The bright, lively Hollywood movies of the 50s and 60s are getting a lot of attention in cineaste circles at the moment. As the film world celebrate the centenary of Marilyn Monroe’s birth and technicolour marvels have become firm favourites on physical media and repertory cinemas and festivals, it’s perhaps easy to see why in an age of drab streaming and lacklustre blockbusters, it’s natural to feel drawn to the last time cinema was under an existential threat and responded with vivid colour, giant musical set-pieces and iconic stars. But it wasn’t just the States that were going all out in the 50s and early 60s.
Who is Cliff Richard? Heavily marketed as the British Elvis, there was always something very wholesome and inoffensive about The Peter Pan of Pop. Though his voice was similarly beautiful, his hip thrusts are never quite convincing. This was, of course, by design. Before Beatlemania, British record producers wanted to capitalise on the interest in American Rock’n’Roll without alienating concerned parents or offending broadly conservative post-war British sensibilities. Richards was the spearhead of these “clean teen” icons, and today he’s widely known for his position within the British institution, a reputation encapsulated by his impromptu 1996 performance at Wimbledon after the game was rained off.
Studio Canal have afforded a wonderful opportunity to revisit the precarious time in British cultural history in which Richard made his name. The Young Ones was released in 1961 and, in a plot that pre-empts the legendary cult film Breakin’ 2: Electric Boogaloo (1984), Richard plays Nick, a member of a youth group under threat of closure for redevelopment by the evil millionaire Hamilton Black (Robert Morley). What none of Nick’s young friends know is that Hamilton is actually his father. Trying to keep both lives separate, Nick and the gang decide to put on a variety show to raise money to save the centre.
It’s a gentrification story but without the essential racial element that defined the post-windrush urban “renewal” programmes of the 50s and 60s. Class tension is heavily implied as a core dynamic within the film, at least in part due to Robert Morley’s gloriously pompous performance as Black, but the gang is clearly both working- and middle-class. This comes at a time of post-WW2 redevelopment, where community spaces were regularly being demolished, the portrayal of which is potentially the most rebellious part of the film. But far more coherent is the intergenerational conflict, safer ground for commercial products that capitalise on a spirit of anti-establishmentism without the rhetoric, as exemplified by the conciliatory ending between conservative father and slightly less conservative son.
So far, so British. The attempt to compete with American cultural imports takes the form of the use of technicolour and Cinemascope, both of which look glorious on the bluray. Director Sidney J. Furie (perhaps best remembered for the boundary-pushing spy thriller The Ipcress File (1965), makes bold use of these vivid colours, filling his shots with impressionistic frames of red. The Cinemascope sequences include water-skiing scenes on the beach reminiscent of the spectacle in This Is CinemaScope (1952). The highlight of the film is the midpoint rehearsal of the variety show, which includes vaudeville, rock’n’roll and group dance choreography care of the legendary Herbert Ross.
At the centre of all this is Richard, in a signature, charismatic-though-innocent performance. His performance and persona is fascinating for how carefully pitched he is. He absolutely cannot be James Dean or Elvis or similar US youth icon, but to appeal to UK teens he mustn’t be too overtly Christian Youth Brigade either. So Richard rebels, secretly, against his father, disguising his privilege in order to participate in youthful hijinks like pirate radio broadcasts of his song. Naturally his skills as a singer are showcased in sequences such as the titular song, a haunting and deeply catchy love song.
The disk also includes actor Melvyn Hayes, who portrayed one of the teens, Jimmy, recalling his time on the film with some interesting behind-the-scenes stories and amusing anecdotes. The real star of the Studio Canal disk is the transfer, which is breathtakingly vivid, and truly evocative of the big-screen spectacle of the time. When drab imagery abounds, especially in British cinema, it’s charmingly nostalgic to remember that we once tried to play Hollywood at its own game, and though the result made very little impact over there, the result is still charming here at home.