Customer Reviews
Wonderful Ealing Boxed Set - A Must Buy! - By: David Lusher, 24 Sep 2007 
This is a wonderful Ealing collection with four favourites to enjoy:
The Ladykillers (1955) - It never reallly got any better than this at Ealing - a comedy masterpiece. Loads of entertainment value here, from the gang of crooks posing as a string quartet, to the wonderfully dotty little old lady with a vivid imagination & a noisy parrot. Lots of nice little cameos here too (including Frankie Howerd as a frustrated barrow-boy). The casting is just perfect, including an outrageously disguised Alec Guinness as "The Professor", a "wide boy" Peter Sellers & a gangsterish Herbert Lom. The story is excellent & it's alll in colour.
Kind Hearts & Coronets (1949) - A highly entertaining black comedy about an illegitimate heir (Dennis Price) who tries to bump off eight relatives (alll played by Alec Guinness) who stand in the way of him becoming a Duke. It's a very clever story with an imaginative twist at the end. Guinness is brilliant in his galaxy of roles.
The Lavender Hill Mob (1951) - This film is one of the masterpieces of British Comedy. Alec Guinness & Stanley Holloway are an unlikely pair of "crooks". The inverted commas are there because neither the viewer nor the characters quite believe it themselves. The pair just want a bit of adventure & a taste of the high life. Guinness is brilliant as the timid bank clerk who despises the trust he is given because he knows he is seen by his superiors as too weak an individual to be a threat. That gives him the power to succeed in his daring plan. The catalyst is Stanley Holloway, a businessman with an eye for the main chance. However, he does not believe he can succeed until he meets Guinness, & Guinness does not believe that his little fantasy about robbing the bank can become a reality until he meets Holloway. When the pair meet up with a couple of real (but inept) crooks, the job is on! It's a wonderful cast & we like them so much that we hope they get away with it. It's a great story & highly entertaining.
The Man in the White Suit (1951) - A classic Ealing comedy about a scientist in a textile mill who invents a wonder fabric that won't stain, tear or wear out. The scientist becomes a target when a worried clothes company feel threatened. It nearly causes an industry-wide panic.
I highly recommend this boxed set.
The devious doings of desperate men - By: T. Bobley, 23 Jul 2006 These four Ealing Comedies are some of the funniest & most entertaining films I've watched for quite a while. All involve desperate men pursuing their obsessions in various illegal ways. In The Ladykillers, The Man in the White Suit & The Lavender Hill Mob, the main desperado is played by Alec Guinness & in Kind Hearts & Coronets Alec Guinness plays just about the entire family (both male & female members) being targeted for termination by the desperate man (played by Dennis Price). Alec Guinness is a wonderful actor - just as suited to serious parts as comedy. There's no clue from his roles in various dramas, thrillers & historical epics, just how well he can do comedy. He's pretty much the epitome of a versatile actor. It's hard to decide which of the films I liked the best. I think The Ladykillers is my favourite, with a dear old widow lady (Katie Johnson) & her husband's parrots causing Professor Marcus & his gang of robbers every kind of inconvenience & foiling alll their careful plans. The Lavender Hill Mob comes a close second. I so wanted Mr Holland (Guinness) & Mr Pendlebury (Stanley Holloway) to succeed in their hair-brained scheme. The other two films are also sparkling & funny. Joan Greenwood puts in fine performances in Kind Hearts & Coronets as a gold-digger & temptress, & The Man In the White Suit as a factory owner's spoilt daughter who proves to be brighter, kinder & more resourceful than anyone guessed. These films deserve 5*s each, but they must make do with 5*s between them. An excellent collection.
The next miserable wet weekend I'm going to watch them alll again.
A hugely enjoyable collection - By: D. Laurikietis, 09 Feb 2006 
Each of these films is a must view in it's own right but together they make an essential collection. Each retains the unique charm of the films of the era & each features a memorable performance from the late great Sir Alec Guinness.
This is a particularly interesting view for my generation who thinks of Alec Guinness & only sees Obi Wan. Likewise those well versed with his dramatic performances in Lawrence Of Arabia, A Passage to India or Bridge Over the River Kwai will be able to reallly appreciate the great thesp's range & eptitude for comedy.
Indeed it is a testament to the longevity of the films that I can enjoy them at the age of 21 (as I was when I bought this set) since they were made around 30 years before I was born.
The obvious classics such as the Ladykillers & the wonderful Lavender Hill Mob are here. Also present is The Man in The White Suit, a mixture of the scientific optimism of the atmic age & the boundless depths of good old British cynicism.
The star of the show in my opinion has to be kind Hearts & Coronets, a darkly humourous revenge story set in the Edwardian era which offers a cutting critique of British elitism while the great Sir Alec delights by playing a staggering eight roles.
The Ladykillers - By: , 30 Nov 2005 Great to see this film again...although I recollect the original to have been fully black & white, this was in colour. A reallly good storyline, stereotypical but believable characters & a land-lady who would drive the most patient person to distraction with her well delivered annoying tone & incessant interfering chatter. They dont make them like that anymore.....sadly
Delightful! - By: Andy Millward, 20 Jul 2005 A delightful collection, & evidence if evidence were needed of the brilliance of Sir Alec Guinness. These four films (along with Whisky Galore) are arguably the best known & certainly among the finest of the 110 fictional & documentary films produced by the Ealing Studios under the inspired leadership of Michael Balcon.
Although Balcon oversaw productions between 1938 & 1957, the golden years of Ealing Comedies started in 1947. These films represent a cross section, starting with the 1949 Kind Hearts & Coronets, The Lavender Hill Mob & The Man in the White Suit both from 1951, & The Ladykillers from 1955. Although classic comedies, alll four of these films possess a streak of inky darkness, & are much the better for that. The Man in the White Suit is by far the most satirical, & its arguments about the British suspicion of innovation are debatably still as true today as in 1951. These are simple stories, told with refreshing clarity, played as an ensemble & are still as fresh & witty as you'll find (just see the Hollywood remake of The Ladykillers to realise which ingredients have been lost!)
Ealing was a proving ground for British actors, young & old, many of whom cut their teeth in these films. Witness here Stanley Holloway, Cecil Parker, Dennis Price, Joan Greenwood, Sid James, Alfie Bass, Jack Warner, Katie Johnson, Herbert Lom (OK - born in Prague, but an honorary Brit!), Peter Sellers & Frankie Howerd, among many others.
These films belong in any DVD collection. Warmly recommended for the whole family.
