Contrary to the previous review Lupino Lane was very much a film star.He made 76 films,the majority in Hollywood.He appeared in The Love Parade for Ernst Lubitsch.He gave up making films because he preferred the stage.In 1939 he scored his biggest ever hit with Me and My Girl.The first 16 minutes are quite funny.Lane with domestic strife with his wife and stepchildren.The scene then switches to Blackpool,where there is a lot of location shooting,a lot of it shot silent.The rather silly plot involving Sari Maitza then comes into play.However the best parts of this film are the silent sections where clearly his expertise as a silent screen performer and director came into play.There is a sequence where he is on a folder which is as poor a process as you will ever see.
10 Reviews
ANOTHER GOOD Sunday Matinée
frankebe2 March 2017
The movie itself is really only about a 5, but for me, when Lupino Lane really gets going, he can do no wrong.
For several years now, I have found myself bored to death over movies that are directed to be more concerned with presenting their "story" than with what they DO with the narrative. Most movies are written by a bunch of hack writers anyway, and few stories have any depth or value to them that can keep me engaged. RATHER, I am interested in any movie that allows truly talented actors to show off their skills.
Now it turns out that Lupino Lane is as good an acrobat as Buster Keaton, and probably as good a pantomimist and dancer as Chaplin or Lloyd. So here I am delighted to find a featurette that really displays his talents—and in a talking picture while the actor is still at his prime, no less.
Not that it couldn't have been even better, but... you can't have everything (although I'll never know why).
Fortunately, there is enough innocent silliness, cartoonishness, pantomime, acrobatics and else at play here, and briskly moving along at a pace to keep my interest.
If you don't know Lupino Lane, you might want to start with a wonderful compilation of clips from his movies, with super music, on the DVD "SlapHappy: Vol 1 (3 Funnymen...)".
If you find those clips amazing, astounding and hilarious, then you should try out some complete silents. After that, if you, like I, cannot possibly get too much Lupino Lane, then you should check out this movie (you can buy it at Amazon UK).
For several years now, I have found myself bored to death over movies that are directed to be more concerned with presenting their "story" than with what they DO with the narrative. Most movies are written by a bunch of hack writers anyway, and few stories have any depth or value to them that can keep me engaged. RATHER, I am interested in any movie that allows truly talented actors to show off their skills.
Now it turns out that Lupino Lane is as good an acrobat as Buster Keaton, and probably as good a pantomimist and dancer as Chaplin or Lloyd. So here I am delighted to find a featurette that really displays his talents—and in a talking picture while the actor is still at his prime, no less.
Not that it couldn't have been even better, but... you can't have everything (although I'll never know why).
Fortunately, there is enough innocent silliness, cartoonishness, pantomime, acrobatics and else at play here, and briskly moving along at a pace to keep my interest.
If you don't know Lupino Lane, you might want to start with a wonderful compilation of clips from his movies, with super music, on the DVD "SlapHappy: Vol 1 (3 Funnymen...)".
If you find those clips amazing, astounding and hilarious, then you should try out some complete silents. After that, if you, like I, cannot possibly get too much Lupino Lane, then you should check out this movie (you can buy it at Amazon UK).
Lane Does A Silent Movie With Sound
boblipton30 October 2023
Henpecked Lupino Lane, Lola Hunt, and his five stepchildren go on a holiday to Blackpool. There, he is mistaken for a spy from Ptomania, whose associates plan to crash the British glider in the competition, winning fifty-thousand-pound prize for Ptomania.
It's all an excuse for long sequences shot wild -- that is, without sound -- in which Lane performs his amazing acrobatics and slapstick routines around the holiday town. Those sequences are quite good, but the cheapness of the production, the poor sound track, and the slapdash writing don't make this particularly good. It reminds me of the proposition that Buster Keaton made to the higher-ups at MGM, to make silent films with talking sequences. I expect the scenarios would have been better than this mishmosh of sequences from THE ADVENTURER, cross-dressing, and puns. Still, it's always fun to see Lane run up a wall. With Sari Maritza and Wallace Lupino.
It's all an excuse for long sequences shot wild -- that is, without sound -- in which Lane performs his amazing acrobatics and slapstick routines around the holiday town. Those sequences are quite good, but the cheapness of the production, the poor sound track, and the slapdash writing don't make this particularly good. It reminds me of the proposition that Buster Keaton made to the higher-ups at MGM, to make silent films with talking sequences. I expect the scenarios would have been better than this mishmosh of sequences from THE ADVENTURER, cross-dressing, and puns. Still, it's always fun to see Lane run up a wall. With Sari Maritza and Wallace Lupino.
Blackpool outing
Prismark102 April 2018
No Lady is a curious British comedy. Lupino Lane shows almost Chaplinesque skills but as a director he certainly could not make this film flow well.
Lupino plays a hen pecked second husband of a harridan and her children, one of whom looks suspiciously looks like a vertically challenged young man.
Thet go off to Blackpool for a holiday. We see scenes of the Pier, the Lido and Lupino gets mistaken for some kind of crook. Once the bad guys realise their error, they go after him but Lupino disguises himself as a woman to escape everyone but attracts the attention of a lot of elderly suitors.
The film is mainly a silent, it has some knockaround fun, you even get a song and dance number. It is rather silly, it showcases Lupino in an uneven way but I cannot say this is a good film.
Lupino plays a hen pecked second husband of a harridan and her children, one of whom looks suspiciously looks like a vertically challenged young man.
