A Jolly Bad Fellow Reviews

Goofy British black comedy stars McKern as a nutty-but-evil professor who discovers a poison that drives victims into hysterics and then kills them without a trace. Originally intending to use the poison for the good of mankind, McKern snaps when university politics threaten his experiments, and he begins to bump off his enemies with the poison. Not only does this kill his victims, but the hysterical aspect of the drug forces them to humiliate themselves before they die. Eventually McKern's well-endowed girl friend and lab assistant, Munro, begins to suspect that she's next on his list and threatens to expose him unless he divorces his wife and marries her. Calmly he offers her a cigarette and she accepts, realizing as she begins to giggle uncontrollably that the smoke has been poisoned. She calls the police before she dies. McKern laughs at her attempt to have him arrested because the poison leaves no trace, and he defiantly lights up a cigarette to wait for the cops to come. Unfortunately, he too realizes too late that he's just smoked a poisoned cigarette. He goes insane, jumps into his car, and drives it into a steamroller, which, as steamrollers do, flattens him. A poised and sophisticated comedy written by one of the most stylish screenwriters and directors in the Ealing stable, Robert Hamer, just before he died, and directed by Don Chaffey, noted for his saucy comedies and adults-only pictures. JOLLY BAD FELLOW also offers audiences a glimpse of a modern hero in the person of Price, Prof. Hughes in the story, who was seriously wounded in WW II but survived that tragedy to become a top character and comedy actor.