![]() Take a look at it again and see what I mean! Cute it may seem to be, but Victor Saville was a wise and quite a subversive soul, and you'll find few other films from this period that so ably blend the dark with the light. Parker's role is very clearly based on Hitler, a times quite unsettlingly so, and it is in the bold but successfully intermingling of whimsy with dictatorial manners that the film gains its particular power. But underlying this story (adapted from a German play by James Bridie) is a subtle satire of dictatorship as was then current in Germany and Italy. It's all very funny and delightfully played by all concerned. There's Vivien Leigh as the provost's daughter and Rex Harrison on top form as the journalist who makes the silly story national news. Why isn't this excellent comedy better known? More to the point, why is it so consistently misinterpreted? Most commentators view it as an amusing piece of froth about the provost of a small Scottish town (Cecil Parker) ordering that a dog be put down because its owner cannot pay for its licence. (The film's funniest line makes sense only in the context of the film: Ursula Jeans' anguished "Harold, he called me a woman!") "Storm in a Teacup" is a genuine delight. The comedy is wonderfully handled, especially during the scene in which a pack of dogs runs rampant through the villain's stately home, and during the climactic courtroom scene. The characters are strong yet sufficiently complex to lift the story above the simplistic comic melodrama it might have been - I can't imagine many American films of the time (or of this time) that would allow the "villain" of the piece enough courage to face down and walk through a mob that has just publicly humiliated him and is ready to attack him. All of the acting is first-rate (and Vivien Leigh, pre-"Gone with the Wind", was about as beautiful as any woman could be), and the sets are unusually lavish for what must have been a medium-budget film in its time. Imagine an Ealing comedy as directed by Frank Capra. Hidden from me, anyhow - I'd never heard of it until browsing through my local library's video collection. Could have been done as a short subject in and of itself. Lots of laughs in this one and check out the scene where the dogs invade Parker's house. But the ending couldn't have been better done by Frank Capra himself. Of course being the oaf he is with his ego out of joint, Parker keeps escalating this storm in a teacup until it's a nationwide issue. ![]() This was an early film for both and the megastardom that was destined for both is apparent. Complicating things is the fact that Harrison's fallen big time for Parker's daughter, Vivien Leigh. Harrison who was going to do a puff piece as we would now call it, is outraged enough to write what occurred. As she's begging, he throws her into the street. While being interviewed by reporter Rex Harrison, Sara Allgood who's a poor widow who can't afford the money for a dog license has her dog taken by Parker's police to be put to death as a stray. Parker is also a fatuous, arrogant oaf with the public relations sense of an ostrich. Parker's an efficient manager who's come to the attention of party bigwigs who want to run him in a bi-election for an open seat in Parliament. Cecil Parker is the provost (Mayor?) of a small Scottish town called Baikie way in the rural north. Rex Harrison could easily be James Stewart, standing up for good. Certainly Cecil Parker as the town provost could easily have fit into a Capra film, a Mr. I agree with the previous reviewer that this British film is an attempt by them to produce a Frank Capra like populist comedy. Really worth seeing for the very young Leigh and Harrison. ![]() Kudos to Patsy the dog, who is the storm in the teacup. Parker plays a pompous man with guts beautifully, and Allgood in her usual role as a low-class woman, is great. Excellent acting sparks this fast-moving comedy - in a run of the mill ingénue role, the beautiful Leigh sparkles, and a very young Harrison does a marvelous job as a determined reporter. Leigh plays his daughter, who just happens to have fallen in love with Burdon. Affronted, Burdon turns the incident into something akin to what Watergate was in the '70s. While talking on one side of his mouth stating that he is for the people, Gow roundly throws her out. As he is being interviewed by reporter Frank Burdon(Harrison), he is approached by a local woman (Allgood) who is near hysterics about her dog being put down because she hasn't paid the license. Vivien Leigh, Rex Harrison, Cecil Parker, and Sara Allgood star in "Storm in a Teacup." Parker plays Gow, an arrogant Scotsman running for public office. ![]()
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