The Belles of St Trinians
A very British take on good clean fun, the first in the St Trinian’s series stars a man in drag (Alistair Sim as the headmistress); black-stockinged six-form girls of decidedly dubious morality; and a plot that involves various parties trying to fix a horse race.
Taking its tone from the Ronald Searle cartoons which inspired the movie, Belles is knockabout farce with few of its 80 or so minutes where we are not fed something funny. Director Frank Launder, a towering figure in British cinema (Oh, Mr Porter! The Lady Vanishes, Millions Like Us...), also wrote and produced along with his regular collaborator Sidney Gilliat, controlling the project and ensuring pace and laughs never lag.
The very best of 1950s British comic talent is showcased in the film: along with Sim in two roles (the headmistress and her brother) we have Joyce Grenfell an unlikely policewoman, George Cole as the spiv Flash Harry, Richard Wattis throwing in a bit of honourable calm, and staff members Joan Sims, Beryl Reid , Hermione Baddeley and Irene Handl.
It may surprise some music-lovers that Malcolm Arnold wrote the score, which provides an energetic background for human and racehorse action alike.
Belles of St Trinian’s made half a century ago has not really dated: the unrelenting humour ; neatly amoral plot; and brilliant character acting make sure of that. But it is nevertheless very much of its time, charming and innocent in spite of goings-on that would probably have made it impossible to produce then in the USA.
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