You Must Be Joking! | |
---|---|
![]() Theatrical release poster | |
Directed by | Michael Winner |
Screenplay by | Alan Hackney Jan Read from a story by Michael Winner |
Produced by | Charles H. Schneer |
Starring | Michael Callan Lionel Jeffries Denholm Elliott |
Cinematography | Geoffrey Unsworth |
Edited by | Bernard Gribble |
Music by | Laurie Johnson |
Production company | Ameran |
Distributed by | Columbia Pictures Corporation (UK) |
Release date | 3 August 1965 (London) |
Running time | 100 minutes |
Country | United Kingdom |
Language | English |
You Must Be Joking! is a 1965 black and white British comedy film directed by Michael Winner and starring Michael Callan, Lionel Jeffries, and Denholm Elliott. [1]
The format of the film, four people each doing six tasks linked to a scavenger hunt, allows for 24 otherwise somewhat unconnected comedy vignettes, which jointly create the story line. The items (purportedly representing British identity) include flying ducks for the wall, an English rose, the Spirit of Ecstasy from a Rolls-Royce car, an electric hare from a greyhound race and the Lutine Bell.
Major Foskett, a British Army psychologist, assembles four soldiers for a testing task: Sergeant Major McGregor (complete with kilt and bearskin), Captain Tabasco, Sergeant Clegg (a father of nine), Staff Sergeant Mansfield and United States Air Force Lieutenant Morton. They have their initiative tested in a scavenger hunt.
Their first task is to escape a maze. Tabasco orders up a helicopter to take him out and two others take a ride, but Clegg is left in the maze.
They are instructed to obtain six items, supposedly symbols of the British way of life. The reward for the winner is to be fast-tracked for promotion and a ten-day, all-expenses-paid trip around the world for two. Among the feats to be accomplished within 48 hours are escaping from a maze, retrieving a rare rose and the mascot from a Rolls-Royce motorcar, and procurement of a lock of hair and an autograph from a popular French singer. The final challenge involves the famous Lutine bell from the Underwriting Room of Lloyd's of London. [2] [3] MacGregor arrives at the finish line by parachute, Tabasco comes in an ambulance, Clegg digs his way in from below. Morton arrives last (by car), but is declared the winner and resigns.
General Lockwood is arrested for misuse of the requisition system. Foskett is arrested for conspiracy to steal the Lutine Bell.
The film was based on an original story by Michael Winner which was inspired by a real army initiative test where soldiers were asked to get as far away as possible from their camp at Catterick. He hired Alan Hackney, who had written several Boulting Brothers screenplays, to write the script. [4]
While looking for finance, Winner was approached to make a film with the Dave Clark Five, but Winner did not like the idea. Charles H. Schneer liked the Hackney script and agreed to make it under a deal he had with Columbia and Winner says he suggested John Boorman take over the Dave Clark movie. Winner said Columbia insisted that Michael Callan play a lead role. Winner called the actor "a nice fellow who didn't sell the film in America and didn't help it in England either." [5]
Winner hired a cameraman who felt they could not film in the locations that had been chosen, so Winner replaced him with Geoff Unsworth. Johnny Speight did some uncredited writing on the film. [6]
Winner says the film received good reviews but was not popular at the box office. [7]
Denholm Mitchell Elliott, was an English actor, with more than 125 film and television credits. His well-known roles include the abortionist in Alfie (1966), Marcus Brody in Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981) and Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989), Coleman in Trading Places (1983), and Mr Emerson in A Room with a View (1985).
Michael Rennie was a British film, television and stage actor, who had leading roles in a number of Hollywood films, including his portrayal of the space visitor Klaatu in the science fiction film The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951). In a career spanning more than 30 years, Rennie appeared in more than 50 films and in several American television series.
Windsor Davies was a Welsh actor. He is best remembered for playing Battery Sergeant Major Williams in the sitcom It Ain't Half Hot Mum (1974–1981) over its entire run. The show's popularity resulted in Davies and his co-star Don Estelle achieving a UK number one hit with a version of "Whispering Grass" in 1975. He later starred with Donald Sinden in Never the Twain (1981–1991), and his deep Welsh-accented voice was heard extensively in advertising voice-overs.
The British Independent Film Awards (BIFA) is an organisation that celebrates, supports and promotes British independent cinema and filmmaking talent in United Kingdom. Nominations for the annual awards ceremony are announced in early November, with the ceremony itself taking place in early December.
Robert Michael Winner was a British filmmaker, writer, and media personality. He is known for directing numerous action, thriller, and black comedy films in the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s, including several collaborations with actors Oliver Reed and Charles Bronson.
Walter Sydney Vinnicombe, known as Wally Patch, was an English actor and comedian. He worked in film, television and theatre.
Michael Hugh Medwin, OBE was an English actor and film producer.
Douglas John Cardew Robinson was a British comic, whose career was rooted in the music hall and Gang Shows.
Michael Callan is an American actor best known for originating the role of Riff in West Side Story on Broadway, and for his film roles for Columbia Pictures, notably Gidget Goes Hawaiian, The Interns and Cat Ballou.
James Michael Hyde Villiers was an English character actor. He was particularly known for his plummy voice and ripe articulation.
Michael George Ripper was an English character actor.
David William Frederick Lodge was an English character actor.
Norman Mitchell Driver, known professionally as Norman Mitchell, was an English television, stage and film actor.
Robert Dorning was a musician, dance band vocalist, ballet dancer and stage, film and television actor. He is known to have performed in at least 77 television and film productions between 1940 and 1988.
John Lovell Horsley was a British actor.
Richard Caldicot was an English actor famed for his role of Commander Povey in the BBC radio series The Navy Lark. He also appeared often on television, memorably as the obstetrician delivering Betty Spencer's baby in Some Mothers Do 'Ave 'Em.
Donald Hugh MacBride was an American character actor on stage, in films, and on television who launched his career as a teenage singer in vaudeville and went on to be an actor in New York.
Gus McNaughton, also known as Augustus Le Clerq and Augustus Howard, was an English film actor. He appeared in 70 films between 1930 and 1947. He was born in London and died in Castor, Cambridgeshire. He is sometimes credited as Gus MacNaughton. He appeared on stage from 1899, as a juvenile comedian with the Fred Karno company, the influential British music hall troupe. In films, McNaughton was often cast as the "fast-talking sidekick", and he appeared in several popular George Formby comedies of the 1930s and 1940s. He also appeared twice for director Alfred Hitchcock in both Murder! (1930) and The 39 Steps (1935).
Alan Charles Langley Hackney was an English novelist and screenwriter.
Brian O'Shaughnessy was a British-born film actor. He was born in Aldershot, Hampshire, in 1931, but was evacuated during the Second World War to South Africa, where he later found fame as an actor.
Winner, Michael (2004). Winner Take All: A life of Sorts (Kindle ed.).