The very first Carry On film which centres around Bob Monkhouse as Charlie Sage who is called up into the army on his wedding day. He is called into the same base as William Hartnell (Sgt Grimshawe) who is about to retire and has the unenviable task of trying to train a winning platoon. Over the course of their 10 week training, there are various ways that the writers have managed to install humour. At just under an hour and a half, this movie manages to pack a lot of jokes and funny scenes in such a short time.
Kenneth Connor's character is quite funny as the hypochondriac Horace Strong. His constant worrying that something is wrong is a nice running joke which is played well by Connor. Kenneth Williams is instantly on form in this as the snobbish and highly intelligent James Bailey. Hattie Jacques’ character is marginal at the beginning but does comes into her own towards the end when she gets revenge on Strong. Despite being the focal point of the movie, I must say that I wasn’t so bothered by the character of Sage and instead found myself being more entertained by the other characters.
It does have a slightly implausable ending when on the final day all the recruits decide to pull together so that Grimshawe can win with his final platoon. To be honest it is something that can be forgiven as by this point there was a lot of good stuff that had gone by. I did like the bit at the end where Hartnell is looking at the present given to him from the boys and has a subtle sense of pride at what has happened. As the first of the Carry On films, its quite an impressive if understated debut. I think that the Carry On films are better in the Black and White ones as there seemed to be a more desire to make jokes as opposed to just smutty jokes which is what the later films became. Carry On Sergeant has some of the finest names in British comedy and tv and its those names and faces that help keep you entertained until the next joke comes along which being a Carry On film doesn’t take long.
Rating - 7/10
No comments:
Post a Comment