The minuscule European Duchy of Grand Fenwick is bankrupted when an American company comes up with a cheaper imitation of Fenwick's sole export, its fabled Pinot Grand Fenwick wine. Crafty Prime Minister Count Mountjoy devises a plan: Grand Fenwick will declare war on the United States, then surrender, taking advantage of American largesse toward its defeated enemies to rebuild the defeated nation's economy. Duchess Gloriana is hesitant but agrees to the plan. Mild-mannered game warden Tully Bascomb is charged as Field Marshal to lead the Grand Fenwick troops, aided by Sergeant Will Buckley.
The contingent of 20 soldiers, in medieval chain mail uniform, travel across the Atlantic on a small merchant ship, arriving in New York Harbor during an air-raid drill that leaves the city deserted and undefended. They chance upon a civil defense truck and are mistaken for invading Martians, prompting an investigation by blustering but ineffectual General Snippet. Puncturing the tyres of the general's jeep with their bows and arrows, the Grand Fenwick troops take him and four police officers hostage. Still looking for a place to surrender, Tully and Will stumble across Dr. Alfred Kokintz, whose invention of the Q Bomb – capable of destroying an entire continent – has prompted the defence drills. He has built a football-sized prototype of the unstable bomb, which Tully takes possession of. With Kokintz and his attractive daughter Helen as additional hostages, Tully declares victory and returns with them to Grand Fenwick.
The duchess indulges Tully's victory, and the prime minister resigns in disgust at Tully's blunder, leaving him as acting prime minister. When the incident is discovered, the U.S. government is thwarted from retaking the weapon and hostages by force, fearing the dishonour of attacking such a small and defenceless nation. Instead, they send the U.S. Secretary of Defense (Austin Willis) to discuss terms of surrender and get back the bomb. Meanwhile, Grand Fenwick receives competing offers of defensive aid from each of the world's powers, in exchange for the weapon.
Tully becomes smitten with Helen, who initially despises him for taking them but falls for his simple charm. Then Snippet and Mountjoy conspire to steal the bomb and return it (and Helen) to America, but Tully gives chase and retrieves it. The Secretary of Defense and Tully agree to terms: the knock-off wine will be taken off the market, Grand Fenwick will receive monetary aid from the US, Helen and her father will remain in Grand Fenwick, and so will the bomb: held by "the little countries of the world" as a weapon of last resort if the superpowers refuse to disarm.
Checking the bomb for damage, Tully, Helen, and Dr. Kokintz find it was "a dud" all along, and leave it in the dungeon, conspiring to keep its impotence secret. However, after they leave, a mouse emerges from it, and it appears to rearm, sitting ready to explode if disturbed.
Cast
Peter Sellers as Duchess Gloriana XII/Prime Minister Count Rupert Mountjoy/Tully Bascombe
Stage rights to the book were bought in 1955 by Howard Dietz.[5]
Columbia pictures publicist Walter Shenson optioned the film rights to the novel in 1957 as his first independent production.[6] and spent over a year trying to raise finance. He eventually obtained interest from Carl Foreman who had an arrangement to produce films for Columbia through his Highroad Films.[7][8][9]
Forman had just completed The Key (1958) and was beginning pre-production on The Guns of Navarone (1961). Conceived as a low-budget project, The Mouse That Roared was expected to absorb office expenses for the high-production Navarone.[10]
Production
Director Jack Arnold, working under the auspices of line producer Walter Shenson, was afforded virtually unlimited freedom in adapting the novel, constrained only by the budget (the film cost $450,000 according to Arnold); “I didn’t have any studio pressures.”[11] Arnold explained that “the producers left me alone because (1) they didn’t think it meant anything, (2) they were just writing it off for expenses anyway.”[12]
Changes from book
Liberties were taken in the film adaptation to display Peter Sellers' versatile comedy talents. The lead character of the book is the Duchess Gloriana XII, an attractive young royal in the manner of the young Queen Elizabeth II and Princess Grace.[13]
In the film version, however, Peter Sellers plays the role as a parody of an elderly Queen Victoria (who thinks the president of the United States is Calvin Coolidge), and his Mountjoy is a parody of Benjamin Disraeli.