Thet go off to Blackpool for a holiday. We see scenes of the Pier, the Lido and Lupino gets mistaken for some kind of crook. Once the bad guys realise their error, they go after him but Lupino disguises himself as a woman to escape everyone but attracts the attention of a lot of elderly suitors.
The film is mainly a silent, it has some knockaround fun, you even get a song and dance number. It is rather silly, it showcases Lupino in an uneven way but I cannot say this is a good film.
Lupino Lane is not a film star!
gnok200210 August 2015
I'm inserting reviews for all films I'v seen that lack one, this rarity has recently been shown on talking pictures, so more people will have a chance to see it, possibly someone will write a more favorable review? well here is mine... Staring, directed and co-written by Lupino Lane, he plays a henpecked stepfather who when holidaying in Blackpool is mistaken for an enemy spy, in a plot involving the sabotage of a radio controlled glider contest! The plot is as irrelevant as it is unlikely, this film is simply an excuse to showcase it's star, it all comes down to is he funny? Well on this evidence Mr Lane joins the long list of successful stage comedians whose talents did not translate to the silver screen, not awful, but of curio value only.
Plane Crazy
richardchatten3 March 2020
There just may be some (very) senior citizens still alive in Blackpool who remember the film crew at large on the front making this zany comedy (described by Rachel Low as a "badly directed, under-rehearsed and distasteful film") that for much of it's running time looks like (and probably is) a silent film with an effects track rather than a true talkie.
The enemy agents our hero tangles with come from a foreign country called Ptomania, pronounced the same way as the country Adenoid Hynkel later became the great dictator of.
The enemy agents our hero tangles with come from a foreign country called Ptomania, pronounced the same way as the country Adenoid Hynkel later became the great dictator of.
No Lady
CinemaSerf28 January 2024
"Pog" (Lupino Lane) is the rather hen-pecked patriarch of a family who heads off to the seaside with his wife and offspring for their annual summer holiday. Once there, he is mistaken for a criminal mastermind and is soon embroiled in the nefarious activities of a gang of spies and crooks. Can he extricate himself from their dastardly schemes? Essentially, this is vehicle for a stage and silent film star who looks completely ill-at-ease in front of a camera into which, this time, he is expected to speak. The drama itself is the thinnest and the familial malarkey with wife (Lola Hunt) and the celebration of Britons on deckchairs wearing bowler hats eating ice cream comes across more scathing than ridiculous. There's some room for a bit of uncomplicated drag, and even some aeronautical antics at the end but this is really only watchable now as a curio of what we watched almost a century ago, what made us laugh and who tickled our fancy.
Better than I expected
martinepstein23 October 2019
Just watched No Lady on Talking Pictures and I must confess that I enjoyed it. True the story is silly but the film was far better than I expected.
There was little evidence that it was made just four years into the talkies and Lupino Lane was a superb acrobatic comedian. This production did him justice.
Pastiche of the silent era only three years into sound.
mark.waltz3 February 2024
Warning: Spoilers
A top notch British farce that provides a terrific part for Lupino Lane, having been paired with Lillian Roth just two years before in the big Hollywood musical "The Love Parade". The much nagged second husband of imperious Lola Hunt, hated by her many children and constantly reminded of his supportive part in the family, Lane is definitely a man to feel sorry for.
When the family heads to Blackpool for a seaside vacagkon, Lane somehow ends up with papers meant for foreign agents and has the villains on his trail as well as the police and the hysterically nasty Hunt. Sari Maritza and Renee Clama play exotic femme fatales, with Maritza having given Lane the plans, mistaking him for someone else. Lupino ends up in deaf, performing a big musical number with the most unlikely chorus of old oglers.
Definitely watch for the pantomime expertise of Lane, reminding me more of Harry Langdon than Chaplin, but performing movements obviously influenced by Charlie. His reactions are hysterical, whether being pelted by a feather pillow or dealing with the twirling gated entrance to the beach where the kids keep going in and out, forcing Lane to pay over and over. His slapping scene with the fee collector is very funny. Rated appropriately as if I had been around in 1931.
When the family heads to Blackpool for a seaside vacagkon, Lane somehow ends up with papers meant for foreign agents and has the villains on his trail as well as the police and the hysterically nasty Hunt. Sari Maritza and Renee Clama play exotic femme fatales, with Maritza having given Lane the plans, mistaking him for someone else. Lupino ends up in deaf, performing a big musical number with the most unlikely chorus of old oglers.
Definitely watch for the pantomime expertise of Lane, reminding me more of Harry Langdon than Chaplin, but performing movements obviously influenced by Charlie. His reactions are hysterical, whether being pelted by a feather pillow or dealing with the twirling gated entrance to the beach where the kids keep going in and out, forcing Lane to pay over and over. His slapping scene with the fee collector is very funny. Rated appropriately as if I had been around in 1931.
Delightfully silly
chrischapman-4754525 January 2024
A very early British talkie (hence poor sound quality but on the version I saw on TPTV there is sound all the way through). Starring the talented Lupino Lane - a master of timing and slapstick. What elevates it above many comedies of the period is the amount of external shots (of Blackpool) at the beginning of the 1930's - not just a lot of cheap interior sets with two dimensional acting. The actors show carryover influence of both silent movies and theatrical stage. The baddies are stereotypical in the extreme and come from a fictional European country with silly hand signals as greetings - two years before Hitler came to power. There must have been a reasonable budget given the number of actors and dancers involved even if some were roped in holidaymakers. It isn't very sophisticated, especially the dance routines, but you can see why audiences enjoyed it at the time. Basically a comedy with some good touches, not to be taken too seriously and in context, and a fascinating view of Blackpool.
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