{"id":6311,"date":"2011-06-23T22:23:17","date_gmt":"2011-06-24T02:23:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/?p=6311"},"modified":"2011-06-23T22:23:17","modified_gmt":"2011-06-24T02:23:17","slug":"the-bed-sitting-room-1969-richard-lester","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/archives\/6311","title":{"rendered":"The Bed Sitting Room (1969, Richard Lester)"},"content":{"rendered":"

I was disappointed to not understand this one very well. I appreciated that a movie with a dull-as-dirt period-drama-sounding title turned out to be a post-apocalyptic absurdist comedy, but all the references to British places and culture flew over my uncultured American head, leaving me only with some Airplane-style puns and the welcome sight of Marty Feldman (in his first film, hence the “introducing” title card, though he was already a TV star with his own show).<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

I suppose the central characters, if there are any, are a young couple in love (Rita Tushingham of The Knack<\/em>, with a great surname for comedy, and Richard Warwick of If…<\/a><\/em>) and her parents, mother Mona Washbourne (of Billy Liar<\/em>), who eventually turns into a (perhaps Dali-inspired) cupboard due to nuclear mutation, and father Arthur Lowe (the only actor I liked in The Ruling Class<\/a><\/em>), who later turns into a parrot. Captain\/Doctor Bules Martin (Michael Hordern, memorable as Jacob Marley in Scrooge<\/a><\/em>) marries the girl after paying off her father, but she still only sleeps with Richard Warwick. Ralph Richardson (butler in The Fallen Idol<\/a><\/em>) is Lord Fortram, who mutates into a bed sitting room (just a one-room apartment, I guess), where everybody gathers for the climax.<\/p>\n

The BBC:
\n<\/p>\n

Some stuff I liked: Frank Thornton (Are You Being Served<\/em>) is a newsman who wears the top third of a ragged suit and frames himself with a TV cutout. “I am the BBC, as you can see.” Also, the short-lived third world war is referred to as “the nuclear misunderstanding.” When the men think they’re being addressed by God, they sing “for he’s a jolly good fellow”.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

The fourth movie I’ve seen with famed comedian Spike Milligan and I still don’t know who he is – the closest I got was recognizing which character he played in History of the World Part 1<\/a><\/em>. Here he played “Mate,” whatever that means. Perhaps he’s the guy driving a wrecking ball with Dudley Moore.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Looking at the screen shots after the fact, it seems like a much more remarkable movie.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I was disappointed to not understand this one very well. I appreciated that a movie with a dull-as-dirt period-drama-sounding title turned out to be a post-apocalyptic absurdist comedy, but all the references to British places and culture flew over my uncultured American head, leaving me only with some Airplane-style puns and the welcome sight of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[410,198,102,701],"class_list":["post-6311","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-movie","tag-1960s","tag-apocalypse","tag-britain","tag-richard-lester"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6311","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6311"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6311\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6393,"href":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6311\/revisions\/6393"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6311"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6311"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6311"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}