Reviews & Ratings for
P'tang, Yang, Kipperbang. (TV) More at IMDbPro »

17 out of 19 people found the following review useful:
Every 12 year old boy should watch this Brilliant film., 27 January 2003

Author: John Taylor (jdtaylor1968@btopenworld.com) from Bedfordshire, England

There is a great danger when you watch a film that had had such a profound affect on you the first time around , that 20 years later , it wont hold the same magic as it did before. I must admit i wasnt expecting it to be as good as i remembered but a was pleasently suprised. P'tang Yang Kipperbang is still as fantastic as i remember it when i was a 12 year old .This film has a certain type of brilliance that not many films possess. It is engrossing , it is briliantly acted and best of all it makes me feel like a kid again and there isnt many things that can do that. John Albasiny and Abigail Cruttenden's rolls in this film are 1st class and i had forgotten how good they were until now. I urge any parent of teenagers to sit them down and watch this and see if it has the same affect on them as it did on me. P'TANG YANG KIPPERBANG EEHHH! 10 out of 10.

11 out of 13 people found the following review useful:
Dr. very strange love., 2 February 1999

Author: sumocat from Cleveland, Ohio

Postwar England, the dawn of the "atomic age". Yet, the worries of a young schoolboy yearning to experience his first "kiss" cannot be derailed by something as inconsequential as THE BOMB. This was a delightful if not educational look at young love from the vantage point of an adolescent male and his world of the

1940's. Free of political correctness and preachy messages, this film exposes the viewer to the world that only the mind (and

hormones) of a young teenager can create. Wonderful subplots

maintain character interest ala "Gregory's Girl", and plenty

of well blocked shots help keep up the imagery of this era. This is a very good story for anyone, young or old, who has

ever been in love, or ever wanted to be. Does he ever get his wish? Watch it and see.

4 out of 4 people found the following review useful:
A boy's simple-yet bitter- quest., 1 March 2005

Author: moamen27 from Egypt

Although i don't like cricket at all and i have seen this movie 13 years ago, I still think it is one of the best coming-of-age movies ..i remember the day i returned home from my school and sat down to have my lunch, I saw the opening titles of that movie and then....i was so immersed in it that i felt i was there, it really affected me personally. i still remember how i felt when i first saw it ,i felt that the poor boy was a friend of mine, going through the same adolescent experience we were having in those days. what i really liked about that movie is the main theme of a "shy" boy fantasizing about "kissing" his dream girl, no offense but if that was an American movie, you would certainly see-at a certain point, mainly climax- the "shy" boy "making love" to his girl, and i really can't grasp this contradicting concepts till now...i have a simple request ,if anyone knows how to get this movie on a DVD by mail ,please let me know cause i need a shot of memories..Thanks

2 out of 3 people found the following review useful:
Not as good as it was, 26 May 2006

Author: raypdaley182 from Coventry

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

I remember watching this 1st time around on Channel 4 way back in the early 80's. To those who asked exactly what P'tang Yang Kipperbang means, you weren't watching the film closely enough or paying attention at all.

The main boy and his friends all used made up words to substitute for normal every day words so PTYK was obviously something they made up for hello and goodbye. Listen to him when he is in the chip shop!

The girl and Whittaker had their "Manyana, Mayana - Mayana's not soon enough for me". You clearly heard Whittaker say with great indignation "I don't do P'Tang Yang Kipperbang!".

To the person who asked about the boxing glove on the bed? All the scenes of the main boy in bed talking to God, wasn't it obvious when he was talking about "thinking about that" he was referring to masturbating. Wearing boxing gloves in bed was an old public school method of stopping boys who were frantic or avid nocturnal masturbators.

I had forgotten about Alison Steadmans relationship with the school groundsman, the fact that he was a deserter and her pregnancy scare. I did remember the play but I thought he kissed her hand or kissed her on the cheek.

It was nice to see early appearances by Eric Richard playing a road-worker (who would go on to find fame in The Bill as Sgt. Bob Cryer) and Peter Dean (who would go on to mega fame playing Pete Beale in Eastenders!)

3 out of 5 people found the following review useful:
1948: The best year of their lives?, 1 June 2006

Author: jeremy corbett UK

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

What makes this film worth a watch is the considerably effective evocation of a nation in transformation, and of the smaller human story at its heart. A plummy Home Service voice-over from cricket commentator John Arlott describes the turbulent inner emotions of Alan 'Quack-Quack' Duckworth as he makes the fraught transition from childhood to adolescence.

One of the film's pleasures is it's comforting nostalgia for times past. Traffic-free Suburban streets, roses in the front gardens, the pervading smell of creosote and carbolic is well suggested here, and there are some great observations on the passing of the old order (The School Headmaster laments on his war-time romance with English teacher Miss Land, consigned to history now that there are younger men back from the war) and a knowing mockery of Quack-Quack's naive belief in post-War Festival of Britain-era optimism, with its United Nations, Teas-Maids, Esperanto and Cricket.

The school setting is a big plus for all viewers of a certain age; the cruelties of children, the awakening sexual urges, life's great mysteries and the ennui of a summer term in a losing battle with the approaching holidays. The adult world, as observed by writer Jack Rosenthal, is represented by either up-tight pedants and martinets, for example Miss Land, or as weak hypocrites, like Tommy, Alan's hero of such theatres of human conflict as Dunkirk, El Alamein, The Battle of the Bulge and Burma, who turns out to be a deserter. The climactic end-of-term play is one of the most banal ever, rightly jeered by the schoolkids, but the adult world they're aping is banal too, as Alan belatedly comes to realise.

