The Amorous Milkman

Awful sex comedies like this were home to a great many character actors before the soaps' domination of UK television offered them a better alternative. However, Arnold Ridley was old enough to know better. He surely must have amassed enough royalties from his play "The Ghost Train", and had enough exposure from his continuing role in BBC TV's "Dad's Army", to be able to turn down a cough and a spit role as a usher in a porno cinema. Julie Ege does add some class, easily outshining the other women in the cast, which sadly includes Diana Dors giving one of the worst performances of her career. Lead actor Brendan Price does his best, but he's defeated by the script and the direction, both in the incapable hands of of 'b' actor Darren Nesbit. It is a film with nothing to recommend it, even the sex is a turn-off.

Masquerading as a "sex comedy", The Amorous Milkman consistently fails to deliver. A well-past-her-sell-by-date Diana Dors is really embarrassing as a sexually frustrated housewife with a penchant for men in uniforms; and Brendan Price in the title role is too annoying for words. Writer-director Derren Nesbitt is responsible for this piece of 70s trash and even has the front to appear in a Hitchcock-like cameo role (as a milkman, naturally).

As some other reviewers have noted, THE AMOROUS MILKMAN must be the nadir of the grubby British craze for sex comedies in the 1970s. Certainly this is poor stuff indeed that makes CONFESSIONS OF A WINDOW CLEANER and its ilk look like polished and professional films in comparison. It's as if somebody decided to make their own version of that kind of storyline but jettisoned everything fun about it.

Instead, what we get is an irritating, gurning guy, played by the poor Brendan Price, who goes around and argues with women very much. For a sex comedy, there's very little sex or indeed comedy, and some of the lines are so duff that it's hard to believe they even made it to the screen. Bizarrely, this was a labour of love for actor Derren Nesbitt, who wrote and directed the thing; you'd wish he'd stuck to the acting with this one.

As ever, one of the main reasons to tune in here is to see the various familiar faces from the British cast. Diana Dors has quite a large role although she does play a horrible character, and there are tiny, blink-and-you'll-miss'em cameos from Sam Kydd, Arnold Ridley, Roy Kinnear, Patrick Holt, and an ultra-creepy Ray Barrett. Hammer starlet Julie Ege (THE LEGEND OF THE 7 GOLDEN VAMPIRES) has a part too, although it's not a very interesting one. In any case, THE AMOROUS MILKMAN is one for masochists alone.

I recorded this film on my VCR when it was shown on British Channel 5. I had to run several parts of the film several times to realise what was going on. The plot, or lack of one, concerns the not very amorous exploits of a not very amorous milkman. He somehow gets involved with a gangster's moll and ends up in court; and this is supposed to be a comedy!

There are goofs galore. Jennifer Westbrook appears in the opening credits but not in the closing. Four different houses are used for Davey's girlfriend's house. I could go on.

The only people who could use a film like this are film schools to show students how not to make a film. Bad, bad, bad.

This film gives a good idea as to the parlous state of the British film industry in the 1970s.

The fact that it features so many familiar faces is indicative of how little film work was available to them in this period.

It is good to get a glimpse of such favourites as Bill Fraser,Sam Kydd,Arnold Ridley and Fred Emney. However this cannot be said of Diana Dors who was rapidly becoming a caricature of her former glamorous self.

This farrago was written,produced and directed by my favourite screen villain of the period, Derren Nesbitt. Its a pitty that he couldn't find one funny line in the overlong 90 minutes running time.