Lance Percival Movies

Lionel Jeffries directed Water Babies, a children's fantasy based on the story by Charles Kingsley that incorporates live-action and animation in the tradition of The Incredible Mr. Limpet. In Dickensian London, a 12-year-old chimney sweep's apprentice named Tom (Tommy Pender) has to put up with his boss, Grimes (James Mason), and his heavy drinking. One day, in the home of a client, Tom is accused of stealing the silverware. Tom makes a run for it and leaps into a pool, where he comes across a collection of animated characters. While submerged he helps to rescue "water babies," children held hostage by an eel and a shark. ~ Paul Brenner, All Movie Guide

This comedy was the final episode in the "Confessions of.." trio. This time the characters from the previous films are cast as dreadfully untalented entertainers working in a resort. Slapstick ensues. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

In this gender-bending war drama, set during WW II, an actor, impersonating a woman, finds himself captured by Nazis. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

Zany British comedian Frankie Howerd, who'd previously laid waste to Ancient Rome in Up Pompeii, does same with World War II in Up the Front. Howerd plays a timorous servant who undergoes hypnosis. While thus entranced, he imagines himself a fearless warrior, and makes a beeline to the recruiting office. The laughs come fast and furious when Howerd finds himself the recipient of the enemy's war plans--tattooed on his tush. As was customary, Frankie Howerd took several opportunities in Up the Front to directly address the audience and crack wise about the situation at hand. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

The British farce Naughty Knights was originally shipped out as Up the Chastity Belt. Raucuous comedian Frankie Howerd, who laid waste to Roman history in the zany TV series Up Pompeii, is the star. The film's medieval adventures, involving a noble knight and his stupid serf, are punctuated by ample displays of female breasts, abdomens and thighs. As in Howerd's earlier projects, the supporting cast plays straight while the star makes snide, anachronistic comments directly at audience. This soft-core nonsense is perhaps best appreciated by fans of Frankie Howard; his suprisingly stellar supporting cast includes Bill Fraser, Anna Quayle and Eartha Kitt. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Julie Andrews made a bid to change her squeaky clean image with this elaborately mounted World War I musical. Lili Smith (Andrews) is a popular British music hall singer who is regarded as a femme fatale and has been known to throw a bit of striptease into her act. However, Lili has a secret: she's actually a German spy, and the uncle she dotes upon is really Von Ruger (Jeremy Kemp), a fellow espionage agent and her contact for the Huns. In hopes of gaining valuable information, Lili begins using her feminine wiles on Maj. William Larrabee (Rock Hudson), a top American pilot. However, Lili soon discovers that she's falling in love with Larrabee and can't find the courage to betray him; Larrabee discovers Lili's secret, but he refuses to turn her in. Darling Lili was a notorious box-office disappointment, grossing a mere $5 million on a budget that rose to $25 million due to a variety of production mishaps. Director Blake Edwards (Andrews' husband) was stung by the poor reception, and he later trimmed the 136-minute film to 114 minutes, downplaying its comic elements in favor of a more serious tone. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

The television host of a popular cooking show, Robert Danvers (Peter Sellers) has a real penchant for women. After one episode, he finds Marion (Goldie Hawn) changing from a wedding dress to street clothes. Instantly deciding to get to her and "take over" before the groom, Jimmy (Nicky Henson) has another opportunity, Robert invites her to his bachelor pad, a specially designed command center for his romantic adventures. He turns on the English gentleman's charm, only to have Marion laugh and suggest forthright that they sleep together. She moves in the following day and the two vacation in France on the Riviera and tour the wine country before returning to London. Upon their return, Robert proposes to %Marion; she rejects him in favor of Jimmy, however, who has sworn faithfulness to her and given up cheating forever. ~ Dan Pavlides, All Movie Guide

