Before he directed what seemed like thirty-five billion "Carry On" burlesques, Gerald Thomas directed this film, a simple drama about what happens when a small boy gets locked in a bank vault with a time lock set for over sixty hours -- and about ten hours' worth of air. It's from a play written by Arthur Hailey, and considering what the director would do, and Hailey's admiration of the AIRPLANE! burlesques of AIRPORT, based on his novel, it makes you wonder what a Carry On this would have made.
As a straight drama, it's a pretty good, if minor picture, filled with the sort of situations and characters that would populate Hailey's big novels, the movies made from them and the Disaster Movie genre. Allen Gifford is particularly good as the bank manager who works hard to get the child out, and constantly blames himself.
If I had any complaint, it is that it is too focused. Everyone is too focused, everyone is too polite. This, however, is not THE BIG CARNIVAL, nor AIRPORT nor CARRY ON, KID STUCK IN A BANK VAULT. For the story it tries to tell, it tells it well.
