Last night, we found another very funny wind-up comedy called "Operation Cupid"(1960), in which three mugs, down on their luck after getting cheated out of their winnings at the race track, try to re-alicecoop their losses upon meeting a gullible rich gent at the pub. "Mr. Cupid" (Charles Clay) fancies a game of poker. "I'm not very good at it" he tells the men, who are not unlike a British Three Stooges, in manner if not in looks. Mr. Cupid invites the trio back to his house. "What's the worst that could happen?" he asks "Charlie" (Charles Farrell), their leader. "I've already lost 5000 this week. It's only money." Cupid apparently has enough of it to burn. He shrugs, but Charlie and his boys are licking their chops, knowing a choice mark when they see one.
At his mansion, they run their "routine" on Mr. Cupid, with cards up their sleeves and shifty slick-shuffles. Cupid loses every hand, and by 3 am he's another 5000 lbs in the hole. The loss is no big deal (he's beyond rich) but he has no cash on hand to pay off. He's also all out of cheques. "Would you gentlemen be willing to accept ownership of one of my small businesses as payment?" Taking note of their surroundings, they assume Mr. Cupid has the Midas Touch, that any business of his must be a gold mine. All they have to do is sign the deed. "We'll take it," says Charlie, without asking what "it"is.
The boys are hoping their new business might be a stock brokerage or something equally profitable, but when they arrive at the address, they are somewhat stupefied to see that it's a marriage bureau. The curvy secretary "Lola" (Norma Parnell), who comes included with the deal, explains that it's not a money-making enterprise. "We charge only a nominal fee for our services. Mr. Cupid set it up as a tax write-off." What they do is arrange marriages. Upset that Mr. Cupid appears to have gotten the better of them after all, by dumping an insolvent business in exchange for his poker debt, Charlie sets about "flogging" (pawning) everything in the office that isn't nailed down. This nets the boys 1000 lbs. They're still 4000 short of their loss, but then in walks a wealthy widow named "Mrs. Mountjoy" (Avice Landone), looking for a marriage partner.
She specifies that, while looks and personality are important, mostly she wants someone of her own class, a man with "as much money as I have. I've supported enough penniless pretty boys in my time." Secretary Lola, who's really running the show for these mooks, seizes the opportunity and makes Charlie over into a millionaire from South Africa. He will be the eligible bachelor to whom they will introduce Mrs. Mountjoy.
Charlie looks the part in a rented three-piece suit with gold watch, but he still has his Cockney accent and the malaprop-laden speech of Leo Gorcey with made-up or incorrect words in every other sentence. "Mervyn" (Harold Goodwin), the dumbest of the trio, hooks up with Mrs. Mountjoy's daughter "Sylvie" (Pauline Shepherd), a dance instructor who wears nothing but a leotard. In her company, Mervyn finds his niche as a musical genius. Suddenly he and Sylvie are a hit songwriting team. The plot has all kinds of such left-field hijinx. "Cecil" (Wallas Eaton), the mid-level lunkhead (with double-digit brain cells instead of single), becomes Lola's henchman as they try to execute a life-insurance plot on Mrs. Mountjoy, only to flub it and have Cecil electrocute himself.
The style is like slow-pace screwball. Charie and his knuckleheads are stoopid-smart like The Stooges, always falling upwards and landing on their feet no matter how badly they bungle things. Lola runs the show with an Iron Hip. Charlie and Mrs. Mountjoy get married as per Lola's master plan, and the gang all hope to get rich off her millions. But first, Charlie has to prove he's wealthy too, to fulfill Mrs Mountjoy's requirements, and therein lies the biggest twist in the plot. Two Big Thumbs Up, verging on Two Huge. You can't do a low-key, deft comedy any better than this. The picture is very good. ////
The night before, in "The Large Rope"(1953), you've got one of those "Troubled Young Man Returns Home" deals. Donald Houston, one of the best actors in our British B-films of this period, plays "Tom Penny", who's back after a serving three year stint for assault. From the top of a hill, he surveys the small village from which he hails. He knows everyone's gonna hate him on sight, even though he was framed. It's that kind of town, pitliess, provincial, suspicious. They even hate the new policeman who comes around checking on dog licences, just because he wasn't born there.
