Time Out
Charles Crichton's direction is subtle but inventive - check out the snaking, near-single-take opening in a Rio cabana - and the performances, writing and plotting are faultless.
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The Lavender Hill Mob
Alec Guinness and Stanley Holloway are gold smugglers in this crime comedy from Oscar-nominated director Charles Crichton (A Fish Called Wanda).
A retiring bank clerk (Guinness) who oversees the shipment of bullion befriends his eccentric souvenir-making neighbour and they together plot to smuggle the bank's bullion out of the country as miniature Eiffel Towers.
Winner of Best Screenplay, 1953 Academy Awards; Best British Film, 1952 BAFTAs; Best Screenplay 1951 Venice Film Festival
1951Rating: G78 minsUK
ComedyCrimeClassic
- Director:
- Charles Crichton ('A Fish Called Wanda', 'Dead of Night', 'The Stranger in Between')
- Writer:
- T.E.B. Clarke
- Cast:
- Alec GuinnessStanley HollowayAlfie BassSidney JamesMarjorie FieldingEdie MartinJohn SalewRonald Adam
The Lavender Hill Mob / Reviews
Daily Telegraph
Both a joyous comedy and a tense thriller. Indeed, its climactic car-chase sequence is easily as dramatic as any of those found in today's summer blockbusters.
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The Guardian
It's tremendously good fun, though lighter in tone than Ealing's two scabrous masterpieces Kind Hearts and Coronets and The Ladykillers...
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