A friend recently reminded me that THE LADYKILLERS is set around King’s Cross, with St. Pancras visible in so many of the external shots. So when I saw the disk at the shop earlier today, I thought I’d revisit. The area is unrecognisable from now. A fat-faced Peter Sellers in an early film role and Herbert Lom, with hair, are recognisable but both look so different than they did in their Inspector Clouseau heyday. And what’s with Alec Guiness’ odd prosthetics make-up? It’s thought to be patterned after Kenneth Tynan but I see him more as a cross between Nosferatu and his henchman, and rather unnecessary. None of this ultimately detract from the ingeniousness of the comedy which Alexander Mackendrick directs with a very pleasing combination of the macabre and the endearing. A shared sense of good manners and propriety is the very basis of William Rose’s screenplay, the rationale for each plot development, and the film is unthinkable without it. I suppose it’s part of what makes Ealing Ealing. I saw it in the Studio Canal disc, and it looks wonderful, but the default is German, which makes watching things, particularly the extras, irksome, as none of the main titles are translated; a bother when they offer essential information on the disc. Stil, the three-strip technicolour looks wonderful.

José Arroyo