Un thermomètre pour le colonel

Well, it was interesting. I laughed more at "Carry On Sergeant".

Fun seeing Wilfred Hyde White, an early Jill Ireland (but as a love interest for old Nasal Nose?) and June Whitfield, no doubt best known in America as Edina's mother on "Absolutely Fabulous."

The strongest point seemed to be waiting for Matron (what little I have seen of this woman, she is steadily emerging as the fave) to show up for inspection, but nothing really coming of it. I suppose the daffodil scene was bold for its time, must remember that. Certainly more daring than anything on American cinema.

I did enjoy Nurse Nightingale tho, keeping an eye on the patient.

There was just a bit of a hint of what is to come with Kenneth Williams and Hattie Jacques, as the two argued here over why he couldn't wear his robe while lying in bed.

And the laughing gas operation was highly original. I would wager that scene had something to do with why it got noticed in America.

Truthfully, I have never heard of any of these movies until a vacation to the UK back in '97.

It is an utterly fascinating idea to use the same actors over and over again in different settings tho.

The Carry On formula was a straightforward one: take any familiar stuffy Brit institution with its blustering authority figures and inflexible bureaucracy and reduce it to chaos with a little strategically applied low class maliciousness. The resulting mayhem and farcical runnings about inevitably turn pompous prigs into quivering jellies, to the roaring amusement of Brit audiences who lived their lives under the heel of such petty authorities and loved to watch them taken down.

Carry on Nurse, with its casual snipes at the Public Health, zany ward carryings on after hours by bored neglected patients fed up with their authoritarian Matron (Hattie Jacques, in her first of more than a dozen appearances as this familiar type) and fighting back in a series of anarchic stunts, shows the Carry On formula in ready-made form and is an excellent starting point for new viewers.

In the last episode I was introduced to the girl who would be painted in Goldfinger (Shirley Eaton). In this one, I see Charles Bronson's wife Jill Ireland (Death Wish II, The Mechanic). You just never know who is going to turn up.

Of course, the usual "Carry On..." cast (Kenneth Connor, Kenneth Williams, Charles Hawtrey, Hattie Jacques (playing Matron) and Joan Sims in her first "Carry On..." appearance) is present to carry on with their gags in a hospital. Most of those gags, of course, revolve around typical male behavior in the presence of pretty nurses. Nothing very original, but it is fun.

Check it out.

While not a laugh riot, this film about nurses and patients at a ward at Haven Hospital holds your interest because of the endearing characters. Kenneth Williams is his usual fun self, aided by an interest in a young (and fairly beautiful, of course) Jill Ireland. Joan Sims plays a bumbling student nurse perfectly, while Hattie Jacques is near perfect as the unamused matron. The beautiful Shirley Eaton is also in this, any film I've seen her in she has been naturally good. The jokes are not hilarious or anything like that, but the film puts a smile on your face often enough (Charles Haughtry is funny in this). There have been (much) worse Carry On Films and some better, but this is a watchable one I think you'll enjoy but not love.

The most successful British film of its original year, 1959, and an equally successful release in the United States, "Carry On Nurse" began as a play by Patrick Cargill and Jack Searle. Part of the appeal of this infectious comedy I assert lies in the complexity of the interwoven story-lines which have been invented for it. Little wonder exists why it spawned so many imitations and a "Carry On" series that has lasted decades since this, the first of the line. The film concerns very anti-Establishment attitudes by the male patients in a British hospital. Then there are the separate stories of the gentlemen trapped under Matron's tyrannical thumb, each with his own visitor or visitors, hopes, complaints, problems, history, purpose and timetable. Finally, there are the nurses, ranging in experience from the inept newcomers to the poised and competent senior staff members. A charming, and sometimes surprising, camaraderie or male bonding develops among the male patients, and the interactions with the nurses range from pursuit to bickering, with the nurses themselves interacting professionally with one another and also personally as human beings. The main storyline is hard to pin down, but never hard-to-follow. A reporter with appendicitis is wooing a pretty nurse, a rising boxer has broken his hand during a successful bout, a man with a large family worries about them, a confirmed bachelor finds himself attracting a lovely young girl, and a cantankerous Colonel irritates Matron and the entire staff; etc., etc. The flavor of the film is very realistic, which allows touches of bawdy humor, wry commentary and dialogue byplay to develop out of the regimen that is stifling patients, burdening nurses and making Matron grimly happy. The ward has rogues, a dilettante who listens to music and conducts wearing 'headphones', malcontents and grumblers, the friendly and the bored. The film was directed by Gerald Thomas from an adaptation of the original play done by Norman Hudis and Jack Beale. Cinematography was done by Reginald H. Wyer with art direction by Alex Vichinsky, both contributing to a realistic style that becomes more than style alone. Joan Ellacott was in charge of costumes and original music was supplied by Bruce Mongomery. The entire cast were well-chosen for their parts. Terence Longdon as the reporter pursues Shirley Eaton, Kenneth Connor is the boxer, Charles Hawtrey, Bill Owen, Norman Rossington play other patients; Hattie Jacques makes a wonderful Matron, Leslie Phillips the rogue, Joan Sims a ditsy young nurse, Susan Stephen a delightfully down-to-earth staff member. Wlfird Hyde-White is properly irritating as the fussy Colonel, with Susan Shaw, Irene Handly, Jill Ireland, Michael Medwin and Rosalind Knight taking other featured roles. The comedic highlight of the film is a surrealistic revolt by some of the patients high on 'laughing gas'. But all turns out well; and this deservedly popular film, whose humor ranges from classic dialogue subtlety to lavatory levels remains in the mind as a classic of its sort--whatever it is--long after Matron has completed her rounds and discovered her nurses' revenge on the obnoxious Colonel which closes the frequently-hilarious proceedings.