Brothers in law (1957)
Contrary to reputation I do not just admire French cinema. I also love many British films from the forties to the sixties. This period of film making produced such gems as The Third Man, I’m all Right Jack, Kind Hearts and Coronets, Zulu, Lawrence of Arabia, Alfie, The Italian Job and Get Carter.
Most of all I enjoy the comedies of the fifties.
It’s now the only opportunity to see legendary theatrical actors like Ralph Richardson or Alec Guinness. Richard Attenborough was not a theatre actor but was versatile in his roles from a blackleg in The Angry Silence to a psychotic young gang leader Pinkie in Brighton Rock and in the film I am reviewing today a jaunty young barrister in Brothers in law.
The other joy for me in such films is to spot the young small part actor who went onto the big time. I noted here Nicholas Parsons, Leslie Phillips and -as a solicitors’s clerk – John Schlesinger who went to direct Darling, Midnight Cowboy and Marathon Man
The film started its life as a book by barrister Henry Cecil (Henry Leon). Fifties British cinema liked to mock the professions as in the Doctor series from novels by Richard Gordon or military service in Private’s Progress made by the same team, and Roy Boulting notably in Brothers in Law which pokes fun at the barrister’s profession.
Ian Carmichael is the young clot making his first faltering steps in the chambers of bumbling Kendall Grimes QC (Miles Malleson). He rooms with Richard Attenborough and both fall in love with the girl upstairs (Jill Adams).
I have a few barrister friends and the film catches life in the law well from irate judges, to arcane practices that have not much changed much from the fifties. Above all it’s a jolly romp.
The transition from ninny to a more streetwise lawyer served Ian Carmichael well.
He starred two years later (1959) in the most searing look of Britain in the fifties I’m all Right Jack in which Peter Sellers was so memorable as union leader Fred Kite.
Finally a word on Burton and Taylor which I watched for the first time last night. It was a convincing representation of a show biz couple I never much rated or liked. The interesting thing that did emerge was that Elizabeth Taylor, a star from the age of 15 in National Velvet, was far better equipped to deal with the pressures of stardom than Richard Burton.
Although he had a tremendous voice Burton never convinced me as an actor.
After the film BBC showed a repeat of an interview with Michael Parkinson.
Parky was dressed in a extraordinary bulky green v-necked sweater with long collared shirt protruding but notwithstanding his sartorial state he drew Burton out on life with Liz and their ostentatious lifestyle, whilst Burton did some superb mimicry of Laurence Olivier and Lee Marvin.
