The Cracksman

The honest locksmith duped by the crooks only sees the light when he has to open the Tower of London. The cannonball & Bobby are a hoot.

This is an underrated little gem of a film. As long as you like the Pre-Python dry Brit farces.

This was Associated Britsh Picture Corporation's third attempt to turn popular television comedian Charlie Drake into a big screen star. To say that this is a notch up on the previous effort (Petticoat Pirates) is not saying much, but at least this is a properly constructed vehicle for Drake rather than a series of irrelevant scenes inserted into an existing story. In this movie Drake actually has a character name and the fact that he is in nearly every scene will either please or appal you depending on your tolerance of the character. The Drake films were clearly intended to be ABPC's answer to Rank's Norman Wisdom films, which had had ten years of box office success but by 1963 were beginning to flag. Unfortunately, public tastes were marching relentlessly on to the swinging sixties and the appetite for sentimental "little man" comedy was on the wane. Even if you are a Charlie Drake fan, the main problem with this effort is the glacial pace. It is at least thirty minutes too long, mainly due to the profusion of slapstick set pieces. As with Petticoat Pirates, ABPC quite unnecessarily shot this in CinemaScope and Technicolor and filled it with familiar British comedy actors including Ronnie Barker having a pre-Porridge spell behind bars and ultra smooth Patrick Cargill trying to play common. If you must watch a Charlie Drake movie, this is probably the best, but that is not much of a recommendation.

No expense was spared on this lavish big screen vehicle for Charlie Drake, much of it filmed on location around a very wintry-looking London in CinemaScope and Technicolor with a supporting cast (in a nod towards 'The Rebel') headed by George Sanders. None of these blandishments (and certainly Ron Goodwin's galumphing score) made him any funnier, so he soon returned to TV.

Ironically Ronnie Barker's name doesn't even make the opening credits, yet the most enduring feature of the film is the first appearance - fully formed - of Norman Stanley Fletcher looking barely a day younger under an earlier alias and with a scar on his right cheek. Sixteen years later the character would return to the big screen (minus the scar) billed above the title.

Charlie Drake plays a naif.Every time he is asked to do a job as a cracksman it turns out he is being duped by a crook.Caught by the police he is sent to prison.This is repeated ad nauseum.For some reason they have included a night club scene which could easily have been cut to bring the film down to a more manageable and less boring 90 minutes.To me only 30 seconds of this film retained my interest.That is when Drake is shown in the East Stand of the marvellous art deco palace that was the East Stand Highbury.I reckon the filming must have taken place after the big freeze of 1962/63.Watch the film for this and nothing else.

British comedian Charlie Drake is an acquired taste, and at his best as the hapless "cracksman" of the title in this modest little spoof of crime pictures. The script is sharper than one might expect from this kind of film, and little Charlie is up to his ears in trouble. His endearing innocence (if not talent) suggests a contemporary version of Chaplin; while his physical appearance suggests the love child of Ned Beatty and Mickey Rooney, making him wholly appropriate for comedy,--and nothing else. He plays so well with bad guy George Sanders, who really comes to life here, that I can almost imagine them as a comedy team, which sounds ludicrous I know, as they would have seemed so incongruous together, but then again comedy teams generally do,