St. Trinians - The Pure Hell Of St. Trinians [DVD] [1960]

Product Information

Malcolm Arnold: The Belles of St. Trinians – Comedy Suite: Orchestra". Music Room . Retrieved 10 October 2021. Thumim, Janet. "The popular cash and culture in the postwar British cinema industry". Screen. Vol.32, no.3. p.259. The action gets more frantic and less amusing as it goes along and, by the end of the whole thing, I'd pretty much lost interest in it. The cast are reasonably good. The girls are in two camps – the young thugs and the sexy `girls' (albeit it they are happily in their 20's). The support cast includes good performances from George Cole (complete with cheeky chappy music in case you didn't get it). Parker and Grenfell are OK but their stuff on the island doesn't really wash. Barker and Walters are fine, as is a cameo from Le Mesurier, but Sid James is pretty wasted. Goodwin, Stephen (October 22, 1998). "Revealed: belles of the real St Trinians". The Independent. Archived from the original on 2022-05-24 . Retrieved April 23, 2017.

Prominent among the older girls is Georgina, played by James Mason's daughter Portland Mason, in her penultimate film before she retired from acting. Portland, apparently named after Portland Hoffa and not the city in Oregon, was about 17 at the time the film was made. It's not entirely clear if the characterisation of the new Schools Minister as corrupt is anti-Labour or simply anti-politicians. It's probably the latter, especially as Launder and Gilliat were originally considered to be quite left wing and were even considering making a Karl Marx biopic at one point. Perhaps that changed, because the next film in this series, The Wildcats of St. Trinian's, would definitely show an anti-trade union stance, and therefore a touch of Thatcherism.Screenplay Frank Launder, Sidney Gilliat, Val Valentine Producers Frank Launder, Sidney Gilliat Cinematography Stanley Pavey Art director Joseph Bato Editor Thelma Connell Music Malcolm Arnold Costume designer Anna Duse Filming took place in April–May 1954. The opening scenes of the girls returning to school were filmed at what is now the All Nations Christian College near Ware, Hertfordshire. This includes the entrance gate of Holycross Road and the outside shots of the school. [7] The bulk of the film was shot at Shepperton Studios near London. The film's sets were designed by the art director Joseph Bato. A poem in one of Searle's books called "St Trinian's Soccer Song", by D. B. Wyndham Lewis and Johnny Dankworth, states that the motto is Floreat St Trinian's ("May St Trinian's Bloom/Flourish"), [12] a reference to the motto of Eton ( Floreat Etona—"May Eton Flourish").

Sim's performance turns the matronly Miss Fritton into a memorable creation. She oversees the school like a mother hen, appreciating as much as tolerating its foibles, regarding her charges with indulgence, and turning a blind eye to their worst failings.Frankie Howerd plays the lead crook, Alfred Askett, whose front operation is as a fancy male hairdresser, "Alphonse of Monte Carlo". Howerd's character has a little fake quiff that he removes when the customers have gone, which must be some sort of in-joke, as it means that the famously badly wigged Howerd is wearing another wig on top of his actual one. Malcolm Arnold's score also adds to the film's air of jollity, and is entertaining and inventive enough to make you regret his move into war films and dramas later in the decade, where he tended to recycle the same themes. Arnold's skills were better displayed in his earlier films, including David Lean's The Sound Barrier(1952) and Hobson's Choice(1954).

The Terror of St Trinians or Angela's Prince Charming (1952; text by Timothy Shy, pen-name for D. B. Wyndham Lewis) According to Mark Simpson in his book Alastair Sim: The Real Belle of St. Trinian's, Alastair Sim was originally offered only the part of Miss Fritton's brother Clarence. But when Launder and Gilliat were unable to find an actress to play the role of the headmistress, he suggested he could play both roles. THE PURE HELL OF ST. TRINIAN'S is the third of the initial four films, coming hot on the wake of the very good BLUE MURDER AT ST. TRINIAN'S. This one's not as hot, as it feels like the series was winding down by now, the gags are limited and it's more like an endless parade of cameoing guest stars, including the likes of Sid James, Thorley Walters and the ubiquitous Michael Ripper.

Rate And Review

Six years had passed since the lastSt. Trinian'sfilm, The Pure Hell of St. Trinian'sin 1960, and of the three principal mainstays of the series, Alastair Sim, Joyce Grenfell and George Cole, only George Cole now remains as Flash Harry, the school's former boot boy who runs the girls' bets and aids them in their various schemes. For those who are interested, St Trinian's School and its home in the fictional county of Barsetshire seems to be located in the Home Counties, west of London. Presumably somewhere near Berkshire, as this film makes reference to Newbury Races and the sequel, Blue Murder at St. Trinian's,has a signpost near the school showing that it's 10 miles from Wantage. The county name of Barsetshire is borrowed from the novels of Anthony Trollope. Malcolm Arnold's comic sensibilities serve him particularly well in The Belles of St. Trinian's.His main theme is a rambunctious version of the school song, raggedly played as if it's being bashed out by the school orchestra. Flash Harry also gets his own theme, a high speed comical march, to complement his shifty shuffle. The concept was very clever and although I still enjoyed it, I would have liked to have seen more jokes and perhaps, as with the last film, another 15-20 minutes to help the pace and give room for extra pranks and plots.