I’m All Right Jack ***** (1959, Ian Carmichael, Terry-Thomas, Peter Sellers, Richard Attenborough, Dennis Price, Irene Handl, Liz Fraser, John le Mesurier) – Classic Movie Review 1850

Director John Boulting and producer Roy Boulting’s 1959 comedy I’m All Right Jack showcases one of Peter Sellers’s all-time greatest performances as the canny but blinkered and blustering union boss, shop steward Fred Kite, who harasses Ian Carmichael’s eternal innocent dufus.

Sellers is not the only bright bulb in the box but he simply lights up the Boulting Brothers’ most enduring satirical comedy. Carmichael plays Stanley Windrush (who was the army private in 1956’s Private’s Progress), a naive aristocratic graduate who has to find work as a forklift driver at his profit-minded uncle Bertram Tracepurcel (Dennis Price)’s factory. Too keen at the new job, Windrush gets caught up in the crossfire between his uncle and an aggressively militant labour union. He alienates both the workers and the bosses, and eventually provokes a national strike.

To get its laughs, the screenplay is happy to aim at any targets it can find all over the place – at both the unions and management to keep things fair, as well as at TV game shows. But its darts are surprisingly sharp for an old British comedy and the film is also a poignant summary of its period.

Carmichael and Price are less showy than Sellers, but they are excellent too. Irene Handl (Mrs Kite), Liz Fraser (Cynthia Kite), Terry-Thomas (Major Hitchcock) and John le Mesurier (Waters) also put in stupendous comedy performances of their best work.

I’m All Right, Jack is a follow-up to Private’s Progress with the same writers (John Boulting, Frank Harvey and Alan Hackney) and many of the same actors, some in the same roles (eg Dennis Price’s Bertram Tracepurcel was the Brigadier). This time they got it exactly all right – it is a far better film than its predecessor.

Sellers won the 1960 BAFTA Film Award for Best British Actor and the three writers won the Award for Best British Screenplay. It is based on Alan Hackney’s novel Private Life. Robin Ray plays a young chemist in his film debut. Richard Attenborough’s wife Sheila Sim has an uncredited cameo as Visitor, her tenth and final film appearance.

I’m All Right, Jack stars Peter Sellers, Ian Carmichael, Irene Handl, Richard Attenborough, Terry-Thomas and Dennis Price. Also in the cast are Margaret Rutherford, John le Mesurier, Liz Fraser, Miles Malleson, Sam Kydd, Marne Maitland, Raymond Huntley, Victor Maddern, Kenneth Griffith, Fred Griffiths, Donal Donnelly, John Comer, Tony Comer, Cardew Robinson, Bruce Wightman, Bill Rayment, Ronnie Stevens, Martin Boddey, Brian Oulton, Malcolm Muggeridge, John Glyn-Jones, Pauline Winter, Maurice Colbourne, Jeremy White, Robin Ray and Sheila Sim.

RIP the lovely Liz Frazer, star of several Carry On movies, who died on 6 September 2018, aged 88. She played Glad Trimble in Carry On Cruising.

RIP Sheila Sim, who died on 19 January 2016, aged 93.

© Derek Winnert 2014 Classic Movie Review 1850

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

Terry-Thomas (Major Hitchcock).

Liz Fraser (Cynthia Kite).