Gasbags *** (1941, Bud Flanagan, Chesney Allen, Jimmy Nervo, Teddy Knox) – Classic Movie Review 8557

Director Marcel Varnel’s 1940 zany British comedy Gasbags is a wartime slapstick farce from the Crazy Gang, with a fairly imaginative script by the talented Val Guest and Marriott Edgar, the pair who wrote Will Hay’s Good Morning, Boys (1937).

It stars Bud Flanagan, Chesney Allen  (as The Crazy Gang/Flanagan & Allen), Charlie Naughton, Jimmy Gold (as The Crazy Gang/Naughton & Gold), Jimmy Nervo, and Teddy Knox (as The Crazy Gang/Nervo & Knox), with Moore Marriott as Jerry Jenkins.

The Crazy Gang boys fly to Germany on a barrage balloon tied to their fish-and-chip cart and bring chaos to the Nazis when they seek a secret weapon and moustachioed Teddy (Knox) is confused with Hitler.

Gasbags is not quite the Marx Brothers, it is unsurprisingly more like a Will Hay film, and pretty amusing all the time thanks to the pacey handling, infectious energy of the players and some witty comedy writing in the screenplay (also by Val Valentine).

Billy Russell plays Hitler.

Also in the cast are Wally Patch, Peter Gawthorne, Frederick Valk, Irene Handl, Carl Jaffe, Manning Whiley, Torin Thatcher, George Merritt, Anthony Eustrel, Mavis Villiers, Henry B. Longhurst and Eric Clavering.

Gasbags is directed by Marcel Varnel, runs 77 minutes, is made by Gainsborough Pictures, Gaumont British Picture Corporation, is released by General Film Distributors, is written by Val Guest, Marriott Edgar and Val Valentine (screenplay), is shot in black and white by Arthur Crabtree, is produced by Edward Black is scored by Louis Levy and Charles Williams, and is designed by Alex Vetchinsky.

It is filmed at the Gaumont-British Studios, London.

It starts: ‘We respectfully dedicate to the peoples of the British Empire this authentic record of our recent experiences in Germany. The incidents shown are borne out by our White Paper which should be taken in conjunction with our Blue Paper, submitted from Seidlitz. Signed Bud Oi Flanagan, Jimmy Nervo, Ches Allen, E Cromwell Knox, Jimmy Gold, Charlie Naughton (his mark).’

The musical number Yesterday’s Dreams by Michael Carr and Dorothy Day is performed by Bud Flanagan (uncredited) and Chesney Allen (uncredited).

© Derek Winnert 2019 Classic Movie Review 8557

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