My all-time favourite Ealing film, and again amazed there was no thread on a BRITISH comedy forum.
Motley crew of 5 bungling robbers pull off a heist and hold up in a gentile old lady's house until the heat is off pretending to be musicians, but they think she suspects who and what they really are, so it's decided that one of them must kill her; but Danny Green (the muscle) has other ideas and things take a hilarious turn for the worse, when greed steps in, which results in a superb ending.
Brilliantly played by Alec Guinness, Peter Sellers, Cecil Parker, Herbert Lom and aforementioned Danny Green, with the wonderful Katie Johnson as the landlady, with smaller parts for Jack Warner (police sergeant, naturally!), Frankie Howerd, Kenneth Connor, tiny Edie Martin, Stratford Johns, oh and look! There's Sam Kydd!
Ironically a younger actress was preferred over Katie Johnson as they thought she maybe too old and frail for the part, that actress died before they started filming!!
Also, and whether Alec Guinness was basing the creepy boss of the gang on him, Alastair Sim was originally going to play the part, and I've mixed feelings about that, as I've love Sim in whatever he does, and/but Alec was superb in the part.
Absolutely brilliant film, so why did the Yanks bother to remake and cock it up - effin' wasters.
