The Girl Said No

CinemaSerf

This is another one of those films that is really only part drama and part stage show. This one sees poor old bookie “Jimmie” (Robert Armstrong) get fleeced by aspiring chanteuse “Pearl” (Irene Harvey) before being dumped, broke, from a great height. Having licked his wounds, he decides that vengeance can be sweet as he engages an out of work Gilbert and Sullivan company to lure her back to the stage. Of course, he thinks it will all go suitably pear-shaped, but it actually transpires that just about anything but occurs. Whilst Hervey does fine here, it’s really the blandness of Armstrong that lets this down. He has some of the looks of a Clark Gable but none of the charisma, and even at it’s daftest there just isn’t much chemistry between them, or indeed anyone, as this lumbers along. The last twenty minutes sees some life breathed into some of the “Mikado”, “Pirates of Penz-aunts” and "HMS Pinafore" so if you are a fan of G&S then the lined up bobbies and neatly attired kimono-clad singers do remind us not just of how quirky their works were, but also of just how popular they were with audiences of ordinary theatre goers. No, there’s not much jeopardy from the plot here, but as it moves along gently pointing out the dangers of practical joking it provides us with an amiable enough hour or so.