Victor Spinetti's tears... This, That and the Other (1969)

Victor and Vanessa

So, another British sex comedy and a film directed by Derek Ford who went onto a string of productions in this lucrative sub-genre; Groupie Girl (1970), The Wife Swappers (1970), Suburban Wives (1971), Commuter Husbands (1972), Keep It Up, Jack (1974) and Sex Express (1975) and more. The mind boggles at the idea of 70’s British Rail allowing an express service of any description let alone one involving these additional benefits.

 So far, so salacious, but exactly how sexy is This, That and the Other – aka A Promise of Bed in the USA – and how funny is it? Well, it’s a mixed bag… and, as usual, the laughs are often at the film’s expense. There are three stories of varying tone and only loosely linked by theme and events but, overall, it’s a fun ride if taken in context.

Dennis is menaced

 First up we find Vanda Hudson as Susan Stress who is so desperate for a role in producer Gordon Sterne’s film that she decides to seduce his innocent photographer son, played by Dennis Waterman no less. Whilst it’s hard to think of our Dennis as in anyway this innocent after all the moments we’ve shared over the years, he does his best as he nervously tries to photograph Vanda who goes to ever more outlandish lengths to shock him in a succession of increasingly provocative costumes. Full marks to Vanda here as she has to improvise madly for most of this story before ending up in the bath and then in bed with the future TV detective and Minder…

All her efforts are not wasted on the young man but there’s a delicious twist in the tale that wouldn’t work quite as well without her commitment to the role.

The second story has the most substance and an especially impressive performance from the highly versatile Victor Spinetti as George, a young man preparing for suicide until he’s interrupted by a lovely young woman called Barbara played well by Vanessa Howard who thinks his is the location of a party. Spinetti does so well to play George’s depression in ways that win our sympathy but not distress; suicide’s no laughing matter, especially in this context, and what we’re left with is a poignant tale that rises above the sauce and still makes us hope for the best outcome.

Victor hangs on

Barbara rationalises his masking tape, continental quilt and open gas fire as the theme for a party which is to be based on suicidal people and when the other guests arrive they take on the personas of various forms of suicide with Valery Leon deciding to dive in the bath – director Derek Ford not wasting his assets here. We also get the sublime Alexandra Bastedo as bored socialite Angie whose arranging her next event almost as soon as she arrives along with Michel Durant as a so-drenched-in-ennui-you-don’t-know-he’s-completely-pissed aristocrat.

All of these characters send flickers across George’s eyes merely highlighting his isolate desolation but perhaps there’s hope for him after the party’s over if only Barbara has truly noticed him…

The film can’t possibly linger on such thoughts as we enter the mostly surreal final segment in which a sex-starved taxi driver, the excellent John Bird, leaves a cinema after watching an X-rated film just like this one, only to be caught up in a psychedelic party that blows our minds. His post film reverie, and boiled egg dinner break, are interrupted by a call to take a glamorous blonde, the sublime Yutte Stensgaard, from a London night club to an ultra-mod house in the countryside. She falls asleep drunk in the back of his cab but he can’t stop looking at her and fantasising… I like the way this section pokes fun at its own audience!

Hallucinations of a Taxi Driver...

The dopey driver is hit by a sports car driven by the posh drunk from the previous episode and the former falls into a dream, as his blonde makes her way to the country house and he follows to witness the most outrageous of events. Women frolic naked in an indoor pool and appear and disappear as the swooning psych sounds of Christos Demetriou and John Kongos score illuminate events. Cleo Goldstein dances as a girl wearing only polythene hands, and our taxi driver has clearly travelled way too far south of the river…

It's a Stanley Long production with a budget of some £8,500 so well played all round for coming up with something that is more substantial than many a Brit sex-com. As The Monthly Film Bulletin wrote, it may have been "… short on comedy but rather better performed than these things usually are.” Although I don’t quite agree that “… the one barely memorable moment is provided by Miss Hudson being pursued round an apartment to the strains of the Light Cavalry Overture."

It's available on Amazon Prime and an increasingly collectable DVD!

 

 

Yutte is covered in fruit... much like the cover of the prog blues LP, Juicy Lucy (Vertigo, 1969)

 

Nice and sleazy does it... Jungle Street (1960)

This falls into that intriguing sub-genre of Soho strip-joint based dramas along with Beat Girl (released 28^th October 1960) and Expresso Bongo (released 1^st December 1959) and was probably the last to be released. It may lack the authenticity of the former – which used professional strippers – and the wit of the latter – which used Cliff Richard – but it’s noteworthy all the same.

