I'm All Right Jack (1959)

This review is sponsored by

BUY IT

General		Extras
Category	Comedy	None
Rating
Year Of Production	1959
Running Time	100:51 (Case: 104)
RSDL / Flipper	No/No	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Menu
Region Coding	4	Directed By	John Boulting
Studio Distributor	British Lion Films Universal Pictures Home Video	Starring	Ian Carmichael Terry-Thomas Peter Sellers Richard Attenborough Dennis Price Margaret Rutherford Irene Handl Liz Fraser Miles Malleson Marne Maitland John Le Mesurier Raymond Huntley Victor Maddern
Case	?
RPI	$14.95	Music	Ken Hare

Video		Audio
Pan & Scan/Full Frame	None	English Dolby Digital 2.0 mono (224Kb/s)
Widescreen Aspect Ratio	1.66:1
16x9 Enhancement
Video Format	576i (PAL)
Original Aspect Ratio	Unknown	Miscellaneous
Jacket Pictures	No
Subtitles	None	Smoking	Yes, lots
		Annoying Product Placement	No
		Action In or After Credits	No

    Like Heavens Above, another Peter Sellers film being released at the same time, this is a satirical look at the British way of life as it was quite some time ago. This film focuses on the trade union movement, with Sellers playing chief shop steward Fred Kite in a large factory called Missiles Ltd.

    If you are old enough to remember a British TV series called The Rag Trade then you'll have some idea of what this film is like. There's a sharp divide between management, who are pictured as arrogant and upper-class, and workers, who are depicted as lazy, not over-bright, and ready to go on strike at the slightest opportunity. Caught in between the two is the head of personnel, Major Hitchcock (Terry-Thomas) who is smarmy and a bit servile to both sides.

    This is the 1950s (the film was made in 1959), so one of the hot topics is the "time and motion man". In this case, it's Mr Waters (played by John LeMesurier in his usual manner). Hitchcock is not happy, because the last time and motion man they had is still in hospital after the workers found out about him.

    To make things more interesting, we get to follow the naive Stanley Windrush (Ian Carmichael), who is looking for a job. He wants a position as a management trainee, but he is wide-eyed, well meaning, and slightly stupid (much like his later role as Bertie Wooster), and so he is rejected by employer after employer. Finally his uncle Tracepurcel (Denis Price), urged by his friend Cox (Richard Attenborough), suggests to him that he apply as a worker at Missiles Ltd. Stanley's great-aunt (the venerable Margaret Rutherford) is shocked at the idea of a upper-class gentleman as a worker, but Stanley is keen (he's always keen!) to give it a go.

    This is the start of the "fish out of water" part of the story, of course. What Stanley doesn't suspect, though, is that Tracepurcel and Cox are using him to try to foment trouble at Missiles Ltd. This part of the story emerges slowly as things progress.

    If you are young, you may not understand the title — it's a reference to the concept of the new selfishness that emerged after the Second World War, the attitude of "I'm alright, and I don't care about you", a big contrast to the idea of pulling together during the war.

    I do wonder why they felt it necessary to start and end the film in a nudist resort...

    I have seen this film before, but I was not aware that it is the second film featuring Stanley Windrush — the first was Private's Progress, made in 1956. I wonder if we'll see that one released soon?

Video

    This DVD transfer is presented in an aspect ratio of 1.66:1. It is 16x9 enhanced. I believe that to be the original aspect ratio, although I have no proof. Due to overscan, you may well not see any black bars on either side (or just very thin ones).

    The image is surprisingly sharp and clear, which is a pleasure — it's not as sharp as a modern film might be, but it looks amazingly good for a film 45 years old; the one place where sharpness fails is during each fade from one scene to another (such as at 14:50, for example). Shadow detail is good. There is some light grain, but it's never disturbing. There is no low-level noise.

    Colour is not a big feature of this monochrome movie. There is quite a decent range of tones from black to white, and no cross-colouration issues.

    There are more than a few film artefacts, but they are mostly small (not all, though — see 25:10). Considering the age of the film, the number of film artefacts is surprisingly small.

    There's only a little aliasing. There is some very minor moiré on some of the fabrics. There are no MPEG artefacts.

    There are no subtitles.

    The disc is single-sided and single layered. There is no layer change.

Video Ratings Summary

Sharpness
Shadow Detail
Colour
Grain/Pixelization
Film-To-Video Artefacts
Film Artefacts
Overall

Audio

    The soundtrack is provided in English Dolby Digital 2.0 mono, at 224kbps.

    The English dialogue is mostly clear and comprehensible, with a touch of distortion at 97:33. There are no obvious lapses in audio sync.

    The score is nothing special, but suits the film. Ken Hare is responsible for it.

    The surrounds and subwoofer get no signal from this mono soundtrack.

Audio Ratings Summary

Dialogue
Audio Sync
Clicks/Pops/Dropouts
Surround Channel Use
Subwoofer
Overall

    There are no extras on this disc.

Menu

    The menu is static and silent. The front menu offers the ability to play the movie, or to scroll through the chapter points (one at a time).

    The Region 1 release of this movie came out at the beginning of 2003, but it is essentially the same as this one, save only that it is NTSC, as opposed to this one (which is PAL).

    A satirical look at industrial relations in Britain post World War II. An older film presented rather well on DVD, albeit without extras.

    The video quality is good.

    The audio quality is quite reasonable.

    There are no extras at all.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall