It's Great to Be Young (1956 film)
| It's Great to Be Young | |
|---|---|
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| Directed by | Cyril Frankel |
| Produced by | Victor Skutezky |
| Written by | Ted Willis (story and screenplay) |
| Starring |
John Mills Cecil Parker |
| Music by | Louis Levy (musical director) |
| Cinematography | Gilbert Taylor |
| Edited by | Max Benedict |
Production company |
Marble Arch Productions |
| Distributed by | Associated British-Pathé (UK) |
Release dates |
|
Running time | 94 minutes |
| Country | United Kingdom |
| Language | English |
| Box office | £282,838[1] |
It's Great to Be Young is a 1956 musical Technicolor comedy film about a school music teacher, starring Cecil Parker and John Mills.[2]
Plot
Mr Dingle John Mills seeks to interest his students in music in order to enjoy life, while the headmaster Mr Frome Cecil Parker believes Dingle is ruining the children's traditional education. Mr Dingle's students come up with a way to raise money by playing to crowds in the street and persuade Mr Dingle to help them when it fails they decide to jazz it up and bring in some younger kids to help which is a success and helps them get new musical instrument with the help of one of the students parents, however when Mr Dingle ends up on the front page of the local newspaper, the headmaster locks the instruments up but the students manage to get them out the locked cupboards, rehearse and put them back without anyone noticing however when Mr Dingle gets offered a job to play the piano in his local pub he takes the offer unfortunately one of the teachers recognizes him and reports him to Mr Forme who fires him for it which results i the kids leading a strike against the school.
Cast
- John Mills as Mr. Dingle
- Cecil Parker as Frome
- John Salew as Routledge
- Elizabeth Kentish as Mrs. Castle
- Mona Washbourne as Miss Morrow
- Mary Merrall as Miss Wyvern
- Derek Blomfield as Paterson
- Jeremy Spenser as Nicky
- Dorothy Bromiley as Paulette
- Brian Smith as Ginger
- Wilfred Downing as Browning
- Robert Dickens as Morris
- Dawson France as Crowther
- Carole Shelley as Peggy
- Richard O'Sullivan as Lawson
- Norman Pierce as Publican
- Eleanor Summerfield as Barmaid
- Bryan Forbes as Mr. Parkes, Organ Salesman
- Marjorie Rhodes as Landlady
- Eddie Byrne as Morris
- Russell Waters as Mr. Scott, School Inspector
Reception
The film was one of the ten most popular movies at the British box office in 1956.[3]
BFI Screenonline writes, "It's Great To Be Young! has a fair claim to be not only one of Britain's first teenage musicals but also one of the most commercially successful of any musical made in Britain during the 1950s - it proved so popular that it allegedly caused riots in Singapore. Its virtues are those of many ABPC productions of its era, from the vibrant Eastmancolor cinematography to the immaculately-selected cast and even if some of the sixth-formers are aged in their twenties, they do sound convincing as teenagers." [4]
References
- ↑ Vincent Porter, 'The Robert Clark Account', Historical Journal of Film, Radio and Television, Vol 20 No 4, 2000 p510
- ↑ "It's Great to Be Young! (1956) - BFI". BFI.
- ↑ BRITISH. FILMS MADE MOST MONEY: BOX-OFFICE SURVEY The Manchester Guardian (1901-1959) [Manchester (UK)] 28 Dec 1956: 3
- ↑ "BFI Screenonline: It's Great to Be Young! (1956)". screenonline.org.uk.
External links
- Synopsis from Movies at AOL
- It's Great to Be Young at the Internet Movie Database
- It's Great to Be Young! at BFI Screenonline