Tag Archives: peter sellers

Aug 29

Box and Fox

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Looking at the blog, I realize I haven’t posted anything in three days. It’s been busy; I covered an election, two health care town hall meetings by federal legislators, and of course the Celebration also started this week. Oh, and this was the week our parent company chose to implement a redesign of our web site and its content management.

Thankfully, this was not my Saturday to work at the newspaper. I have done very little productive today; I finished up my sermon this morning, and I have a load of laundry in right now.

Turner Classic Movies has been doing its annual “Summer Under The Stars” this month, and today’s featured star is Peter Sellers. I saw two very funny Sellers movies today that I’d never seen before.

“The Wrong Box” is more of an ensemble piece, with Sellers in a very small role, but it was quite funny — a broad farce of scheming and misunderstanding as two elderly brothers (and their heirs) try to figure out which will die first, leaving the other with a huge cash prize. The cast includes Michael Caine, Peter Cook & Dudley Moore (back when they were a team), and Ralph Richardson.

“After the Fox” finds Sellers as a thief trying to smuggle a huge shipment of gold out of Italy. He figures out the perfect cover — he creates a fake movie crew, knowing that the little Italian village where he is to make the drop will be starstruck and that he’ll even have police protection. To add veracity to the cover story, he flatters an aging movie star (Victor Mature, in a rare comedic role!) who refuses to understand why no one is offering him lead roles anymore.

I wasn’t familiar with either, and both were pretty funny.

They were followed, however, by “Lolita” on “The Essentials.” I’d never seen “Lolita,” and it’s supposed to be a classic, so I tried to give it a chance, but to me Humbert Humbert just comes off as a jerk. I switched the channel to the Titans pre-season game.

Jul 11

“Mouse” debrief

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Well, I have to say I enjoyed the movie version of “The Mouse That Roared.” There were definitely some differences from the book — I am certain that in the book, Tully did not realize he was supposed to lose. In the movie, he seems aware of the fact (but not so convinced that he turns down an opportunity to win).

I was delighted to see the great British character actor Leo McKern (“Rumpole of the Bailey,” “The Prisoner”) in the movie, as well as William Hartnell.

Who is William Hartnell, you say?

He certainly is.

William Hartnell was the original 1963 incarnation of “Doctor Who.” I have only seen very brief snippets of him in that role; he was surely removed from the second-banana character he plays in “The Mouse That Roared.”

Anyway, I enjoyed the movie, and would recommend you catch it the next time TCM shows it.

Jul 11

Losing strategy

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I have to admit I’ve never actually seen “The Mouse That Roared,” one of Peter Sellers’ comedy classics, but I read the book, and several of its sequels, when I was a teenager, and loved them all. It’s high time for some sort of remake, maybe as a TV movie.

If you’re unfamiliar with the story, it concerns the tiny (and mythical) duchy of Grand Fenwick, tucked in somewhere between France and Switzerland. The country has fallen on hard times and comes up with an ingenious plan. The rulers notice that the USA often spends huge amounts of money to rebuild its vanquished enemies (the original book, by Leonard Wibberley, was written in 1955). They decide to declare war on the U.S., lose as quickly and painlessly as possible, and then wait for the relief dollars to roll in.

However, they don’t reveal the whole plan to the slow-witted but highly-patriotic young man whom they appoint to lead the invasion force. He takes his job seriously, but he and his comrades, armed with the nation’s traditional bow and arrow, arrive in New York City and can’t seem to get anyone to take them seriously.

They wander onto the campus of Columbia University and, by sheer dumb luck, into the laboratory of a kindly old professor (of Fenwickian blood, no less!) who has developed a super-weapon. They take him prisoner …. and the U.S. surrenders.

It’s all great fun. As I say, I’ve never seen the movie. I do know of one difference between the two versions — in the book, the Duchess who rules Grand Fenwick is a young woman, while in the movie she’s a dowager (one of multiple characters portrayed by Sellers).

Worth checking out, especially since TCM is presenting it as one of “The Essentials,” hosted by Robert Osborne and Alec Baldwin.