Daydreamer Alan's infatuation with Ann and his thwarted attempts to secure a kiss is easy and enjoyable to identify with, but generally the girls come off rather badly: Ann rejects her conservative suitor and is herself rejected by the object of her curiosity, Alan. Miss Land is freed from one complication, only to be (we are led to believe) doomed to repeat it because of her unchecked sexual appetites.

The writing is engaging, the direction assured, and while the acting is a little TV-drama standard, the stand-outs are Alison Steadman's prim but voracious Estelle Land and Alan's schoolmates, Abbo and Shaz. My favourite line comes during a canalside game of cricket, when an over-excited Quack-Quack enthusiastically hits the ball for six to the watery boundary and a collective groan goes up from the outfielders. Abbo dryly observes 'We're going to have to move that canal'. Sublime.

5 out of 9 people found the following review useful:
Great atmosphere, iffy plot, 19 January 2007

Author: alan997 from United Kingdom

An enjoyable movie, without a doubt, and very evocative of both its era and that very particular stage in any boy's 'rites of passage'. But I have to say that having read the very positive comments here, I was a bit disappointed. The period was captured, but the plot was desperately thin. The whole thing revolves around the most egregious bit of miscasting in the history of school plays. The idea that quack quack would ever be chosen to play not only one of only three star turns, but a philanderer, is risible. And without that, nada. The sub-plots bore no relation that I could see to the main plot - all of them could be removed in their entirety without in any way affecting the main story - which surely suggests a fundamental flaw. When all your sub-plots look like padding, you know a central idea is being stretched beyond its limits. Nevertheless, it's a benign movie with its heart in the right place, there are some fine performances, and you just get the feeling that everyone involved felt deflated at the final 'cut!' That good feeling permeates the film. And that has to count for something. A flawed really quite good movie. 7 out of 10.

A quest for emotional maturity, 17 March 2012

Author: norman-42-843758 from Belgium

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

I missed this when it was originally shown on Channel 4 but heard so much about it at the time that when I found it on DVD from one of the mail order companies I ordered a copy. I was not disappointed by this little gem. It has the authentic feel of the times it portrayed although in many cases boys' and girls' schools were not combined until the advent of comprehensives many years later.

This is a true rights of passage movie in the same way as "The Summer of 42". The difference is subtle but films like Kes are coming of age movies where the subject attains an emotional maturity by becoming passionate about an interest.

So far as the title and language the boys use to each other goes, this has long been used as a form of cohesion between members of a group and a dividing line between generations. Some of you may be old enough to remember Cookie from 77 Sunset Strip. He was a hipster who did grunt work on the street for two private detectives. Now and again a situation would occur where the bosses realised their phones were being tapped by the bad guys and would say "Scramble it Cookie". Cookie would then go into the verbal jive of the time, which we all understood, of course but left the villains looking nonplussed at the receiver. Take a simple word like 'Good' and see how this has changed over time. In the days of Elvis it was 'hip', 'cool' seemed to last a few generations through. When the Beatles came along it was 'fab' until the Mods changed it into 'maximum' before it morphed into 'mega'. I am going from memory here so there are probably a few in between I have missed.

When the girls voted on their choice of dishiest guy in the class, our hero Duckworth was the nerd left standing against the fence after everybody else had picked their teams. Geoffrey wins the poll and is making a play for heroine Ann. "I don't do P'tang yang kipperbang" he says with disdain but when he tries to be sophisticated by saying to Ann " Manyana doesn't come soon enough for me" he just comes over as a pretentious Pratt.

Early in the film we see Alan Duckworth laying in bed praying to God to let him kiss Ann. Even though it is obvious he also has sexual thoughts, a kiss is all he wants from her. Later, when the boys are playing cricket by the canal there is a very knowledgeable conversation about prostitutes. They discuss how much they charge and that some want extra money for kissing and some just don't kiss at all. This, they rightly decide, is because kissing brings an emotional element into the otherwise functional tasks they perform. There is a very good piece of psychology towards the end of the film when Ann feels rejected by the class nerd. If the class nerd is passing her up then what hope is there for her. When she feels no longer in control, she leaves her comfort zone with Geoffrey to chase after Duckworth. She then finds him interesting because he has a real point of view, in that he wants an emotional relationship first and a physical relationship second which shows a maturity above his years. Ann is warming to him but does Quack Quack Duckworth seize the main chance when he has it in his hands? You will have to watch the film to find out.

2 out of 5 people found the following review useful:
Excellent Film, 28 October 2006

Author: Martin Dawson (flugluftholgate@hotmail.co.uk) from United Kingdom

I was at school in the late sixties and early seventies and this film is very much how my school was. The school play where the leading actors kiss, that happened at my school. A crazy gang of lads, my school again only when we went on a cross country run we would have a smoke! 'Getting the whack', some one at my school broke in through a sky light and broke the canes! after that they were kept in a safe!!! And as for certain nocternal activities! what can I say.... The film actually came out in 1982, I remember that as it was when I bought my house and the film was showing at the same time. If you like British films and films about school, growing up and period pieces, then this is for you. Another film very much like it, 'SWALK', came out a few years before and I for one would like to see that again, also 'Kes' is in the genre. Highly recommended. (But trust me, 1982 is when it came out)

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