Complete credited cast: | |||
Norman Wisdom | ... | Norman Pitkin / General Schreiber | |
Honor Blackman | ... | Lesley Cartland | |
Edward Chapman | ... | Mr. Grimsdale | |
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Campbell Singer | ... | Sergeant Loder |
Hattie Jacques | ... | Gretchen | |
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Brian Worth | ... | Henri Le Blanc |
Terence Alexander | ... | Captain Wharton | |
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John Warwick | ... | Colonel Layton |
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Arnold Bell | ... | General Hunt |
André Maranne | ... | Jean-Claude (as Andre Maranne) | |
Victor Beaumont | ... | Jogenkraut | |
Frank Williams | ... | Captain Ford | |
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Eddie Leslie | ... | Medical Officer |
Richard Marner | ... | German Officer | |
John G. Heller | ... | German Officer at Gatepost |
Norman and Mr Grimsdale are council workmen mending the road outside an Army base when they come into conflict with the military. Shortly afterwards, they get drafted and fall into the clutches of the Sergeant they have just bested. They are sent to France to repair roads in front of the Allied advance but get captured. Norman takes advantage of a useful similarity to impersonate General Schreiber and manages to return a hero. Written by Steve Crook <steve@brainstorm.co.uk>
All Norman Wisdom Films tend to follow a simple formula. Loveable Norman has a simple life, usually overlooked by a father figure (Mr Grimsdale) who takes care of him. An antagonist enters the frame and usually angers Wisdom. Much revenge type comedy ensues. Throw in a little child or children who needs help and a unfeasibly attractive woman for Norman to fall in love with. So once this formula has been established it's very unusual to expect anything else. Not that The Square peg does a great deal different but it looses the child element and offers up instead, Wisdom in two roles. The first is his standard 'Pitkin' role and the second is the evil Nazi general. Sure he camps up the Nazi and plays it for all the laughs possible but this film is nothing more than comic brilliance. The scene between Wisdom in his two characters and Hattie Jaques as a Teutonic opera singer is staggeringly funny.