbling of Cecil Parker and the mean looking Herbert Lom. It's also interesting to see a very young Peter Sellers who would soon hit his stride a few years later. The dark lighting and moody scenes are perfect for this comedy and are very typical of British films of the era, so the look is familiar right away as you begin to watch. The "Tea Party" scene is just a riot. Odd to see so many negative comments on the film - it's one of if not the best Ealing film and deservedly regarded as one the best comedies of all time. They just dont make them like this anymore.

If you had to choose a film that represented British Cinema at its best, you'd be hard-pressed to find one better than "The Ladykillers". The story, the sets, the actors, the photography, the humour, are all perfect. There isn't a bad performance anywhere, and that goes for everyone, including those who only briefly appear. The ladies who arrive for an afternoon tea party are all wonderful. Even the parrot, who creates mayhem amongst the thieves by escaping and flying around the room, puts in a perfect performance. Curiously the story is by an American, yet he has managed to portray all the idiosyncrasies that makes British humour what is is. The wonderful thing about the bunch of thieves is that they are all equally excellent. Alec Guinness with his crooked teeth, Peter Sellers' spiv, Herbert Lom's dark psychopath, Cecil Parker's colonel character and Danny Green's dumb heavyweight - with the wonderful nickname of one-round. The cameo performances of people like Frankie Howerd, Jack Warner, just add to the completeness of the film. But Katie Johnson is absolutely superb and the house she lives in, a fantastic creation of a Victorian house precariously sitting on top of a railway tunnel. The ending is incredible and if you thought that it might tail off here, well it doesn't. I cannot recommend it enough. Any student of British Cinema or those just wanting a really good laugh, this is the film to start with.

One of the Ealing studio's finest achievements, this immensely entertaining crime caper looks at first glance to be pure, inconsequential entertainment. But it doubles as a sly, subtle rummage around the psychology of the respectable, old-fashioned middle classes, with Katie Johnson deserving top billing alongside Alec Guinness (she doesn't get it) for her remarkable turn as the lady in question, the redoubtable Mrs Wilberforce.

No less than the not-quite-ruthless-enough gang of criminals who scheme in her house, she lives in her own private universe with its own particular rules and values. Though she begins the film as the stereotype of a maddeningly officious pillar of local society, it gradually emerges that there is a freer as well as shrewder spirit locked in there than meets the eye. The umbrella she is always losing (she herself suggests that she unconsciously _wants_ to lose it), the escapologist parrot, and most poignantly the memory of a 21st birthday party interrupted by the end of the Victorian age, all hint at an inner life that the comic plot could easily have done without. The screenplay, deservedly Oscar-nominated, has the genius and economy to provide us with all these hints without ever slowing down a tightly-edited and superbly directed narrative.

The other characters are a good deal simpler, but Alec Guinness is in impressively seedy form as 'Professor' Marcus and Cecil Parker makes an appealing Major. Peter Sellers and Herbert Lom don't have a great deal to do and don't try to hog the limelight, but there's a nice cameo from Frankie Howerd. Ealing went out on a high.

OK so I like it. Why? Well it is that intoxicating combination of dry black humour, pathos and perhaps a pleasing inevitability that whatever twist the film takes, you know it should be no other way.

I cannot fault the cast, I regretted as a kid that I did not see Katie Johnson again (I know she made many other films, but I have never collided with them), whereas Alec Guinness and Peter Sellers were often featured on a Saturday Matinee.

I am, however, pleasantly surprised at how well this film is rated by IMDb! Of course I would give it high marks, but it is very interesting to see how many other people from other nations both 'get it' and appreciate it. It is perhaps, these days, just a gentle farce with black edges where naivety blends in with irony, and I am not claiming that it makes me LoL the whole time. But it is eminently watchable and re-watchable and I would never hesitate to recommend it; indeed those who do not like it would probably not 'get me' either!

Soon after this atmospheric black comedy begins, aged widow Johnson putters around her house (situated near a railyard) as an imposing shadow seems to peer at her from every window (accented by dramatic music.) When she opens the door, there stands Guinness, in one of his amusingly creepy personas. He rents a room from the lady and arranges to have his cronies come over to practice their quintet. Unfortunately, he has something else in mind and the quintet is merely a cover for a greater plan. The film has detail, wit and character to spare. Guinness (and his friends, played by legendary character actors like Sellars and Lom) are a funny, motley lot. However, the story really belongs to Johnson. Shamefully underbilled and unsung, she perfectly embodies the role at hand and is incredibly memorable in her understated sweetness and supposed vulnerability. This is a woman who looks for the best in everything and everyone and fights injustice whenever she encounters it. Johnson gives a quiet, yet towering performance and it is astonishing how disrespectful her billing is in the film and how little she's been given even in recent packaging. There is nothing wrong with Guinness's work, but this is Johnson's film. (Ironically, according to Robert Osborne, a younger actress was cast in the film, to be made up as older, because the producers felt that the sometimes demanding director would be too much for Johnson to bear. However, that actress died before filming, so Johnson was used and got on fine!) It is truly the type of film that won't be made again. (It may be RE-made, but never with the same quaint, understated style, nor with such polished actors.)