Rating: C-
Dir: Edward G. Whiting
Star: Christabel Leighton-Porter, Michael Hogarth, Ian Colin, Peter Butterworth
Even though this isn’t very good, it’s the kind of weirdness for which I love Tubi. This was based on a incredibly successful and surprisingly risqué comic-strip, which ran in the Daily Mirror for more than a quarter century, beginning in 1932. Over the years various, largely unsuccessful efforts were made to translate its popularity to other media. There was a TV series starring Glynis Barber, and a little later, Jane and the Lost City. Neither left much impression on collective culture, and nor did this. I think by the time it came out in 1949, the Jane-mania of the war (during which Churchill called her Britain’s “secret weapon,” for her morale-boosting efforts on British soldiers), had faded from the consciousness.
Leighton-Porter, in her only screen role, was certainly the right person to play Jane, having taken over as the artist’s model for the strip in 1940 [she replaced the wife of cartoonist Norman Pett, which must have made for an awkward conversation]. However, the results here are severely hamstrung by the film censorship then in place, which was considerably stricter than for newspaper drawings. Those could on occasion get away with much more. Here, there’s a couple of incidents where Jane followed the comic-strip approach of being accidentally separated from her outer clothing. But it’s hardly going to get the audience’s blood pressure up. If you’re expecting something like the “nudie cuties” of early Russ Meyer, you’ll be highly disappointed.
The plot is so flimsy as to be almost a nothing-burger. Jane is a music-hall artist, though we never are told precisely what her act involves. I imagine the audience at the time will have known Leighton-Porter toured doing striptease – or, as close as forties regulations would permit (in particular, only stationary nudity was permitted!). She is given a bracelet by an admirer, but it turns out to be part of a plot to smuggle diamonds. If you can’t think of a better way to achieve that end, you’re not trying very hard. Slightly amusing shenanigans occur, involving a yacht, Jane’s abduction and a car chase. Plus, entirely irrelevant to the story, you get future Carry On star Butterworth, as a drunk who ends up in bed with Jane’s dachshund, Fritz.
So, like Bitter Desire yesterday, it’s hardly erotic, not exactly thrilling, and the humour is… Well, I will admit I did laugh at this exchange between a couple dining in a restaurant and the manager.
– Do you serve crabs here?
– We serve anybody, sir.
– Tell me, have you got cow’s feet?
– No, madam, it’s tight shoes that make me walk like that.
Ok, it’s hardly great comedy. Yet it fits very nicely with the vaudeville theme, and I wish they had leaned fully into those kinds of jokes. Instead, I can understand why the audience at the time apparently couldn’t be bothered. The main point to a contemporary viewer is likely as a time capsule, offering a glimpse back to life in the period just after World War II.