Carry on at Your Convenience

What stands out for me is the trip to the sea side. Oh what a sweet time! I never saw England back then but today it just looks charming. I would love to visit that pier complete with the tacky corny rides and attractions. It really is quite delightful. The film captures the period beautifully. The reliable cast are all there. Thankfully the annoying ones are not (especially Kenneth Connor). Hawtrey is superb in this and Sid James and Hatti are a delight. Its lovely seeing the sacred cows get a knocking. There is nothing PC about this film. If dear old Sid did some of the things he does to lovely Joan he would be up on harassment charges today. Its all good fun. They certainly did not think much of the union movement in this film. Not the best carry on but it has lovely moments.

This is the Carry On film which took longest to make back its money. It's not difficult to see why as it is so disparaging towards the unions and the typical Carry On fan in the early 70s was working class. If you are going to insult your target audience then don't be surprised to find they don't go to see your film. Having said that the basic storyline has plenty of opportunities for Talbot Rothwell's seaside postcard humour especially as they go on a works outing to Brighton. One of the Carry On films' best points is the way they added those little details so you get a toilet manufacturer called WC Boggs, the foreman's name sounds like plumber, his daughter's name is Myrtle which is a plant that grows in bogs. If I could only buy a budgie like Sid Plummer's I'd be laughing even more.

I find this one of the most unusual carry ons,as it seems to take life a bit more serious,its more kitchen sink drama, which for this carry on is appropriate for the title.For me it has the funniest plot of all,which is the budgie who can pick horse winners,and the excellent teaming of Sid James and Hattie Jacques as the married couple.Vic the union leader and his nagging Irish mum are also very funny.Although the usually very funny Bill Maynard seems a bit wasted in this film,i don't think he gets many funny lines,if any.On the whole this is a very enjoyable carry on,and the only time you see a man get spanked in a film, which was quite original.It was a carry on, which tried to be different from the others and does succeed.Although it does still have the same naughty gags,but then thats what carry on films are for.We don't make films like these anymore so enjoy them while you can.

This is my favourite "Carry On" film.

It has a gag per minute. Most of the gags are "telegraphed" and predictable but for me this makes them so much funnier.

The film is about a toilet making factory owned by WC Boggs (note to US readers - a toilet in England is called a "bog"). 90% of the gags are related one way or another to toilets or biological functions.

If you like slapstick and toilet humour then you will love this film.

If you are pretentious and claim only to like "serious" humour then take that corn-cob out of your Khyber and watch this film anyway.

Also recommended: "Carry on Abroad"; "Carry on Matron"; "Holiday on the Buses", and "Mutiny on the Buses".

I like this entry in the series, I really do. Many others however find it a dud and feel that it should be flushed down one of the toilets that feature at W.C. Boggs' factory in the film. Blending the obvious toilet gags with a tale about unionised shop floors, the Carry On team have actually crafted one of the franchise's less mucky pictures. Sid James, so long the bastion of sexually driven lechery in Carry On folklore, has a very restrained role in this one, and this to me somewhat explains to an extent why "Convenience" is often shunned by the series fans.

Elsewhere it's the subplots away from the factory that put the smile on my face. Charles Hawtrey is indulging in strip poker with shop steward, Vic Spanner's mother!. While James' Sid Plummer is getting horse racing winners from his budgie!, all under the watchful eye of his apparently scatty wife Beattie (a terrific Hattie Jacques). Sexy eye candy for us blokes comes in the form of Jacki Piper, and the film finale on the Brighton seaside is drunken buffoonery to at least raise a giggle or two. Not the best Carry On by a long shot - that could have been predicted by Sid and Hattie's budgie, but certainly not one of the worst either. 6.5/10