The Wrong Arm of the Law **** (1962, Peter Sellers, Lionel Jeffries, Davy Kaye, Bernard Cribbins, John le Mesurier, Dennis Price) – Classic Movie Review 1865

Director Cliff Owen’s vintage 1962 comedy stars Peter Sellers, who finds one of his most rewarding British parts as Pearly Gates, a criminal mastermind. This exuberant, delightful farce about bungling crooks in the London underworld is good, old-fashioned British fun that provides lots of laughs.

The breathless madcap comedy focuses on three Australian crooks, who are chased for impersonating coppers and pocketing stolen cash. Owen directs with his usual flair for jokes and sight gags.

Based on a story by Ivor Jay and William Whistance Smith, the screenplay by Ray Galton and Alan Simpson, John Antrobus, John Warren and Len Heath is exceptionally bright and breezy, and above all funny.

All the true Brit comedy troupers (Davy Kaye, Bernard Cribbins, John le Mesurier, Dennis Price) are on good form, though it’s Lionel Jeffries who steals the show as an obtuse, psychophantic Scotland Yard inspector, Fred ‘Nosey’ Parker.

Nanette Newman, Bill Kerr, Irene Browne, Arthur Mullard (as Brassknuckles), Ed Devereux, Reg Lye, Dermot Kelly, Graham Stark, Vanda Godsell, Dick Emery, Martin Boddey, Tutte Lemkow, Barry Keegan, Mario Fabrizi, Cardew Robinson, Gerald Sim, Marianne Stone and John Junkin also appear. Blink and you’ll miss Michael Caine as a police station constable.

Sellers voices the part of Siggy Schmoltz, played by Tutte Lemkow. The white Ferrari he arrives in at the fairground is his own, a 500 Superfast, one of only six in the UK at the time.

Bill Kerr (who plays Jack Coombes in The Wrong Arm of the Law) died at 92 on August 28 2014. He also featured in Peter Weir’s Gallipoli and The Year of Living Dangerously, and he was Giles Kent in Doctor Who (1967-68). He was one of Tony Hancock’s regular sidekicks on the popular radio series Hancock’s Half Hour for its six-year run in the Fifties.

Graham Stark (who plays Sid Cooper in The Wrong Arm of the Law) died on October 29 2013, aged 91. He is best remembered for his appearances alongside Peter Sellers, notably in the Pink Panther movies.

© Derek Winnert 2014 Classic Movie Review 1865

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