I’ll Never Forget What’s’isname *** (1967, Oliver Reed, Orson Welles, Carol White, Harry Andrews, Marianne Faithfull) – Classic Movie Review 5898

Michael Winner’s typically unsubtle 1967 Swinging Sixties comedy drama film I’ll Never Forget What’s’isname stars Oliver Reed as an adman who quits for an honest life in literature, but is won back to the media fray by a manipulative tycoon (Orson Welles).

Producer-director Michael Winner’s typically unsubtle 1967 Swinging Sixties tragi-comedy drama film I’ll Never Forget What’s’isname stars Oliver Reed as Andrew Quint, a conscience-stricken adman who smashes up his desk and quits the business for an honest life in literature, but is won back to the media fray by his old boss, manipulative tycoon Jonathan Lute (Orson Welles).

Despite a tendency to circumvent subtlety and go for over-ebullience, reflecting the personalities of its stars and the director, as well as box-office considerations, Winner’s movie is funny, touching and well performed, in some cases excitingly performed.

Winner tends to have a sledgehammer touch as director, spoiling any serious intentions Peter Draper’s screenplay may have had or points it wanted to make about ambition, the rat race, the literary world and the ad industry. But somehow it all still works quite well, thanks mostly to the exuberance of the iconic cast, and to Winner’s perseverance too.

I’ll Never Forget What’s’isname was a hit and it is now a fascinating 1967 slice of life. Even if the title doesn’t mean anything, like the film, it is good fun.

Also notably co-starring in the iconic cast are Carol White as Georgina Elben, Harry Andrews as Quint’s old teacher Gerald Sater, Michael Hordern as headmaster, Wendy Craig as Louise Quint, Marianne Faithfull as Josie, Norman Rodway as Nicholas, Frank Finlay as school chaplain, and Ann Lynn as Carla,

Also in the cast are Harvey Hall, Lyn Ashley, Edward Fox, Basil Dignam, Mark Burns, Mark Eden, Stuart Cooper, Veronica Clifford, Roland Curram, Peter Graves, Robert Mill, Bessie Love, Terence Sewards, Josephine Rueg, Katherine Kessey, Karen Kessey, Hugo Keith-Johnston and Mona Chong.

Welles, the same man who made Citizen Kane, said that Peter Draper’s screenplay was the best he had read since Graham Greene’s for The Third Man, which he appeared in back in 1949.

Shocking some Sixties sensibilities, Marianne Faithfull as Josie says: ‘Get out of here, you f***ing bastard! The BBFC demanded the removal of this single use of the word for the cinema release. Winner reached a compromise by partly obscuring the word with the sound of a car horn. Released on 18 December 1967, I’ll Never Forget What’s’isname is often cited as the first time the word was heard in the cinema, though Ulysses was released earlier the same year, in June 1967, and thus became the first film in the UK to feature the F word. 

I’ll Never Forget What’s’isname also got into censorship trouble in America too when it was denied a MPAA seal of approval because of a scene between Reed and White that implies oral sex. So Universal distributed the film through a non-MPAA-signatory company. This and a similar scene in Charlie Bubbles (1967) helped to end the US Production Code and see it replaced by a ratings system.

Francis Lai’s Swinging Sixties soundtrack was released on LP by Decca Records.

The Oscars forgot what’s’isname. The Oscars snubbed Michael Winner when they failed to acknowledge him in the 85th Academy Awards’ In Memoriam section in 2013.

The cast

The cast are Orson Welles as Jonathan Lute, Oliver Reed as Andrew Quint, Carol White as Georgina Elben Harry Andrews as Quint’s old teacher Gerald Sater, Michael Hordern as headmaster, Wendy Craig as Louise Quint, Norman Rodway as Nicholas, Marianne Faithfull as Josie, Frank Finlay as school chaplain, Ann Lynn as Carla, Harvey Hall as Charles Maccabee, Lyn Ashley as Susannah, Edward Fox as Walter, Mark Burns as Michael Cornwall, Mark Eden as Kelloway, Stuart Cooper as Lewis Force, Roland Curram as Eldrich, Peter Graves as Bankman, Bessie Love as American tourist, Anthony Sharp as Mr Hamper Down, Julian Holloway as young man in disco, Nicky Henson as young man in disco, Basil Dignam, Veronica Clifford, Robert Mill, Bessie Love, Terence Sewards, Josephine Rueg, Katherine Kessey, Karen Kessey, Hugo Keith-Johnston and Mona Chong.

Marianne Faithfull

Marianne Faithfull was born on 29 December 1946, to Eva, the Baroness Erisso, and Major Glynn Faithfull, a World War Two British spy.

She achieved fame in the 1960s with the release of her UK top 5 single ‘As Tears Go By’, her popularity enhanced by her films I’ll Never Forget What’s’isname (1967), The Girl on a Motorcycle (1968) and Hamlet (1969)

She died in London on 30 January 2025, aged 78.

© Derek Winnert 2017 Classic Movie Review 5898

Check out more reviews on http://derekwinnert.com

The Oscars snubbed Michael Winner.