Rent Too Many Crooks (1959)

Money with Violins - Too Many Crooks review by CH

Although the opening scene of Too Many Crooks (1959), very well shot, has all the dark pace of a noir, this is soon revealed to be stuff of comedy when the truck in question crashes directly into a jeweller’s, and there tumble from and under it such hapless stalwarts of farce as Sid James (whose character is once again called Sid as that it what people call him anyway).

He is one of a group of crooks - including George Cole and Bernard Bresslaw - with ideas above their abilities. What’s more, this being late-Fifties England, it is scarcely surprising that along the way suave businessman Terry-Thomas’s eyes stand forth almost as often as moll Vera Day’s breasts.

Crudely put as that might sound, this is all in fact a blow for women’s rights - as befits a script by Michael Pertwee which was in fact built upon a story co-written by Christiane Roochefort, whose left-wing upbringing informs her novels and other writings (and she managed the linguistic feat of translating John Lennon’s books in the Sixties). The plot is readily summarised. The gang hits on the idea of kidnapping the daughter of Terry-Thomas who has made his pile by building nefariously upon his wife’s initial money; less than grateful to her, he proves thankful when the gang kidnaps her - a hearse and chloroform to hand - by mistake.

There is an expression known as a Sam Kydd moment. He frequently pops up effectively for a few seconds in films at this time - and never finer than when he stirs from an early-morning bench only to see a driverless hearse head his way, then crash, with which a shrouded figure rises from the now-vertical coffin and sends him running.

Restored to life, the wife joins forces with the gang to bilk Terry-Thomas of even more than the ransom he had proved far from willing to pay.

Chases, a convenient fire, an outlandish scene in front of a magistrate, impersonated officers from Scotland Yard, not to mention the stock-in-trade of a violin vase and such lines as “what’s in that cigar? Congo rat?”, here is diversion more skilfully managed by director Mario Zampi than anything the gang itself hoped to pull on the Great North Road

Pure slapstick, but very enjoyable. - Too Many Crooks review by Maureen

This is an old film so we wondered whether it would be dated, but it featured many of the really good actors from many films of the period so we took a chance. We were a bit worried at the start of the film when one of the characters trips on the stairs and slides down, a bit like Inspector Clouseau, but we needn't have been concerned as the film got better and better with the exceedingly incompetent crooks getting into more and more trouble. Do try it, you won't be sorry.

George Roby.