Film Review
The film that was intended to revive the flagging careers of two once
legendary personalities proved in fact to be the final nail in the
coffin for both of them. A highly popular musical hall act who
had started appearing in films as early as 1937, Arthur Lucan's Old
Mother Riley looked
like a relic from a bygone era by 1950 and his/her last few films had been
very ill-received. Likewise, Bela Lugosi, the original screen Dracula,
was now well past his prime and had difficulty finding work to stave
off encroaching poverty. The only thing that Lucan and Lugosi had
in common (other than the fact that their names began with the same
letter) was that they were faded stars who should have been put out to
grass years ago,
Lugosi's story was particularly tragic. In the summer of 1951,
the 70 year-old actor had hoped to make a comeback in a stage
production of
Dracula in
England. Alas, the show failed to attract an audience and closed
not long after it had opened. Virtually penniless, Lugosi did not
even have enough money to pay for his return trip to the United States
and was stranded in England. It was through the intervention of
producer Richard Gordon that Lugosi found his way into the next (and
final) Old Mother Riley film. The stage was set for one of the
most unlikely team-ups in cinema history - and one of the most
disastrous.
Mother Riley Meets the Vampire
marked a new low in Bela Lugosi's career and was pretty well
universally reviled. Today, it is still widely considered one of the
absolute low points of British comedy, with Lucan and Lugosi both
looking worn and visibly struggling to make anything of the
sub-amateurish material they are lumbered with. It's a credit to
both actors, and their supporting cast (which includes a fair
smattering of well-loved comic performers), that the film holds up as
well as it does.
The chaotic, thoroughly illogical mess that purports to be a script
ought to have made the film unwatchable, indeed virtually
unmakeable. Fortunately, the gusto that everyone brings to the
film salvages it and makes it passable entertainment. Director
John Gilling deserves some credit for his work, offering a few cheeky
nods to the old Universal horror films which had originally made Lugosi
a star. From this far from auspicious beginning, Gilling would go
on to direct some classic British horror films, including Hammer's
The
Reptile (1966) and
The Plague of the Zombies
(1966).
Mother Riley Meets the Vampire
is not quite so bad as its reputation would have you believe.
Indeed, if you approach it in the right frame of mind, it is actually
quite fun. Had a little more time and thought gone into the
script, the Lugosi-Lucan pairing could have worked pretty well.
Lugosi still manages to send a shiver down the spine (thanks in part to
some atmospheric lighting and camerawork) and Lucan's destructive
exploits can still extract a good laugh or two. No one would ever
mistake this for a comedy masterpiece but it has a certain charm, and
on a sufficiently rainy day, it might be just what you need to lift
your spirits.
© James Travers 2010
The above content is owned by filmsdefrance.com and must not be copied.
Film Synopsis
Baron Van Housen has grand ambitions. He intends to build an army
of killer robots and take over the world. He is also quite mad
and believes he is descended from a vampire, which is why he sleeps in
a coffin and has been busy abducting pretty young women. So far,
the evil baron has built only one robot, which is being shipped over
from Ireland. To build more, he needs uranium, and this he hopes
to acquire by stealing a chart which will show the location of a huge
uranium mine. The chart is in the possession of Julia Lauretti,
the daughter of the mine's owner, so Van Housen wastes no time in
abducting her and bringing her to his secret hideout in England.
The baron takes delivery of a crate, but instead of his robot, he finds
a collection of useless household objects. Realising that his
delivery has been mixed up with another, the baron traces the location
of the robot and guides it, by remote control, to his
headquarters. The robot has in fact been delivered by mistake to
a grocers' shop owned by Old Mother Riley, who had been expecting to
receive her share of an inheritance from a recently deceased
relative. The robot abducts the old woman and takes her to the
baron's house, where she receives a more than courteous welcome from
the baron, since she is his favourite blood group. Thinking that
her host has succumbed to her subtle feminine charms, Mrs Riley
agrees to stay at the baron's house and perform some light cleaning
duties, for which she is handsomely paid and generously fed on steak
and liver. When she realises what the baron is really up
to, Old Mother Riley flies into a panic. Teaming up with the
housemaid Tilly and her constable boyfriend Freddie she sets out to
thwart the baron's dastardly scheme. First, there is that
homicidal robot to attend to...
© James Travers
The above content is owned by filmsdefrance.com and must not be copied.