Tom checks in with the officer, just like he's supposed to as a parolee. "Officer Kensall" (Leonard White), ironically sees him as a kindred spirit, being as they're both despised. "You oughta think about movin'," he tells Tom. "I'm tryin' to help ya." But Tom needs to see "Jeff Stribling" (Peter Byrne) the guy who framed him and stole his girl "Sue" (Susan Shaw). Jeff and Sue know he didn't assault "Mrs. Jordan" (Vanda Goodsell), the 30-ish woman who flirts at the local pub. Mrs. Jordan is known for luring the high school boys to the woods for a tumble. Tom did three years even though he never touched her. He can't understand why she accused him of rape, or why Jeff and Sue went along with it in court. Now he's back, and he lets the three of them know how angry he is, but that's all. He holds his temper so as not to be sent back to prison.
The working-class men of the town all hate him. Soon, a mob mentality sets in. His former friend Jeff is about to marry Sue the next afternoon. Tom's Dad kicks him out of the house after hearing of his return. It seems his only friend is Officer Kensall. On the day of Jeff and Sue's wedding, Mrs. Jordan shows up at the pub for a morning pint, then leaves, and is later found strangled in the woods. Naturally, suspicion falls on Tom Penny, though it's clear from everything thus far in the plot that he didn't do it. The men of the village gather at the small police station, which is manned only by Officer Kensall and a detective. The villagers grow surly, and threaten to take Tom Penny themselves, led by Mrs. Jordan's drunken lout of a husband (Robert Brown). It's played straight down the middle whether she's a slut because of his drunkeness, or he's a drunk because of her sluttishness. But he leads the charge to lynch Tom Penny for her murder. Tom has no choice but to run for his life when he becomes separated from police custody.
He first goes back to see Jimmy and Sue again, just hours before they're to be married. Tom begs them to tell the truth, that they know and can prove he was innocent of assaulting Mrs. Jordan in the first place. Jeff then admits he's been meeting Mrs. Jordan in the woods all this time. His fiancee Sue is shocked."Yes, I've lain with her, but I didn't kill her!" Who did then, if it wasn't Jeff or Tom?
Only the town's windmill knows for sure, because you knew at the beginning of the movie it was gonna make an appearance. It has wooden stairs, which allow for Climbing to a High Place, which every killer has to do at the end of this kind of movie. Catwalks at warehouses, high railings at power stations, wooden stairs at windmills, any of those will suffice as a place for a killer to fall from, following the Obligatory Upward Climb. I won't reveal who the killer is here, but it ain't Tom Penny. Donald Houston plays him too earnestly for that. Robert Brown, who plays Mrs. Jordan's sullen husband, is better known for being "M" of James Bond fame. Two Big Thumbs Up for "The Large Rope", a tale of small-town resentment and blame-the-victim mentality. The picture is razor sharp. ////
And that's all I've got for tonight. I had fun at the Greek Festival today, hadn't been there since pre-pandemic. I always enjoy touring the church, with it's beautiful gold-leaf chancel and stained glass window-portraits of the early Saints of the Orthodox Church. Watching the dancers by the bandstand is fun too, and listening to the non-stop, shreddin' Greek music. Did you go? You have one more day. Be sure to sample the pastries or even have a delicious lunch (roast chicken, lamb, shawarma, Greek pasta). Beer.
Beer.
My blogging music was "Heavy Horses" by Jethro Tull, and also an awesome Tull concert on Youtube from 1976 at Tampa Stadium. My late night is Handel's Aetsi Opera. Can you believe we still need sweatshirts at night on Memorial Day Weekend? That's global cooling for ya.
I send you Tons of Love, as always. xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxooxoxoxo :):)
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