The sequences for Marseille and New York Harbor were filmed in Southampton; the presence of the RMSQueen Elizabeth ocean liner there was a lucky coincidence. In addition, in the novel, an encounter with the New York Police Department leads to bloodshed that complicates peace negotiations; this does not appear in the film.Director Jack Arnold recalled the serendipitous encounter:
There was a lot of improvisation that went on while making the film that came out rather well…Accidently, when I was shooting the little tugboat [scene]…I saw the Queen Elizabeth coming in towards Southampton. I was on the camera boat, and told the tugboat captain to get as close to the [ocean liner] as she could get, and tell all the boys to shoot arrows at her. We had three cameras on the boat…and we got a sensational little sequence.[14]
A studio reproduction of the ocean liner’s bridge, plus a brief scene with actors posing as captain and first mate reacting to the fusillade, combined with the footage of the Queen Elizabeth, emerges as an organic element of the comedy rather than improvisation.[15]
Additionally, in the film, both Tully and Helen are with Dr. Kokintz when he discovers the bomb is a dud, and it is Tully who suggests that they keep that fact a secret; in the book, Dr. Kokintz discovers the fact alone and keeps it to himself.
Casting
Acknowledging that British actors “know how to play this kind of satire”, director Jack Arnold hired the finest players available for the project.[16] Peter Sellers, who was popular in Great Britain as a comedian and drummer, but largely unknown in the United States, was selected to perform three of the leading characters in the film: Duchess Gloriana XII, Prime Minister Count Rupert Mountjoy and Tully Bascombe.
Arnold commented that “No one [in the United States] had ever heard of Peter Sellers. He was just a character actor, except for The Goon Show on radio and the West End. This is the first movie that made him a star.”[17] Arnold’s only casting objection was that of American actress Jean Seberg:
The only problem I had at the time was that Columbia insisted I use Jean Seberg…Jean had just done Saint Joan (1957) and Bonjour Tristesse (1958)...fresh from her indoctrination by director Otto Preminger into film acting. Preminger was a screamer and yeller. He waited until he got her into hysterics, then he’d turn the camera on. I don’t yell and scream and this was a new experience for her. Sometimes it took twenty [takes] to get it but we got it…She went on to be quite a good actress.”[18]
Shooting
Columbia Pictures logo parody variant
The Mouse That Roared incorporated a burlesque of the iconic Columbia Studios Torch Lady logo, which for decades had depicted a personification of Columbia in the pose of the Statue of Liberty holding her glowing torch as a beacon to immigrants at the opening of all their productions. Director Jack Arnold, with titles designer Maurice Binder devised a take-off of the corporate symbol, in which the statue screams at the approach of a white mouse and flees from her pedestal, which the mouse quickly occupies. Though producers Carl Foreman and Walter Shenson had approved the logo parody, Columbia studios chiefs were not consulted. The comic alteration of the logo material technically constituted a violation of their trademark, although it was a studio release by the legal owner, Columbia Pictures Corporation. Director Jack Arnold recalled:
...We [didn’t] tell them until we previewed it, you see. The audience laughed so hard, without even the story beginning, just at the logo, that we were home free…it set the tone for the whole movie…of course, Columbia didn’t touch it after that.[19]
Box office
The film did not perform up to expectations in the UK, earning theatrical rentals of $200,000[20][3] but was a surprise hit at the US box office with rentals of $2 million.[7][2] It was felt that the reluctance of the characters to join the British army in a time of need was received less well in the UK than in the US.[3]
Director Jack Arnold reports that the American premier, debuting at New York’s Trans-Lux and Loew’s 84th St. theatres, received overwhelming audience approval. Arnold adds that Foreman immediately had credits for The Mouse changed from “Columbia Pictures Corporation presents” to “Carl Foreman presents on all the prints.[21] Film critic and biographer Dana M. Reemes notes that as of 1988, The Mouse That Roared had accrued gross receipts of $50 million in all markets.[21]
Critical appraisal
The New York Times in its October 27, 1959 edition called the picture “a rambunctious satiric comedy.”:[22]
