My first inkling of Esma Cannon was in the BBC t.v. comedy series "The Rag Trade" from the early 1960s in which she played a comic "put upon" machinist.She was a funny comedienne with her 4'10" height and way of speaking.In "Holiday Camp" she again plays a lonely spinster on the look out for a beau.Unfortunately a confidence trickster and "Mannequin" murderer, "Sq. Ldr. Hardwick" (Dennis Price), takes her out for a walk down a remote country lane and although we don't see her end in the film, we have to presume she became his next victim.Bear in mind this was a 1947 family film and the British Board of Film Censors would have clamped down hard on any graphic sex & violence."Holiday Camp" has quite a cast and although Charlie Chester & Patricia Roc get star billing you only see them (as themselves) for very short scenes.The real stars are Jack Warner & Kathleen Harrison as working class parents Mr Joe & Mrs Ethel Huggett along with their daughter,Hazel Court as Joan Huggett who has a toddler in tow.I did not hear whether she was a war widow or had an unfortunate accident but she finds a boyfriend in the shape of Jimmy Hanley (Jimmy Gardner) who has been left a "Dear John" letter by his former girlfriend.
There are some nice period touches like sweet rationing (Britain did not finally come off it until 1955 and I vividly remember my parents stocking up our rations so we could go away on holiday with our chocolate/butterscotch etc, (I was born in 1946).Of course contraception was not mentioned and a previous reviewer mentioned it was daring of Sydney Box (the screenplay writer) to include a subplot of a pregnant unmarried girl Valerie Thompson (Jeannete Tregathen) whose musical boyfriend Michael Halliday (Emrys Jones) cannot afford to keep them both.
Which brings me to Dame Flora Robson.I was surprised to see her in this type of film as she normally appeared in serious drama but even a Shakespearean actress wants some light relief occasionally.She plays Esther Harman a woman who lost track of her boyfriend in 1918 and supposed him dead with the millions of others.She keeps a photograph of them as young lovers in her handbag.Due to a very unlikely coincidence (which only happens in films), it happens her old lover, Esmond Knight, is now married with two boys and working (although blind as a result of a mine) as the holiday camp announcer.Although she meets him in his office, she does not divulge who she is as she realises he is a happy man.Rather Esther becomes a sympathetic mother-type figure to Valerie and admonishes Valerie's very disapproving aunt played by Gainsborough stalwart Beatrice Varley for not lending her support to her niece's desperate need.
Another subplot involves the perils of engaging cardsharps in pontoon, but Jack Warner thankfully comes to the rescue.Beauty parades, swimming, wonky bicycles, dances, entertainment on the stage, communal eating etc. its all there.I am so glad my parents took me & my two sisters down to the coast and avoided organised entertainment!!
There are some nice period touches like sweet rationing (Britain did not finally come off it until 1955 and I vividly remember my parents stocking up our rations so we could go away on holiday with our chocolate/butterscotch etc, (I was born in 1946).Of course contraception was not mentioned and a previous reviewer mentioned it was daring of Sydney Box (the screenplay writer) to include a subplot of a pregnant unmarried girl Valerie Thompson (Jeannete Tregathen) whose musical boyfriend Michael Halliday (Emrys Jones) cannot afford to keep them both.
Which brings me to Dame Flora Robson.I was surprised to see her in this type of film as she normally appeared in serious drama but even a Shakespearean actress wants some light relief occasionally.She plays Esther Harman a woman who lost track of her boyfriend in 1918 and supposed him dead with the millions of others.She keeps a photograph of them as young lovers in her handbag.Due to a very unlikely coincidence (which only happens in films), it happens her old lover, Esmond Knight, is now married with two boys and working (although blind as a result of a mine) as the holiday camp announcer.Although she meets him in his office, she does not divulge who she is as she realises he is a happy man.Rather Esther becomes a sympathetic mother-type figure to Valerie and admonishes Valerie's very disapproving aunt played by Gainsborough stalwart Beatrice Varley for not lending her support to her niece's desperate need.
Another subplot involves the perils of engaging cardsharps in pontoon, but Jack Warner thankfully comes to the rescue.Beauty parades, swimming, wonky bicycles, dances, entertainment on the stage, communal eating etc. its all there.I am so glad my parents took me & my two sisters down to the coast and avoided organised entertainment!!