American Tom Poston (Tom Penderel) is asked by his sometimes roommate Casper (Peter Bull) to meet him at his ancestral home. Arriving at the deteriorating mansion, he discovers Casper dead and the house inhabited by Casper’s mother, dotty Agatha Femm (Joyce Grenfell), his twin brother Jasper (also Peter Bull), his uncles, sinister Roderick Femm (Robert Morley), Biblically-obsessed Potipher Femm (Mervyn Johns), and hulking Morgan Femm (Danny Green), and his cousins sleezy Morgana Femm (Fenella Fielding) and innocent Cecily Femm (Janette Scott). They all must stay at the house in order to remain an heir to the great riches acquired by their pirate ancestor. Soon other family members are murdered, and the storm prevents Tom from leaving.
Fading Hammer Studios collaborated with gimmicky showman William Castle for a remake in-name-only of Jame’s Whale’s The Old Dark House (1932). The film shares nothing except character names and its subgenre (Old Dark House horror films) with its predecessor and with the novel Benighted, which supposedly is the basis for both. This is a broad comedy, with pratfalls galore and everything tongue in cheek, reminding me more of The Ghost and Mister Chicken then anything by Whale.
What it has going for it is a great British cast, including two of the mainstays of the Post-War British Comedy movement, Grenfell and Morley. Bull, Johns, Green, and Scott are all solid as well, and while I was not familiar with Fielding, she’s up to the level of her colleagues. This is a funny group of comedians, and some of the greatest character actors of the time.
What it doesn’t have going for it is jokes. Since it’s a broad comedy, there’s no scares, no particular atmosphere, and the mystery is simple, which means the gags have to carry the film and it just isn’t funny. Outside of Poston falling down, I can’t see what was even supposed to be a joke. The Femm family members are all appropriately odd, but odd doesn’t equal funny. Poston isn’t the equal of the Brits, but he isn’t given anything to work with. A great delivery can create a joke when one isn’t there, but it’s better when that joke is there.
That doesn’t make this a bad film, But it isn’t a good one either. There’s always amusement to be had From Grenfell and Morley just being Grenfell and Morley, so I didn’t mind watching it. Apparently no one was taken with it. It was released in the US on a double-bill with a thriller, and in B&W. In England it didn’t make it to theaters for three years, and then no one cared.