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Professor Marcus (Alec Guiness) rents a room at old lady Mrs
Wilberforce's (Katie Johnson) house & invites four of his friends -
Major Courtney (Cecil Parker), Louis (Herbert Lom), Harry (Peter Sellers),
& One-Round (Canny Green) - over for practice, as they are a violin
quintet ... Now that doesn't sound exciting in the least, but actually the
five of them are criminals who plan to rob a money transport, & need
Mrs Wilberforce's place not only as a hideout, but also her to help them,
if unbeknowest to herself.
During the planning period, they can convince her they are actually
practicing (thanks to a record they continuously play) & are only
occasionally interrupted when Mrs Wilberforce offers to make these nice
men tea or needs them to help her give her parrots medicine.
Even the heist goes alright, which involves the old lady to pick up a
box (containing the loot) at Kings Cross Station & delivering it to
her home (& the professor) while the police only controls boxes out
of London.
It's only when she is already on her way home that things start getting
a little out of hand, when she interferes in a fight between a fruitseller
& a garbageman, which almost not only gets these two arrested but her
cab driver too - & all the while the box with the loot is just sitting
there, right in front of the police station ... & eventually, the
scene culminates in the police delivering the lady & her box (which
all London is looking for by now) safely to her home.
Now everything should be fine - but it isn't, as when our quintet is
already leaving, One-Round's cello case springs open right in front of Mrs
Wilberforce, & instead of a cello, it contains money, lots of money,
obviously the loot of the heist.
Mrs Wilberforce is quick to make the right deductions, of course, but
grossly misinterprets the situation she is in, as se constatnly insists
that the five men give themselves up to the police, & not even the
Professor's attempts to persuade her can make her give in ... so there's
only one thing to do for our criminals - Kill the old lady.
After drawing matches the task to kill the lady falls upon the major,
but killing is not really his forte, so instead he convinces the old lady
to let him slip away to get the police - when in fact he wants to make off
with the money.Unfortunately the others have found out that, &
ultimately the Major falls off the chimney to his death. &
after they have disposed of the body (by dropping it onto a passing by
freight train), the task to kill Mrs Wilberforce falls upon Harry, but
unfortunately by now slow-brained brute One-Round has changed sides &
threatens to kill everybody who touches the old lady. Soon enough, Harry
is dead. When disposing of Harry, the Professor & Louis make plans to
get rid of One-Round in order to be able to get rid of the lady ... but
unfortunately, One-Round has overheard the situation & now tries to
kill them. Still he dies, & soon lands on a freight train to god knows
where, but by now the professor & Louis try to outsmart each other,
with the effect that both of them end up as blind but dead passengers on
freighttrains as well.
The next morining, Mrs Wilberforce wakes up unharmed, withthe money
still here but the men gone.
But when she tries to return the money to the police, nobody wants to
believe the old lady's story about her criminal tenants, & in the end
they persuade her to keep the money ...
Great comedy, featuring tons of typically British black humour, great
performances of all involved, a wickedly clever & funny script & a
suitably subtle direction. There's just not one thing that's bad about
this film.
In 2004, the Coen-brothers remade that film, & while they stayed
close to the original's script, & the comedy corresponds greatly with
their sense of humour, & not even Tom Hanks in the lead is annoying
(but of course he's no Alec Gzuiness either, & never will be), they
really shouldn't have bothered, they didn't even come close to the
original (& that's coming from a Coen-brothers fan).
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