"It’s all about a Dad . . . a Draftee . . . and a Detonation heard round the camp!"
Sergeant Grimshawe wants to retire in the flush of success by winning the Star Squad prize with his very last platoon of newly called-up National Servicemen. But a motley bunch they turn out to be, and it's up to Grimshawe to put the no-hopers through their paces.
Bob Monkhouse
Private Charlie Sage
William Hartnell
Sergeant Grimshawe
Shirley Eaton
Mary Sage
Eric Barker
Captain Potts
Dora Bryan
Norah
Bill Owen
Corporal Bill Copping
Charles Hawtrey
Private Peter Golightly
Kenneth Connor
Private Horace Strong
Kenneth Williams
Private James Bailey
Sergeant Grimshawe wants to retire in the flush of success by winning the Star Squad prize with his very last platoon of newly called-up National Servicemen. But a motley bunch they turn out to be, and it's up to Grimshawe to put the no-hopers through their paces.
I suppose that this first of the "Carry On" films suffered quite definitely from being all to easily compared with the far funnier and potent wartime efforts of the likes of Will Hay and Norman Wisdom. These latter efforts had a far more immediate sense of blackened humour given that bombs were frequently dropping around them all as the films were being made. This is more of a compendium of satire and smut that struggles to build on quite a weak story, some rather puerile dialogue and a remarkably lacklustre effort from a team who seemed just a little too tentative and out-of-sorts to string the flimsy plot out. That story centres around the desire of "Sgt. Grimshawe" (William Hartnell) to retire in a blaze of glory by taking his ramshackle squadron of half-baked boys and girls and turn them into the winner of the "Star Squad" award. What ensues is slapstick-lite, with punchlines you can see from space and some really quite bland stereotypical characterisations of the nice but dim, the clever but hapless and the sexually frustrated - none of which really worked for me. It's barely eighty minutes long buy it felt longer and I was a bit bored with it by mid-way through. Better to come - well you'd hope so.
A by-the-book Captain is ordered to capture a strategic village in Italy. The Italian soldiers are willing to surrender, if they can have a festival first. The lieutenant convinces the Captain this is the only way. Because of aerial reconnaissance, they must look like they are fighting. To sort this out an intelligence officer is sent in. Meanwhile the festival gets complicated with the Mayors daughter.
Topper Harley is found to be working as an odd-job-man in a monastery. The CIA want him to lead a rescue mission into Iraq, to rescue the last rescue team, who went in to rescue the last rescue team—who went in to rescue hostages left behind after Desert Storm.
The gang that created Airplane! and The Naked Gun sets its sights on Top Gun in this spoof. Topper Harley is a talented but unstable fighter pilot with an axe to grind: clearing the family name. His mission is to avenge his father and save a mission sabotaged by greedy weapons manufacturers. He also gets involved in a relationship with Ramada Thompson, a woman with an unusually talented stomach. Hot Shots! makes fun of a variety of other films, from Dances with Wolves to The Fabulous Baker Boys.
Major Benson Winifred Payne is being discharged from the Marines. Payne is a killin' machine, but the wars of the world are no longer fought on the battlefield. A career Marine, he has no idea what to do as a civilian, so his commander finds him a job - commanding officer of a local school's JROTC program, a bunch of ragtag losers with no hope.
Carry On favourite Barbara Windsor makes her debut in this outrageous send-up of the James Bond movies. Fearless agent Desmond Simpkins and Charlie Bind, aided and abetted by the comely Agent Honeybutt and Agent Crump, battle against the evil powers of international bad guys STENCH and their three cronies.
The working-class Smiths change their initially sunny views on World War I after the five boys of the family witness the harsh reality of trench warfare.
As a swinging fashion photographer by day and a groovy British superagent by night, Austin Powers is the '60s' most shagadelic spy. But can he stop megalomaniac Dr. Evil after the bald villain freezes himself and unthaws in the '90s? With the help of sexy sidekick Vanessa Kensington, he just might.
Involuntarily-retired Colonel Hyde recruits seven other dissatisfied ex-servicemen for a special project. Each of the men has a skeleton in the cupboard, is short of money, and is a service-trained expert in his field. The job is a bank robbery, and military discipline and planning are imposed by Hyde and second-in-command Race on the team, although civilian irritations do start getting in the way.
An American doughboy, stationed in France during the Great War, goes on a daring mission behind enemy lines and becomes a hero.
A spoof of the entire 1940s detective genre. San Francisco private detective, Lou Pekinpaugh is accused of murdering his partner at the instigation of his mistress—his partner's wife.