the audience applauded

Admirable film.

A Disappointing Continuation

It’s not bad or unwatchable but despite the amplitude of the spectacle, the end result is underwhelming.

When a German bomb lands on a crypt, the explosion lets out the ghost of a bad old earl, and lets loose a roundabout plot involving a decayed aristocrat, his tenant, who wishes to enclose a cricket pitch annoying the local villagers, Richard Greene, who has shown up to look at some recently revealed old manuscripts and his real life wife, Patricia Medina, as the earl's daughter.There's a fair amount of well-constructed social satire in this production, as well as some good jokes, and the amount of silliness increases at a steady pace throughout, as the ghost becomes more and more active in setting things right. A goodly number of screen comics get a chance to amuse the audience, particularly Edward Rigby as the butler, Moore Marriott as the inevitable ciderhouse layabout and Joan Hickson, when she was merely middle-aged -- doubtless, if she ever appeared in any movies when she was young, they were produced by Robert W. Paul.Although the movie becomes a bit too cartoonish for my taste at the three-quarters mark, it recovers itself nicely at the end and makes its points, humorous, dramatic and serious, nicely by the end.

Peter Hayward (Richard Greene) leads the villagers in the town of Chaunduyt (pronounced "Condwit") against a landowner, Mr Pike (Alfred Drayton), who refuses to allow animals onto his land and wants to plough up the cricket pitch. Peter is helped by a ghost (Richard Bird) who has been released from the walls of a stately home after it has been hit by a German bomb. Hey, it might be a British bomb, after all, we now know that in every war it seems traditional to kill your own troops in some way. The film climaxes with a court scene and a surprise revelation.I was hoping for a good ghost story but it is far from that. Unfortunately, this is another example of British silliness. The ghost as played by Richard Bird is hardly in the film and when he does appear, he is portrayed as a friendly buffoon. Another buffoon who I suspect was meant to court sympathy was the "Butler" as portrayed by Edward Rigby. We have tedious sections at the beginning of the film where every time he moves around the stately home, he is accompanied by comedy music. I found him irritating. There are some funny touches, eg, the fact that everyone in the village has the same name due to inbreeding throughout the years (a hot topic especially with the royal family) and this film gives us the original dilemma over the pronunciation of the surname "Bucket"...... or is that "Bouquet"? If you like silly British nonsense, then you will enjoy this film. It's not a catastrophe but it is a disappointment.

A pleasant and amusing but far from brilliant old British comedy, more often than not it is too silly for its own good, and some of the comedy bits are a bit awkward. The biggest problem with it all is however that the plot is tad too complex, in view of the light-hearted manner in which the material is treated. Still, the film certainly has its fair share of virtues. The cinematographer makes good use of lime lapse and zooming, plus the set design is interesting. Having Moore Marriott on hand is always a good thing too, even though this time he is not quite as delightful as usual. The special effects are okay for the time, and so is the overall quality of the picture. It is nothing really special, but it is quite satisfactory stuff.

Chaunduyt is rather like Brigadoon, locked in time centuries before. A bomb hits the castle and manages to awake a ghost, who is rather a jolly old soul. Word gets out about the ghost, and other findings, and suddenly the manor is open to tourists, and newcomers flood Chaunduyt, not all with good intentions. A young professor is most interested in some ancient manuscripts - and the current Earl's daughter - but he ends up getting much more involved, in a fight with the villagers, aided by the ghost, over some developers who want to bring Chaunduyt a little more up to date.Fairly amusing. 6/10