By Howard Hughes
(The following review is of
the UK release of the film on Region 2 format.)
In Roy Ward Baker’s 1960s
comedy-drama Two Left Feet, Michael
Crawford plays Alan Crabbe, a clumsy and unlucky-in-love 19-year-old who begins
dating ‘Eileen, the Teacup Queen’, a waitress at his local cafe. She lives in Camden Town and there are rumours
that she’s married, but that doesn’t seem to alter her behavior. Alan and
Eileen travel into London’s ‘Floride Club’, where the Storyville Jazzmen play
trad for the groovers and shakers. Eileen turns out to be a ‘right little madam’,
who is really just stringing Alan along. She’s the kind of girl who only dates
to get into places and then starts chatting to randoms once inside. She takes
up with ruffian Ronnie, while Alan meets a nice girl, Beth Crowley. But Eileen holds
a strange hold over Alan and at a wedding celebration of their friends, Brian
and Mavis, they are caught in bed together – which ruins his relationship with
Beth and gets him on the wrong side of Ronnie and his flick-knife.
‘Two Left Feet’ is a pretty
gritty Brit-com of misunderstood youth and romantic entanglements. It’s the
antithesis of Cliff Richard’s day-glow musical fantasies ‘Summer Holiday’ and
‘The Young Ones’, and closer to kitchen sink dramas: the roughness of ‘Beat
Girl’ or the tragicomedy of ‘Billy Liar’. The inspired cast is a major asset,
with several of the roles providing early opportunities for future stars. Michael
Crawford went on to massive fame in the TV series ‘Some Mothers Do ‘Ave ‘Em’ as clumsy, socially inept Frank
Spencer. He’s also went on to appear in some very good British film comedies in
the 1960s, including ‘The Knack…and How to Get It’, ‘The Jokers’ and ‘How I Won
the War’. Nyree Dawn Porter, cast as Eileen, was memorable as Irene in TV’s ‘The
Forsyte Saga’. Porter is excellent
here as the sexy seductress and lights up the screen whenever she appears.
Another of the clubgoers is played by David Hemmings, who oozes cool and class
as Brian. Julia Foster, from ‘The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner’ and
‘Alfie’, plays Beth. The
appropriately-named Michael Craze plays psycho Ronnie, Dilys Watling is Brian’s
girl Mavis and Hammer Films’ regular Michael Ripper played her Uncle Reg. Cyril
Chamberlain shows up as garage owner Mr Miles and David Lodge appears Alan’s cocky
co-worker Bill. James Bond’s M crops up
again, with the ubiquitous Bernard Lee playing Alan’s father, a policemen.
British rock ‘n’ roller Tommy Bruce performs the title song, ‘Two Left Feet’, in imitable bellowing style,
while the band in the Cavern-like ‘Floride Club’ is Bob Wallis and His
Storyville Jazzmen.
‘Two Left Feet’ was based
on the 1960 novel ‘In My Solitude’ by David Stewart Leslie. Wide-eyed, but
strangely disillusioned, the protagonists of this story are caught in a period snapshot
between the dour 1950s and the soon-to-be-fab Sixties. The sequences shot in
London, including near the statue of Eros in Piccadilly Circus, locate the film
historically to a very specific time and place. The cinema billboards display
adverts for ‘Lawrence of Arabia’ and ‘How the West Was Won’, but on Alan’s
visits ‘Up West’, he prefers to frequent the more niche ‘Bijou Cinema’, which
is showing Harrison Marks’ nudie feature ‘Naked as Nature Intended’, starring
‘The Fabulous Pamela Green’. The social mores of the era are also to the fore –
when offered a smoke on her way to the club, Eileen is aghast: ‘Cigarette? Not
in the street thank you!’. Membership of the ‘Floride Club’ is 12/6 (a
pre-decimalisation twelve shillings and sixpence) and sensible Alan decides he
can’t get married yet because he’s too young and financially challenged. The
wedding reception has none of the scale of modern wedding celebrations – it’s
just a gathering at a private residence, with a buffet, party games and
sing-song at the piano. The generational gap is keenly delineated in the
relationship between Alan and his father. His father’s generation’s upbringing
was strict – they learned respect, lived by the rules and didn’t question them
– while Alan’s generation is unfettered by such notions. The presumption is
that they can be anything, do anything and be free as air.
‘Two Left Feet’ is part of Network’s
‘The British Film’ collection. It’s another British Lion release shot at
Shepperton Studios and the disc includes an image gallery and promotional
material pdf. It is rated 15 in the UK, presumably for the mild sexual
promiscuity, the prominent use of knives by Ronnie and the beating Alan
receives from Ronnie’s heavies. The film is another interesting 1960s British
film rescued from obscurity and is worth seeing for both Hemmings and Porter,
and the energetic dance moves in the ‘Floride Club’. It’s worth mentioning that
if you like this type of 1960s film, then check out Hemmings’ excellent film ‘Some
People’ (1962), also from Network, with he and Ray Brooks playing bikers who form
a rock ‘n’ roll band.
DVD format: Region 2
Rated: 15
RRP: £9.99
Screen ratio: 1.66:1
90 mins B&W
Text © Howard Hughes/Cinema Retro 2014
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