The humour in this film starts with the title. Lavender Hill is a respectable middle-class area of London, so the idea of its being associated with a "mob", in the sense of a gang of criminals, is an incongruous one. This, however, is no ordinary mob. Its leader is himself impeccably respectable and middle class. Henry Holland is the archetypal city gent, a minor official with the Bank of England. Holland is regarded by his superiors as honest and conscientious, if dull and lacking in initiative, so is entrusted with the task of escorting gold bullion from the foundry to the Bank. He is, however, rather less honest than his superiors imagine; indeed, he is obsessed with the idea of stealing the gold in his care and escaping to live a life of luxury on the proceeds. The only reason he has not yet done so is that he knows he will not be able to sell the gold on the black market in Britain and cannot think of any way of smuggling it abroad under the noses of the police and Customs.
Holland's luck changes, however, when he makes the acquaintance of Alf Pendlebury, a manufacturer of tourist souvenirs. The two come up with a scheme to melt down the gold and to export it to France in the form of golden replicas of the Eiffel Tower, painted to look like the normal leaden ones that Pendlebury manufactures for the Paris souvenir trade. All that remains is to organise the robbery itself, which they achieve with the aid of two petty criminals. Things start to go wrong, however, when some of the golden models are accidentally put on sale and brought back to England after being bought by a party of schoolgirls.
Many of the Ealing comedies had as their subject the theme of the little man, as an individual or as part of a group, taking on the system, either by fair means or by foul. A group of Scottish islanders manage to hide a cargo of stolen whisky from the authorities. The poor relation of an aristocratic family murders several relatives on his way to a Ducal title. The inhabitants of a London suburb find a legal technicality that will enable them to get round the rationing laws. "The Lavender Hill Mob" fits in with this general theme. For all his bowler-hatted respectability, Holland is very much the little man, patronised and badly paid by his employers. When he is offered a pay rise, it is only of fifteen shillings (seventy-five pence) per week. He is forced to live in a drab and seedily genteel lodging-house, similar to the one in "The Ladykillers", another Ealing film with a crime theme. The London we see in some striking black-and white photography is an equally drab place, much of it still in ruins after wartime bombing. This is a film for everyone who has ever imagined taking revenge on his boss and escaping to a better life.
Alec Guinness was one of Britain's greatest movie actors, and played a major part in the success of the Ealing comedies. His performance here as Holland is perfectly judged. Holland is a reserved, diffident English gentleman, likable enough for us to sympathise him with his despite his criminal intentions. He receives good support from Stanley Holloway as Pendlebury and Sid James and Alfie Bass as their working-class sidekicks. There are some brilliantly funny scenes, such as the one where Holland and Pendlebury entrap the two crooks and then persuade them to support their scheme and the chase sequence where the police pursue the fleeing gang.
During the fifties there was a convention, enforced by the British Board of Film Censors, that films about crime could not show the villains succeeding in their illegal enterprises, which resulted in a number of films having a surprisingly moralistic ending tacked on to them. In "Kind Hearts and Coronets" the scriptwriters were able to turn this convention to their advantage by using it to end the film with a splendidly ironic and cynical twist. The ending to "The Lavender Hill Mob", by comparison, is disappointing. Holland is so much the underdog that we end up wanting him to get away with it. The character played by Dennis Price in "Kind Hearts", by contrast, may be the "poor relation", but forfeits our sympathy because he is as cold, arrogant and snobbish as any of his richer relatives, if not more so. The ending apart, however, "The Lavender Hill Mob" represents the Ealing comedies close to their best. 9/10
Holland's luck changes, however, when he makes the acquaintance of Alf Pendlebury, a manufacturer of tourist souvenirs. The two come up with a scheme to melt down the gold and to export it to France in the form of golden replicas of the Eiffel Tower, painted to look like the normal leaden ones that Pendlebury manufactures for the Paris souvenir trade. All that remains is to organise the robbery itself, which they achieve with the aid of two petty criminals. Things start to go wrong, however, when some of the golden models are accidentally put on sale and brought back to England after being bought by a party of schoolgirls.
Many of the Ealing comedies had as their subject the theme of the little man, as an individual or as part of a group, taking on the system, either by fair means or by foul. A group of Scottish islanders manage to hide a cargo of stolen whisky from the authorities. The poor relation of an aristocratic family murders several relatives on his way to a Ducal title. The inhabitants of a London suburb find a legal technicality that will enable them to get round the rationing laws. "The Lavender Hill Mob" fits in with this general theme. For all his bowler-hatted respectability, Holland is very much the little man, patronised and badly paid by his employers. When he is offered a pay rise, it is only of fifteen shillings (seventy-five pence) per week. He is forced to live in a drab and seedily genteel lodging-house, similar to the one in "The Ladykillers", another Ealing film with a crime theme. The London we see in some striking black-and white photography is an equally drab place, much of it still in ruins after wartime bombing. This is a film for everyone who has ever imagined taking revenge on his boss and escaping to a better life.
Alec Guinness was one of Britain's greatest movie actors, and played a major part in the success of the Ealing comedies. His performance here as Holland is perfectly judged. Holland is a reserved, diffident English gentleman, likable enough for us to sympathise him with his despite his criminal intentions. He receives good support from Stanley Holloway as Pendlebury and Sid James and Alfie Bass as their working-class sidekicks. There are some brilliantly funny scenes, such as the one where Holland and Pendlebury entrap the two crooks and then persuade them to support their scheme and the chase sequence where the police pursue the fleeing gang.
During the fifties there was a convention, enforced by the British Board of Film Censors, that films about crime could not show the villains succeeding in their illegal enterprises, which resulted in a number of films having a surprisingly moralistic ending tacked on to them. In "Kind Hearts and Coronets" the scriptwriters were able to turn this convention to their advantage by using it to end the film with a splendidly ironic and cynical twist. The ending to "The Lavender Hill Mob", by comparison, is disappointing. Holland is so much the underdog that we end up wanting him to get away with it. The character played by Dennis Price in "Kind Hearts", by contrast, may be the "poor relation", but forfeits our sympathy because he is as cold, arrogant and snobbish as any of his richer relatives, if not more so. The ending apart, however, "The Lavender Hill Mob" represents the Ealing comedies close to their best. 9/10