Bryan Forbes’ large-screen colour venture into the realms of black comedy is a story set in the Victorian era about two rival brothers (Ralph Richardson and John Mills) and their beneficiaries fighting it out to the death for the sake of the lottery fortune dangled between them.
Helping the irascible, poverty-stricken Masterman Finsbury (Mills) is his shy grandson Michael (Michael Caine).
Opposing them are his eccentric younger brother, Joseph Finsbury (Richardson), and a pair of greedy nephews, Morris (Peter Cook) and John (Dudley Moore).
Julia (Nanette Newman) is in love with Michael, and unbeknown to her, he also adores her.
Morris and John believe that Joseph is killed in a train crash and not wanting the authorities to find out, they ship home what they believe to be their uncle’s body – and hence Michael finds a coffin containing a perfect stranger on his doorstep.
Before you can shout ‘fratricide’, the landscape is cluttered with corpses, a bumbling detective (Tony Hancock) and a mad surgeon (Peter Sellers).
Based on a story by Robert Louis Stevenson, the film is rife with plots, counter-plots, mix-ups and a wild chase with lots of character cameos, gags, jokes and slapstick sequences amusingly tied together.
Masterman Finsbury
John Mills
Joseph Finsbury
Ralph Richardson
Michael Finsbury
Michael Caine
Morris Finsbury
Peter Cook
John Finsbury
Dudley Moore
Julia Finsbury
Nanette Newman
Detective
Tony Hancock
Doctor Pratt
Peter Sellers
Brian Allen Harvey
Jeremy Lloyd
Sydney Whitcombe Sykes
James Villiers
Ian Scott Fife
Graham Stark
Alan Frazer Scrope
Nicholas Parsons
Peacock
Wilfrid Lawson
Mrs. Hackett
Irene Handl
Dr. Slattery
John Le Mesurier
Vyvyan Alistair Montague
Leonard Rossiter
Queen Victoria
Avis Bunnage
Military Officer
Peter Graves
Engine Driver
John Junkin
Director
Bryan Forbes