We’ve got to hand it to Roger MacDougall and Stanley Mann, who wrote the script; to Jack Arnold who directed, and to all the people who play in this lively jape. They whip up a lot of cheerful nonsense that makes fun of the awesome instruments of war and does so in terms of social burlesque and sheer Mack Sennett farce.[22]
The Los Angeles Times wrote the film "laid an egg",[23] but Bosley Crowther at The New York Times offered a more positive review.[24]
On Rotten Tomatoes, the film has an approval rating of 90%, based on reviews from 20 critics.[25]
Television
In 1964, Jack Arnold obtained exclusive television rights for The Mouse That Roared from Leonard Wibberley.[26] He produced and directed a television pilot with ABC Television and Screen Gems called The Mouse That Roared, starring Sid Caesar as the Duchess, Mountjoy, and Tully, and co-starring Joyce Jameson, Sigrid Valdis, and Richard Deacon. It was filmed by Richard H. Kline.[27]
The pilot was submitted by CBS and Columbia Screen Gems for review before a test audience. Receiving low polling results, the project was dropped.[28]
Biographer and film critic Dana M. Reemes describes Arnold’s development of the proposed “half-hour color comedy series”:[29]
The production was a fairly elaborate affair, including the creation of the fictional Grand Duchy of Fenwick, its costumed inhabitants, a U.N. Assembly set, and animated titles by DePatie-Freleng Enterprises...at a time when American television comedy avoided generally avoided serious satire, Arnold hoped the series might break new ground by tackling controversial subjects in the various episodes.[29]
The film was released on VHS 14 July 1993. It was also released on DVD for the first time on 8 July 2003. It was released on Blu-ray in Australia by Umbrella Entertainment on 7 April 2021. The Film were not to be released again in theaters until the next generation, (probably not, because if Columbia Pictures were to release it again, they would in trouble).
↑ Reemes, 1988 p. 122: “Something was needed to charge office expenses, and an inexpensive comedy like The Mouse was perfect…production got underway.” And p. 128: The comedy used “to write off expenses.”
↑ Reemes, 1988 p. 127: “We made it for only $450,000, which wasn’t a lot of money even in those days.” And p. 130: no “pressures.”
↑ Reemes, 1988 p. 140: The pilot tested at "the infamous 'Preview House' on Sunset Boulevard. One screening before an unresponsive audience was all it took to kill a show."
Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb is a 1964 political satire black comedy film co-written, produced, and directed by Stanley Kubrick and starring Peter Sellers in three roles, including the title character. The film, financed and released by Columbia Pictures, was a co-production between the United States and the United Kingdom.
Peter Sellers was an English actor and comedian. He first came to prominence performing in the BBC Radio comedy series The Goon Show. Sellers featured on a number of hit comic songs, and became known to a worldwide audience through his many film roles, among them Chief Inspector Clouseau in The Pink Panther series.
The Incredible Shrinking Man is a 1957 American science fiction film directed by Jack Arnold, based on Richard Matheson's 1956 novel, The Shrinking Man. The film stars Grant Williams as Scott and Randy Stuart as Scott's wife, Louise. While relaxing on a boat, Scott is enveloped by a strange fog. Months later, he discovers that he appears to be shrinking. By the time Scott has reached the height of a small boy, his condition becomes known to the public. When he learns there is no cure for his condition, he lashes out at his wife. As Scott shrinks to the point where he can fit into a dollhouse, he has a battle with his family cat, leaving him lost and alone in his basement, where he is now smaller than the average insect.
Otto Ludwig Preminger was an Austrian-American theatre and film director, film producer, and actor. He directed more than 35 feature films in a five-decade career after leaving the theatre. He first gained attention for film noir mysteries such as Laura (1944) and Fallen Angel (1945), while in the 1950s and 1960s, he directed high-profile adaptations of popular novels and stage works. Several of these later films pushed the boundaries of censorship by dealing with themes which were then taboo in Hollywood, such as drug addiction, rape and homosexuality. He was twice nominated for the Academy Award for Best Director. He also had several acting roles.
Jean Dorothy Seberg was an American actress. She is considered an icon of the French New Wave as a result of her performance in Jean-Luc Godard's 1960 film Breathless.
The Duchy of Grand Fenwick is a tiny fictional country created by Leonard Wibberley in a series of comedic novels beginning with The Mouse That Roared (1955), which was made into a 1959 film.
