Passport to Pimlico (1949)

everything you have heard about this movie is true.

Awesome Movie

Great example of an old-fashioned, pure-at-heart escapist event movie that doesn't pretend to be anything that it's not and has boat loads of fun being its own ludicrous self.

There's no way I can possibly love it entirely but I just think its ridiculously bad, but enjoyable at the same time.

Written by Thomas Clarke, "Passport to Pimlico" watches as the Pimlico distinct of London learns that an ancient document authenticates it as belonging to the last Duke of Burgundy. The film then has fun watching as this tiny piece of land becomes its own nation state, complete with trade laws, no governmental ties to Britain, its own representative committee and legal councils.Clarke was renowned for writing screenplays which took seemingly absurd ideas and told them in a highly logical manner. Here he has the tiny town of Pimlico - which suddenly finds itself resembling Berlin during the post war blockades - set up passport checks, and even tax-free shopping zones (which leads to an influx of "immigrants" from Britain!). The inhabitants of Pimlico, however, soon learn that "belonging" to His Majesty's Britain has its own perks, including war-rationing, protection, food and water. They conduct night raids on Britain in an attempt to steal resources, but to no avail. The message: post war Europe is better off under the umbrella of those bumbling but loving Brits.7.9/10 - Worth one viewing.

One of Ealing's most fondly remembered comedies and for good reason; it's another one of their "little man stands up to the establishment" films, this time with the people of Pimlico sticking by their rights to be independent from Whitehall. There are some problems with the set-up - most notably with the fact that many of the problems the Pimlico citizens get into are their own fault by deliberately spiting the British government (ridiculing the police a few minutes before demanding they have police protection is a good case in point) - but overall the film gets by with its charm and almost fantastical quaintness. The satirical edge has been blunted by the passing years but for a film over 55 years old it still stands up today rather well. A glimpse into another world, really, where everybody in the district knows each other and life goes on amongst glimpses of bombed out buildings following the Blitz (for more of this sort of thing, see the earlier "Hue and Cry").The characters are an amiable lot and Stanley Holloway is a likable lead, embodying the Ealing Comedy spirit very well. Watch out also for a rather depressed pre-Carry On Charles Hawtrey, wandering in and out of the story at regular intervals. However, the absolutely wonderful Margaret Rutherford steals every one of her scenes, playing her eccentric, dotty old lady character as reliably and enjoyably as she ever did. I'm always amazed at how energetic her performances were. She was certainly one of British cinema's treasures."Pimlico", despite some story problems, remains a fun little picture that at 80 minutes doesn't out-stay its welcome, and probably gets better with repeated viewings. Well worth a go.

I'm guessing that at the time this film was made the Welsh Nationalists with their penchant for turning signposts around to confuse English tourists were more or less inactive but now that a national newspaper in England is giving away several vintage Ealing comedies dating from the forties/fifties it's possible to read Tibby Clarke's screenplay as a satire on those misguided, hot-headed Taffs. Like the same stable's Hue and Cry London bomb-sites are a feature of this feature and it does arguably serve a function as living history although it's reasonable to suppose that much of it was shot in the studio. It's not so much difficult as virtually impossible to accept that a world like this ever existed, not so much the whimsical 'plot' as the lifestyles which are totally alien to anything we know today. If you're fairly undemanding and of a mind to time-travel to another galaxy then this may well hit the spot.

I believe that what separates modern nations from the old model — and affiliations that aren't nations — is in the consistency of the national narrative. These days that is molded in cinematic terms.The much-celebrated sound bite phenomenon only works because as a shortcut it refers back to that narrative. All sound bits are cinematic. If we want to understand ourselves, we need to understand the stories we've joined.That's why I'm spending a bit of time with films that define what it means to be British. I'm not British myself, so It should be a bit easier to see. I write this shortly after terrorist attacks in London, an event which forces the UK to snap back to references of who they are. I saw this on a double bill with a quintessential Battle of Britain movie. You can see there that the whole enterprise is designed to convey a short list of characteristics. War movies are seldom about war and always about who we are.This is different. Possibly no collection of films define the Brits more than Ealing comedies. And I think this is the clearest.The setup concerns a small suburb of London. Ordinary folks... that's important.By some plot device, they become non-Brits in the midst of Britain. They cling to this, as one says they fight so hard to be non-British because they ARE British.As this unfolds, what we see is self-evaluation of what it means to belong and what the characteristics of the group are. I could list what I saw, but that's boring.Much more interesting is that everything I saw was a mild version of what we'd see later with the "Goon Show" and Monty Python. The "Minister of Silly Walks" bit seems pretty tight.Slight fun. Important. InsightfulTed's Evaluation -- 3 of 3: Worth watching.