Two Left Feet
Directed byRoy Ward Baker
Written byRoy Ward Baker
John Hopkins
Based onIn My Solitude
by David Stuart Leslie
Produced byRoy Ward Baker
Leslie Gilliat
StarringMichael Crawford
Nyree Dawn Porter
CinematographyWilkie Cooper
Harry Gillam
Edited byMichael Hark
John Pomeroy
Music byPhilip Green
Production
company
Roy Ward Baker Productions
Distributed byBritish Lion Film Corporation (UK)
Release date
March 1963
Running time
93 minutes
CountryUnited Kingdom
LanguageEnglish

Two Left Feet is a 1963 British comedy-drama film directed by Roy Ward Baker and starring Nyree Dawn Porter, Michael Crawford, David Hemmings and Julia Foster.[1] It is based on David Stuart Leslie's novel In My Solitude (1960).[2]

Plot

Alan Crabbe is a callow youth desperate for a date with any girl who can offer him the experience he lacks. Every time he tries a manful stride into the jungle of sex, his two left feet turn the attempt into a trip-and-stumble. Then he meets Eileen, the new waitress at the corner cafe, and sparks begin to fly.

Cast

Soundtrack

Tommy Bruce sings "Two Left Feet" over the opening credits of the film; later Susan Maughan sings "Where Were You When I Needed You?" .

Release

Baker's expectations were high, hoping to attract wide popularity with a young audience, since most of the film's leading players were under 21. In his memoirs he writes: "The cast turned out to be one of the best I've ever had. They were all terrific and the film turned out well."[3] But there were difficulties obtaining a release. None of the actors were stars, the film was given an X Certificate,[4] and it was eventually released on a poorly promoted double bill, after a delay of two years.[5]

Baker called it "A disaster. I fiddled around, tried to make a picture of my own which I did, put money into it. That was a nice little picture, with a wonderful cast... and I was quite pleased with it, but nobody wanted to show it, nobody wanted to see it, we couldn’t get a circuit release and so I went into television."[6]

Reception

Kine Weekly said "Drama of modern teenagers and their love lives, with a strong odour of the kitchen sink. . ... The film is a commercial contradiction, a young romance designed for young audiences and barred to them by the X certificate. The picture fails on nearly all counts. ... It is a pity that such a promising young actor as Michael Crawford. ... should be wasted on such unrewarding toil".[7]

In the New Statesman John Coleman wrote "Hesitantly, though, to be recommended for the vestigial sense of teenage loyalties communicated: anxiety about a mate engaged to a bird who may be well into her twenties, general ganging up – and not necessarily with knives – against the adult scene."[8]

Variety called the film a "flimsy, ill-developed pic concerned with the turbulence of adolescence; disappointing and unlikely to make much of a mark at the box office. ... It is difficult to pin down just what has gone wrong with Two Left Feet, but with the exception of Miss Porter and, occasionally, Crawford, it has the look of a very tired piece of old hattery."[9]

Monthly Film Bulletin said: "The best of this film is comically true to life; ... The plot, like the dialogue, runs into entertaining little byways that lead nowhere, but which do suggest an observation slightly above average."[10]

Leslie Halliwell opined: "Ponderous sex comedy with no apparent purpose but some well observed scenes."[11]

References

  1. ↑ "Two Left Feet". British Film Institute Collections Search. Retrieved 10 November 2023.
  2. ↑ David Stuart Leslie, In My Solitude (London: Hutchinson, 1960).
  3. ↑ Baker, Roy Ward (2000). The Director's Cut: A Memoir of 60 Years in Film and Television. London: Reynolds & Hearn Ltd. p. 117. ISBN 1-903111-02-1.
  4. ↑ Geoff Mayer, Roy Ward Baker, page 37 (Manchester University Press, 2004). ISBN 0-7190-6354-X
  5. ↑ Geoff Mayer, pages 37-38.
  6. ↑ Fowler, Roy (October–November 1989). "Roy Ward Baker Interview" (PDF). British Entertainment History Project. p. 214.
  7. ↑ "Two Left Feet". Kine Weekly. 575 (3004): 16. 29 April 1965.
  8. ↑ Coleman, John (1 January 1965). "Left Behind". New Statesman. 69: 774.
  9. ↑ "Two Left Feet". Variety. 238 (13): 30. 19 May 1965.
  10. ↑ "Two Left Feet". Monthly Film Bulletin. 32 (372): 96–97. 1 January 1965.
  11. ↑ Halliwell, Leslie (1989). Halliwell's Film Guide (7th ed.). London: Paladin. p. 1060. ISBN 0-586-08894-6.
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