There are some lukewarm reviews on IMDB for the film but it’s a convincing kitchen-sink crime drama with a memorable if occasionally jarring lead performance from David McCallum as the troubled petty crook Terry Collins. As Collins, McCallum never lets the intensity drop as a rebel with no cause but his own and no loyalty to family or friends. The exception to this is dancer Sue, played by McCallum’s then wife, Jill Ireland who I have to say provides the most stunning of catwalks for her moment in the club; she’s got star power to spare, as with her husband, and near infinite legs!

David McCallum

As with the excellent but underused Kenneth Cope, they bring out what there is of the drama and make this low budget Las Vegas a low-impact but compelling watch for a bank holiday afternoon; the showgirls may be faking it but the feeling of supressed violence and desperation is tangible.

All begins with an old man’s late-night bus journey from Notting Hill set to a swinging Harold Geller score. He arrives at his destination and gets fatally knocked out by a blackjack wielded by petty Terry who takes his money and throws his wallet down the drain.

We’ve had the violence so now it’s time for “sex” as we enter the Adam and Eve club presumably down a dark Soho Alley to find smiley Marian Collins introducing a variety of acts starting with “Dimples” (Vanda Hudson) in tight-fitting silver slacks and, initially at least, matching top, as she strips and sings “I’m Only a Girl” to row after row of pale, stale males sucking harder on their cigarettes with every gyration and discarded item of clothing; it’s definitely the singer and not the song.

Jill Ireland and her near infinte legs...

Terry arrives at the club just as a black dancer (Faye Craig) gives the film’s most overtly sexual performance – just as with Pascaline in Beat Girl… the differing moral standards of the age towards “native” dance and expression? He settles down to a short and salty exchange with Joe Lucas (Brian Weske) a lower league but established criminal who none-the-less has more street smarts.

Backstage, star attraction Sue, who is fending off the advances of club owner and gutter entrepreneur, Jacko Fielding (John Chandos) before taking to the stage. Sue’s dance is perhaps more graceful and composed than you’d expect in such a dive but Jill Ireland simply acts her way through it with a range of expressions that conveys much beyond the choreographed physical routine. With the occasional cut-away to an increasingly distracted Terry, she’s defiant, alluring and ultimately in control of the room. You get the feeling there could have been a much deeper story here.

But. Not today… what we get is not enough character development and a story that, whilst competently directed by Charles Saunders, falls between the twin stools of titillation, crime and socially aware drama.

Grumpy breakfast with mum and his ol' dad.

Terry’s tense breakfast with his belligerent Dad (Thomas Gallagher) and long-suffering mother (Edna Doré) starts with a close-up of a fry-up and abrasive exchanges that almost lead to violence; they’re a family on the brink and Terry’s either going to put up or shut up. The headline in The Daily Express tells him there is no going back as it’s revealed that his mugging has turned into a murder.

But no one seems to take Terry seriously and as the girls in the club, Dimples, Margo (Anne Scott) and another (Gillian Watt) laugh at him he slaps out and is floored by a fierce straight right from Dealer (Fred Griffiths). Terry just hasn’t got what it takes and just doesn’t know it and as Sue takes pity on him, getting him laid out in her dressing room her quickly turns from grateful of hateful as he forces himself on her.

Things are about to get worse for Terry though as his former partner in crime, Johnny Calvert (Kenneth Cope), gets early release from Wormwood Scrubs and comes looking for his share of the proceeds from the job that landed him in clink as well as his old love, Sue. Terry’s spent the money though, of course, but has a plan to rob the club and pay his mate back in spades.

Gillian Watt dances as Kenneth Cope and David McCallum make plans

Johnny’s hard to persuade though after making up with Sue – accepting his own part in her having to turn to this life even as Jacko is lining up a new star dancer Dolly (a brief cameo from Jacqueline Jones who was in Antonioni’s Il Grigo in 1957). Meanwhile the coppers have found the old man’s wallet and, having identified prints, are sweeping the neighbourhood trying to find the matching fingers…

Time is running out and everything will turn on the boy’s plan to rob the club – just one last job to get Johnny the money to get away with Sue and Terry’s only hope of escaping the law. What do you reckon’s going to happen?

Dusty Verdict: Jungle Street is very near the real thing and is saved by the grit of McCallum and the grace of Ireland. There’s decent support all round and you do end up caring about – most – of the characters although Terry’s a particularly un-redeeming character which, to be fair, is the point; we keep on expecting him to turn the corner but he can’t and whatever he sows, he reaps. Plenty of character actors to spot and there’s a smashing turn from Meier Tzelniker as elderly jeweller Mr. Rose. Shirley Anne Field has a bit part too although she doesn’t dance.

Attentive audience

Vanda Hudson

Marian Collins

Faye Craig

Jill Ireland

Anne Scott

Gillian Watt

John Chandos and Jacqueline Jones who had a much bigger role in Antonioni's acclaimed Il Grido (1957)