Join the Jolly Jaunty Jalopies Jetting and Jesting along the comedic road of yesteryear.
The great thing about cinema is that it takes you to times and places that you normally wouldn’t travel to without the aid of this modern marvel of storytelling. Instead of watching auto racing in modern slick cars whizzing around a track very fast in a dizzying circle, you get to travel through the 1920’s European countryside in antique cars which zoom and clunk its to Monte Carlo.
Watching Nascar you may see an interview with a rather normal guy with commercial logos everywhere on his and his car’s being. In ‘Jaunty Jalopies’ you get to meet not so normal eccentric folk who today might be on some type of medication.
There’s Chester Schofield (Tony Curtis) a hip roaring 20‘s American car manufacture who owns half a car manufacturing plant that he won in a card game. The other half is owned by Sir Cuthbert Ware-Armitage (Terry-Thomas) the son of Sir Percy Ware-Armitage (Terry-Thomas). His father was the big louse of a villain who tried to scheme and cheat his way to victory during the 1910 Airplane race which can be seen in ‘Jaunty Jalopies' predecessor ‘Those Magnificent Men in Their Flying Machines or How I Flew from London to Paris in 25 hours 11 minutes (1965). Same writer and director also.
Sir Cuthbert doesn’t want Yank innovation spoiling British ingenuity and uses the Monte Carlo Rally as a chance to place a bet with Chester where winner takes all of the car plant. The bet is on. The Race is On. The nastiness is on as Sir Cuthbert pleads and plots dastardly plans to make sure Chester doesn’t win the race.
The other characters who race along the road of comedy include
Perkins (Eric Sykes): Cuthbert’s un-loyal side kick who is forced into helping Cuthbert’s nasty schemes due to his being blackmailed.
Betty (Susan Hampshire): A woman who went looking for her horse and instead became Chester’s race car companion.
Major Dawlish (Peter Cook): a proud British inventor and his loyal sidekick
Lt. Barrington (Dudley More): Their innovations to their auto mobile sometimes work great and other times not so great. These two provide the biggest laughs in film and thus the most smiles.
Willy (Gert Frobe): A highly recommended getaway driver sprung from prison to smuggle stolen Jewels for a bunch of German crooks. He is accompanied by his companion on the journey Count Levinovitch (Jack Hawkins). There is a great scene where the Count breaks Willy out of prison. After that these two are only mildly amusing throughout the rest of the picture except when shown in rivalry with Dawlish and Barrington.
Then there are the other major throw-away characters which include two cops
Marcello (Lando Buzzanca) and Angelo ( Walter Chiari). One is somewhat normal and the other is overly horny. He practically assaults won of the other female drivers by dragging her into his hotel room.
Which brings us to the trio of french female drivers (Mireille Darc, Marie Dubois and Nicoletta Macchiavelli) A female doctor and her patawon’s. They provide the minimal and restrained compared to now, suggestive humor including fleeting partial nudity which may make this unsuitable for family viewing.
If you want a good car comedy race movie with interesting characters, great action gags, and some amusing chuckles watch ‘Jaunty Jalopies’. If your a student of slapstick university there are some great moments throughout the film to watch and study. But as a whole it’s just plain good. If you want a great film of the same genre, watch Tony Curtis (yet again) in the superior ‘The Great Race’, which probably has the best pie fight put on film since Laurel and Hardy. No pie fight in JJ. Some amusing sights, including a chase through a ski slope and Jimmy Durante singing the opening song, but again no pie fight.
I remember watching pie fights with the three stooges and also on the Brady Bunch and thought’ It would be fun to get into a pie fight.’ In college I shoved an apple pie in a friend’s face to see what would happen. I learned that pie’s in the face is very uncomfortable and annoying. And if you want a terrible car comedy race movie watch ‘The Cannonball Run 2) but I would stick with the Tony Curtis racing films.
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