Will Hay - Where There's A Will DVD

Not quite vintage Will Hay, Where There's a Will dates from 1936--a year or two before the comic started turning out his best screen work--and casts Hay as an inept, drunken lawyer who begins the day by having the gas, phone and electricity cut off as he dryly plays off his cynical office boy (Graham Moffatt), but ends the film dressed as Santa Claus foiling a high society robbery and convincing even his stern, upper-crust brother-in-law (blustering HF Maltby) that he's earned a drink. It lacks the focus of Hay's best vehicles, with too much plot about conniving gangsters... (slinky Gina Halo, sly Hartley Power) using the "Red-Headed League" ploy of hiring the lawyer to get him out of his office so they can rob the downstairs bank, while Hay's family complications revolve around a daughter (Peggy Simpson) who idolises him and doesn't know he's a failure. There are a few vaudeville-style turns, as Hay tries to blind officious landladies or potential clients with legal nonsense or gets a teetotal butler drunk, but it's mostly running-around. Imported Yank director William Beaudine, who gets a script credit with Hay (from a Sidney Gilliat/Leslie Arliss story), basically referees the show, standing back so the star can get on with it. Hammer fans should note that editor TR Fisher is Terence Fisher, future director of The Curse of Frankenstein and other classics.--Kim Newman [show more]

Read More