Directed by Basil Dearden
United Kingdom • 1957 • 80 mins. • In English
Matt (Bill Travers) and Jean (Virginia McKenna) are a young, newly married couple with their whole lives ahead of them. But when Matt’s uncle dies and leaves a decrepit cinema to him, the newlyweds are forced to postpone their dreams of world travel for a career in film exhibition. Along with the cinema come three employees: a doting bookkeeper (Margaret Rutherford), an alcoholic projectionist (Peter Sellers), and an elderly usher (Bernard Miles). All is going well-ish until a pushy competitor offers to buy the cinema, intent on leveling the building to create parking—but Matt, Jean, and their ragtag band of workers have other ideas. “A delightfully eccentric comedy . . . An Ealing-style allegory of English resolve.”—Time Out. Imported 35mm print.
Genres: Comedy
Appears in: 2018 on Celluloid, Essential Cinema