Saw MMM more than 300 times (yes!) because it has enough in it to amuse, interest and make you wish you lived with these zany, big-hearted misfits. Bored, would-be good-doers, Dame Bea and her lodgers get caught up in just the opposite when excitement turns up unexpectedly on their front doorstep (literally). Then, there's no stopping them--altho they do bungle nearly every heist. Yes, they must (à la Robin Hood) steal from the rich to give to the poor. And poor Lily, the ex-inside maid, trying to stay on the good side!
The actors, all lovable, eccentric characters, are too good to be true, with special kudos to the female quartet (Athene Seyler, Hattie Jacques, Elspeth Duxbury, Billie Whitelaw--in the flower of youth and yet already on her brilliant way to HER BRILLIANT CAREER) and their grumbling but more than willing hero (Terry-Thomas). Picture the latter in gangster attire in front of a sleeze bar--better than the entire scene inside it! Or Elspeth being "attacked" in her bath (Oh, how she wishes!) by a couldn't-be-further-from-his-mind! Or, maybe best of all, a stunning, long-haired blond, high-heeled Hattie Jacques (that's right) just AFTER her firebomb goes off in a plush fur shop in the Kensington District of London. But there are SO MANY perfect scenes in this nearly perfect film (after 300 times you pick up 3 or 4 technical bloopers, but who cares?), it is impossible to single them out without telling the whole film.
My only question is: Why isn't it a FILM CLASSIC?
Marya Berry, Film Buff and Critic
The actors, all lovable, eccentric characters, are too good to be true, with special kudos to the female quartet (Athene Seyler, Hattie Jacques, Elspeth Duxbury, Billie Whitelaw--in the flower of youth and yet already on her brilliant way to HER BRILLIANT CAREER) and their grumbling but more than willing hero (Terry-Thomas). Picture the latter in gangster attire in front of a sleeze bar--better than the entire scene inside it! Or Elspeth being "attacked" in her bath (Oh, how she wishes!) by a couldn't-be-further-from-his-mind! Or, maybe best of all, a stunning, long-haired blond, high-heeled Hattie Jacques (that's right) just AFTER her firebomb goes off in a plush fur shop in the Kensington District of London. But there are SO MANY perfect scenes in this nearly perfect film (after 300 times you pick up 3 or 4 technical bloopers, but who cares?), it is impossible to single them out without telling the whole film.
My only question is: Why isn't it a FILM CLASSIC?
Marya Berry, Film Buff and Critic