Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #9430 in DVD
• Released on: 2003-02-17
• Rating: Parental Guidance
• Aspect ratio: 1.78:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Formats: PAL, Special Edition, Widescreen
• Original language: English
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 89 minutes

Amazon.co.uk Review
Carry On Don't Lose Your Head parodies the adventures of the Scarlet Pimpernel, with crinkly cackling Sid James as master of disguise the Black Fingernail and Jim Dale as his assistant Lord Darcy. He must rescue preposterously effete aristocrat Charles Hawtrey from the clutches of Kenneth Williams' fiendish Citizen Camembert and his sidekick Citizen Bidet (Peter Butterworth). The Black Fingernail is assisted in his efforts to thwart the birth of the burgeoning republic by the almost supernatural stupidity of his opponents, who fail to recognise the frankly undisguisable Sid James even when dressed as a flirty young woman.

What with an executioner who is tricked into beheading himself in order to prove the efficacy of his own guillotine, it's all a little too easy. As usual, no groan-worthy pun is left unturned, or unheralded by the soundtrack strains of a long whistle or wah-wah trumpet. This is pretty silly stuff even by Carry On standards, with most of the cast barely required to come out of first gear and an overlong climactic swordfight sequence hardly raising the dramatic stakes. Most of the humour here resides neither in the script nor the characterisation but in the endlessly watchable Williams' whooping, nasal delivery (occasionally lapsing into broad Cockney) and the jowl movements of the always-underrated Butterworth. --David Stubbs

Synopsis

Carry On Don't Lose Your Head is one of the best films in the "Carry On" series. In this 1967 installment a foppish Englishman, Sir Rodney Ffing (Sid James), goes undercover as "The Black Fingernail" with his partner, Lord Darcy (Jim Dale), to rescue French aristocrats. Hot on their heels are Citizen Bidet and and Citizen Camembert in this very funny Scarlet Pimpernel parody.

Customer Reviews

Carry on chopping!!

DON'T LOSE YOUR HEAD

(UK - 1967)

Aspect ratio: 1.85:1
Theatrical soundtrack: Mono

During the French Revolution, the villainous Citizen Camembert (a perpetually outraged Kenneth Williams) goes in search of the notorious 'Black Fingernail' (Sid James), an unidentified British aristocrat who's been crossing the English Channel to rescue his French counterparts from the guillotine.

The second and final entry in the long-running series not to feature 'Carry On' in its title due to political fall-out from a change of UK distributor (the first was FOLLOW THAT CAMEL in 1966), DON'T LOSE YOUR HEAD demonstrates yet again that screenwriter Talbot Rothwell was at his best when indulging his fondness for historical burlesque. Sumptuously mounted on various high-blown locations (including Clandon Park and Waddesdon Manor, with interiors filmed at Pinewood studios), the film's ribald parody of the French Revolution encompasses everything from silly character names (Camembert is the local 'big cheese', aided and abetted by the gormless Citizen Bidet, while the Black Fingernail conceals his true identity under the foppish pseudonym of Sir Rodney Ffing - "with two F's!") to puns, sight gags and lowbrow slapstick. In other words, the formula as before. But like so many of the better Carry On's, the comedy is rooted in a well-developed storyline, augmented by the usual array of flamboyant characters and eccentric supporting players.

Highlights include Charles Hawtrey as a jolly French aristocrat, and Joan Sims as Williams' Cockney-spouting sister (Sims and Hawtrey share an unlikely seduction sequence midway through the film which culminates in a terrific 'please yourself' gag). Sid James and Jim Dale are the nominal heroes of the piece, camping it up with affectionate glee, while Peter Butterworth excels as Williams' dimwitted lackey, forever lusting after Sims and shouting: "Equality! Fraternity! Liberty!" (to which Sims retorts: "I don't care about the equalities and the fraternities, but I'm NOT having the liberties!"). But as usual, Kenneth Williams walks away with the picture, overplaying every gesture, emphasizing every double entendre, and milking every gag for all its considerable worth. An absolute comic gem!

Director Gerald Thomas keeps the pot boiling throughout, and production values are solid. Watch out for a couple of mistakes which made it into the final print (Williams' hat being knocked by Butterworth in a cramped carriage, and Sims almost falling over whilst admiring a lovely new dress), betraying a rushed production schedule. Favourite gag: Hawtrey brags to a group of young women that he escaped the guillotine by slaying half a dozen of his captors, and one gushing admirer declares: "What a bloody sight it must have been." Hawtrey, quick as a flash, retorts: "M'dear, if me sword hadn't broken, it'd have been a bloody sight more!" Genius.

One of the funniest
This must be one of the funniest of the Carry On series. Set during the French Revolution, a rebel known as the black fingernail begins to cause havoc by setting free the imprisoned peers, lords, ladies and royalty.

With inuendos in every sentence and a great script, this film is one of my personal all-time favourites.

Even if you're not too keen on Carry On films, you will like this one!

The best carry on of all time - beware the black fingernail!
This carry on has a marvellous story, great acting and hilarious jokes in this carry on about the French revolution. Kenneth Williams plays the hilarious evil Citizen Camembert, who is chopping off all the heads of the french aristocracy, along with his stupid little assistant, Citizen Bidet. Meanwhile back in England Sid James and Jim Dale here about this and come over to france to save all the poor aristocracy, using many different tricks and disguises, and always leaving behind him a picture of two fingers stuck up and one of the fingernails is black, so they are notoriously know in France as The Black Fingernail!