Yellow Submarine is an animated meandering journey filled with puns and dry British humor, where psychedelic music videos take precedent over any linear story. What little there is of a plot, however, concerns a vibrantly colored place called Pepperland that resembles the album cover for Sgt. Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band come to life. The swirling animation is a mixture of pop-culture images and modern artistic styles brought loosely together with a naïve antiwar message and some clever political commentary. The Blue Meanies take over Pepperland, draining it of all its color and music, firing anti-music missiles, bonking people with green apples, and turning the inhabitants to stone by way of the pointed finger of a giant white glove. As the only survivor, the Lord Admiral escapes in the yellow submarine and goes to London to enlist the help of the Beatles (voiced by actors). The charming and innocent boys travel through strange worlds and meet bizarre characters, including the tagalong Nowhere Man. Several blissed-filled musical sequences and drug references later, the Beatles drive out the Blue Meanies and restore Pepperland to tranquility armed with only music, love, and witty remarks. ~ Andrea LeVasseur, All Movie Guide

Though long defunct in the United States, the tiny production firm of Pathe continued churning out British programmers into the 1960s. Pathe's The Big Job stars Sidney James, Dick Emery and Lance Percival as a trio of none-too-bright bank robbers. Released from jail after 15 years, the intrepid trio makes a beeline for the location where they hid their stolen money. Uh, oh: the cash is squirreled away in a tree, and the tree has now been replanted in front of a police station. Thus, the "big job" of the title consists of the crooks' efforts to retrieve their swag without the Bobbies catching on. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

In this British wartime comedy, a group of captured con-artists must choose between jail terms or military service. Naturally they choose the army. Once they are assigned to a post they set up successful gambling and liquor operations. When they go overseas, they do the same thing. They are then asked to start a social club to boost morale. They do so, and the operation is only a hair's breadth away from being a brothel. They attempt to keep the joint a secret from visiting Parliamentary members, but it is not long before the cathouse is out of the bag. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

A professor of astronomy, David Garrett (Ian Carmichael), is involved with a highly confidential project to develop missiles. He runs into an old friend from the Soviet Union who is now the world chess champion. As David soon discovers, the champion is with a team working for sinister businessman Hubert Marek (Curt Jugens). Marek intends to have David abducted while making it appear as if the professor has defected. Though he narrowly escapes one trap in England, David must continually ascertain who may be in on the group's scheme if he is to survive. Director Cy Endfield enjoyed much greater success earlier in 1964 with Zulu, his historical action feature about a native uprising in Africa. David Stone wrote the screenplay for Hide and Seek, adapted by Robert Foshko from Harold Greene's story. Stone and masterful cinematographer Gilbert Taylor (A Hard Day's Night, Dr. Strangelove, Star Wars) would soon have another project in common: Roman Polanski's psychological thriller, Repulsion. ~ Kristie Hassen, All Movie Guide

Terrence Rattigan, the playwright who brought us the multicharactered, multistoried Separate Tables, again offers us an episodic cross-section of humanity in The V.I.P.'s. When a heavy London fog paralyzes all air traffic, the lives of several people are profoundly affected. As indicated by the title, most of the characters in this portmanteau film are of the social and/or financial elite. Elizabeth Taylor wishes to leave her enormously wealthy husband Richard Burton in favor of playboy Louis Jourdan. Peripatetic European film producer Orson Welles is hoping to escape London with his newest protegee Elsa Martinelli in order to avoid paying his income tax. Australian businessman Rod Taylor, accompanied by his devoted (and adoring) secretary Maggie Smith, is anxious to head to New York to stave off a hostile takeover of his firm. And impoverished aristocrat Margaret Rutherford (who won an Oscar for her performance) would rather not go to Florida to accept a job as a social arbiter, but the wolf must be kept from the door. Before the fog disperses, you can be sure that at least one of the many plotlines will intersect with another. David Frost, in a tiny part as a reporter, was fond of recalling in later years that, while the major stars of The VIPS were introduced in the opening titles with animated limousines, he was consigned a tiny Volkswagen; alas, no such cartoon joke appears in the film, though on occasion the actors-particularly Mr. Welles-behave as though they were cartoons. Mercilessly skewered by the critics, The VIPS was a winner at the box-office, due in great part to the Cleopatra-inspired publicity concerning the top-billed Liz Taylor and Dick Burton. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide