Film Review
Ooh... You Are Awful is quite
possibly the only film in which Dick Emery appeared which made full use
of his comedic talents. By now one of the most popular comic
performers in Britain, Emery was able to draw massive audiences with
his television series
The Dick Emery
Show (which ran for almost twenty years without changing its
format) and his repertoire of comic grotesques was known to just about
everyone in the land. What a treat then to find Emery in his many
guises in a full-length feature film, which not only finds a place for
doddering oldster Lampwick and man-eating spinster Hettie but also
Emery's most famous creation, busty blonde Mandy, whose memorable
catchphrase (which somehow manages to bring erotic overtones to the word 'Are')
gave the film it's appropriate title.
Cliff Owen directs the film with his customary penchant for knockabout
comedy, having first directed Emery in
The Wrong Arm of the Law (1963)
and then Morecambe and Wise - another great British comedy act - in
That Riviera Touch (1966).
Owen also directed the first film outing for television's most famous
rag-and-bone men,
Steptoe and Son (1972).
Ooh... You Are Awful may be a
shameless showcase for Dick Emery but it somehow manages to knit its
comedy situations together within the framework of a gangster thriller
spoof, Francis Ford Coppola's
The Godfather and Mike Hodges'
Get Carter being two likely
influences.
Several actors familiar to British television audiences at the time -
Ronald Fraser, Derren Nesbitt, Pat Coombs, William Franklyn and Steve
Plytas - do their utmost to prevent this from being a one-man show and
provide some relief from the repetitive plot, most of which involves
Emery looking for girls with tattoos located in their nether regions
(where else?). Emery's brand of comedy, consisting mostly of
harmless innuendo and affectionate mockery of frustrated spinsters,
effeminate homosexuals and prurient vicars with buck teeth, now appears
somewhat dated and slightly suspect, but the comedian's inoffensive
personality and fiendish talent for mimicry are still a winning
combination.
Ooh... You Are Awful
isn't so much a comedy classic as a saucy picture postcard from the
1970s.
© James Travers 2015
The above content is owned by filmsdefrance.com and must not be copied.
Film Synopsis
Charlie Tully and Reggie Peek are a pair of confidence tricksters whose
latest scam, to con an Italian businessman Vittorio Ferruchi into
believing his son will marry into the British royal family, looks set
to earn them half a million pounds. Before the enterprising duo
can escape to Switzerland with their ill-gotten gains, Charlie is
arrested when he attempts to sell a dog that isn't his to a gullible
pair of tourists. Released from prison, Charlie meets up with
Reggie, not knowing that gangland boss Sid Sabbath is after his
blood. Before Reggie can pass on to Charlie the number of the
Swiss bank account where he deposited the loot, he is murdered by one
of Sabbath's henchmen. Charlie then discovers that his partner
had the account number tattooed onto the bottoms of four of his
girlfriends. As he sets about finding the four young women
Charlie is threatened not only by his old enemy Sid Sabbath, but also
by hired assassins working for the pathologically vindictive Ferruchi...
© James Travers
The above content is owned by filmsdefrance.com and must not be copied.