Leonard Patrick O'Connor Wibberley, who also published under the name Patrick O'Connor, among others, was an Irish author who spent most of his life in the United States. Wibberley, who published more than 100 books, is perhaps best known for five satirical novels about an imaginary country Grand Fenwick, particularly The Mouse That Roared (1955).
Richard Quine was an American director, actor, and singer.
Bonjour Tristesse is a 1958 British-American Technicolor film in CinemaScope, directed and produced by Otto Preminger from a screenplay by Arthur Laurents based on the novel of the same name by Françoise Sagan. The film stars Deborah Kerr, David Niven, Jean Seberg, Mylène Demongeot and Geoffrey Horne, and features Juliette Gréco, Walter Chiari, Martita Hunt and Roland Culver. It was released by Columbia Pictures. This film had color and black-and-white sequences, a technique unusual for the 1950s, but widely used in silent movies and early sound movies.
The Mouse That Roared is a 1955 satirical novel by Irish writer Leonard Wibberley, which launched a series of satirical books about an imaginary country in Europe called the Duchy of Grand Fenwick. Wibberley used the premise to make commentaries about modern politics and world situations, including the nuclear arms race, nuclear weapons in general, and the politics of the United States.
Jack Arnold was an American actor and film and television director, best known as one of the leading filmmakers of 1950s science fiction films. His most notable films are It Came from Outer Space (1953), Creature from the Black Lagoon (1954), Tarantula (1955), and The Incredible Shrinking Man (1957).
Carl Foreman, CBE was an American screenwriter and film producer who wrote the award-winning films The Bridge on the River Kwai and High Noon, among others. He was one of the screenwriters who were blacklisted in Hollywood in the 1950s because of their suspected communist sympathy or membership in the Communist Party.
The Lost World is a 1960 American fantasy adventure film directed by Irwin Allen, loosely based on the 1912 novel of the same name by Arthur Conan Doyle. Shot in De Luxe Color and CinemaScope, the film's plot revolves around the exploration of a plateau in Venezuela inhabited by cannibals, dinosaurs, carnivorous plants, and giant spiders. The cast includes Claude Rains, David Hedison, Fernando Lamas, Jill St. John, and Michael Rennie.
Grant Williams was an American film, theater, and television actor. He is best remembered for his portrayal of Scott Carey in the science fiction film The Incredible Shrinking Man (1957), and for his starring role as Greg MacKenzie on Hawaiian Eye from 1960 through 1963.
The Mouse on the Moon is a 1963 British comedy film, the sequel to The Mouse That Roared. It is an adaptation of the 1962 novel The Mouse on the Moon by Irish author Leonard Wibberley, and was directed by Richard Lester. In it, the people of the Duchy of Grand Fenwick, a microstate in Europe, attempt space flight using wine as a propellant. It satirises the space race, Cold War and politics.
The Mouse on the Moon is a novel by Irish author Leonard Wibberley. It was released in 1962 as the sequel to The Mouse That Roared and Beware of the Mouse. In it, the people of the Duchy of Grand Fenwick, a tiny isolated country in the Alps, attempt a space flight using wine as a propellant. It satirizes the space race, Cold War and politics. In 1963 it was adapted into a film The Mouse on the Moon.
The Lady Takes a Flyer is a 1958 American CinemaScope Eastmancolor comedy-drama romance film released by Universal Pictures. It was directed by Jack Arnold and written by Danny Arnold based on a story by Edmund H. North.
Hello Down There is a 1969 American comedy-adventure film starring Tony Randall and Janet Leigh that was released by Paramount Pictures. It was produced by George Sherman and Ivan Tors and directed by Jack Arnold and Ricou Browning. The screenplay was written by John McGreevey and Frank Telford.
A Global Affair is a 1964 American comedy film directed by Jack Arnold, and starring Bob Hope, Michèle Mercier, Yvonne De Carlo, and Elga Andersen.
Walter Shenson was an American film producer, director and writer, best known for producing the Beatles' films A Hard Day's Night (1964) and Help! (1965), as well as the 1959 comedy The Mouse That Roared, starring Peter Sellers.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.
