Carry On Henry (1971)

reviewed by
Graeme Huggan


                              CARRY ON HENRY
               A film review by Graeme Huggan

Copyright 1996 Graeme Huggan Carry on Henry is all about Henry VIII and his eight wives! Sid James plays Henry, who no sooner has the film started, is getting rid of his present Queen and hopes to find another one soon. As part of his alliance with France, he requests the hand-in-marriage to the Queen of Normandy (Joan Sims). She comes to England in the hope of marrying Henry but when he finds out that she loves garlic and has a reeking garlic breath, he is totally averse to the idea of marriage. Henry's court is very corrupt, with the Cardinal (Terry Scott) trying to bribe Cromwell (Kenneth Williams) and Cromwell trying to bribe the King. There is a state of crisis when the King puts Marie the Queen (Sims) in the Tower of London ready for execution. The Queen is pregnant but she has not liased with the King before, so fingers are pointed at Sir Roger de Lodgerley played by Charles Hawtrey, who has a rather lecherous character to play this time. The Cardinal and Cromwell decide to get a signed confession from Sir Roger by using all kinds of torture devices! Owing to circumstances, Sir Roger is sometimes needed to sign that he is the father and sometimes that he isn't. This is because of renewed threats by the King of France (Peter Gilmore) to come over himself, which in the end he does. By then, Henry has found himself a new Queen, played by none other than Barbara Windsor! It looks like he has some explaining to do! There are stand-out performances by Sid James as Henry, Joan Sims as Marie, and Terry Scott in an unusual role as the Cardinal. Also there are cameos from Kenneth Connor and Peter Butterworth, who plays Barbara's father. The set and costume design is first class and the overall production of this film is good. There is even an early appearance from David Prowse, who later became the Green Cross Code Man and Darth Vader. The film does have it's downsides though, as it is getting pretty routine for the Carry-on team to stage historical films and the inventive streak of the script seems to run out pretty quickly. There is also the absence of Hattie Jacques and Bernard Bresslaw, who could have helped the film along. However, overall the film is funny and there are plenty of laughs and saucy jokes, so that is why I mainly recommend it to Carry on fans only, but there is enough humour in the film to make it worth anyone's while to sit down and watch it.

My Star rating: 4 out of 5 stars By Graeme Huggan


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