Even though this limerick does not appear in this delightful farce, there is a sequence where the imagination does take over, given the viewer the opportunity to see the untold joke, and that is just one of the many hysterical moments in this delightfully droll British comedy. The story focuses on a bumbling veterinarian (Leslie Phillips), a shy sort whose bashfulness gets him unwanted attention because in his attempts to avoid attention, he becomes a major klutz. His career as a vet starts off very profound and will strike a cord with those fighting for animal rights, because all but one of his first office visitors are there to have their animals euthanized for their own selfish reasons, and when he does find a genuine patient, he realizes that the poor old lady's dog must be put to sleep to avoid further suffering. Later, he visits her to pick up the dying pooch and presents her with an adorable puppy which has been left with him to avoid being killed. The emotions of the old dear are very clear, at first avoiding contact with the pup but then refusing to let go of it.
Other than this bit of dramatic pathos, the rest is complete farce, mostly concerning vaudeville star Peggy Cummins and her partner, an equally adorable young female chimpanzee. Equally as endearing as Bonzo (minus the presence of Ronald Reagan), this chimp splatters Phillips with powder, is chased by him into an all women's spa, and later scares the same spa customers out simply by being some fury beast. When the chimp takes over a masculine female masseuse's job, the equally butch customer complains about being massaged too hard. It actually is the chimp which brings romance into the life of the shy Phillips, although if his veterinarian rival James Booth had his way, he'd get Cummins for himself. In fact, it is the womanizing Booth who tends to Mrs. Peddle's poodle, and his hypnosis of sweet Puddle results in a very funny gag.
There's really not a lot of plot, although the incidents which preceded it do come together in the finale moments for an exotic pet show where a tamed lion gets the crowd into an uproar (pardon the pun). The shot of a frightened cat searching for a hiding place inside an already occupied bird cage is one of just many amusing visual gags which also includes the adorable chimp peddling past a cop on a tricycle. The film, with some slight sexual innuendo that most children probably won't pick up on, is perfect family fair, and a nice discovery among the obscure British classics that have escaped American audiences other than their initially brief art house showings.
Other than this bit of dramatic pathos, the rest is complete farce, mostly concerning vaudeville star Peggy Cummins and her partner, an equally adorable young female chimpanzee. Equally as endearing as Bonzo (minus the presence of Ronald Reagan), this chimp splatters Phillips with powder, is chased by him into an all women's spa, and later scares the same spa customers out simply by being some fury beast. When the chimp takes over a masculine female masseuse's job, the equally butch customer complains about being massaged too hard. It actually is the chimp which brings romance into the life of the shy Phillips, although if his veterinarian rival James Booth had his way, he'd get Cummins for himself. In fact, it is the womanizing Booth who tends to Mrs. Peddle's poodle, and his hypnosis of sweet Puddle results in a very funny gag.
There's really not a lot of plot, although the incidents which preceded it do come together in the finale moments for an exotic pet show where a tamed lion gets the crowd into an uproar (pardon the pun). The shot of a frightened cat searching for a hiding place inside an already occupied bird cage is one of just many amusing visual gags which also includes the adorable chimp peddling past a cop on a tricycle. The film, with some slight sexual innuendo that most children probably won't pick up on, is perfect family fair, and a nice discovery among the obscure British classics that have escaped American audiences other than their initially brief art house showings.