School rebel (If...) and coffee salesman (O Lucky Man) Mick Travis is back, this time as a reporter checking out a government funded hospital which is about to receive a Royal visit from the Queen Mother. He encounters vicious hardhat strikers, greedy and unscrupulous union bosses, mad scientist medical caregivers and a hospital administrator (Leonard Rossiter) whose heart is in the right place, but who finds himself having to descend time and again to the brute level of everybody around him. The picture painted of UK society here is grim and mean and there is less of the cheeky fun of O Lucky Man here, making the film more successful as satire but less so as madcap comedy, although that is clearly it is clearly intended as both. Britannia Hospital has its entertaining moments, though, especially with the brilliant chief of surgery (Graham Crowder) who turns out to be clearly insane and when government protocol officials show up to instruct hospital workers on the correct forms of address for the Queen Mum and nobody can understand their elite, upper crust accents! Worth a look for fans of O Lucky Man and social satire movies in general.
Just don't expect to laugh out loud a lot.
Just don't expect to laugh out loud a lot.