Review of Press for Time

When Norman passed recently,some of his better films were shown on television and the usual suspects were rolled on to offer the usual platitudes.."comedy giant...sadly missed...unique talent"..etc etc,but the fact of the matter is he was never rated by the Guardianistas who control the media because the characters he played and the people who loved him were chavs,the types who sat in the cinemas and smoked,drank Kia - Ora and laughed very loudly instead of sitting po -faced with admiration at a comedian who was so cerebral that only the truly cerebral (such as the Guardianistas themselves of course) could truly appreciate him. Mr Wisdom's true metier was the stage;give him a live audience to interact with and he would frequently set out on flights of fancy beyond any of his contemporaries,because he wasn't just a front - of - curtain comic,he was a clown and an acrobat,a mime,a singer and often an inspired improvisor. The generation home from the second world war discovered him and made him their own.He was the first true comic superstar on British TV. Inevitably he would go into motion pictures,and his comedy - pathos scthick was a box - office draw for years,but by 1966,Britain was re- inventing itself as a hedonistic,nihilistic, drug - taking,"swinging" nation where Norman's Little Man character was no longer funny but instead a figure of fun. He was also getting a bit long in the tooth to play the shy,man/boy virgin,awkward with girls at 50 years of age. Four years before, he had made his one great masterpiece "On the beat", a performance Peter Sellers would have been proud of,indeed,one he couldn't have bettered. Now,with "Press for time",although still remarkably agile and still a clever tumbler,the gags,some of which would make Jim Carrey seem like Woody Allen,were beginning to age. He seemed to be more at home playing his father than himself. The story - about the idiot son of an idiot Prime Minister being given a job on a west country newspaper - is the usual "Norman makes good" plot of all his comedies and need not concern us.Suffice it to say there are no existential moments. Many of the gags go on far too long - the bus had time to drive to Exeter before ending up predictably in the ocean - but the highlight of th film is the incomparable Mr Stanley Unwin who had saved many a movie in a three minute cameo. The colour is as fresh as a lick of paint and the scenes of 1960s Teignmouth are deliciously nostalgic for those of a certain age,but you have to sit through a lot of not particularly funny business before and after. "Press for time" is not - I would moot - a film Mr Wisdom would choose to launch a perspective of his career,but for his admirers,just about enough of his magic survives to make it worth while.