Release CalendarTop 250 MoviesMost Popular MoviesBrowse Movies by GenreTop Box OfficeShowtimes & TicketsMovie NewsIndia Movie Spotlight
    What's on TV & StreamingTop 250 TV ShowsMost Popular TV ShowsBrowse TV Shows by GenreTV NewsIndia TV Spotlight
    What to WatchLatest TrailersIMDb OriginalsIMDb PicksIMDb Podcasts
    OscarsBest Picture WinnersBest Picture WinnersEmmysSTARmeter AwardsSan Diego Comic-ConNew York Comic-ConSundance Film FestivalToronto Int'l Film FestivalAwards CentralFestival CentralAll Events
    Born TodayMost Popular CelebsMost Popular CelebsCelebrity News
    Help CenterContributor ZonePolls
For Industry Professionals
  • All
  • Titles
  • TV Episodes
  • Celebs
  • Companies
  • Keywords
  • Advanced Search
Watchlist
Sign In
  • Fully supported
  • English (United States)
    Partially supported
  • Français (Canada)
  • Français (France)
  • Deutsch (Deutschland)
  • हिंदी (भारत)
  • Italiano (Italia)
  • Português (Brasil)
  • Español (España)
  • Español (México)
  • Cast & crew
  • User reviews
  • Trivia
IMDbPro

Clockwise

  • 19861986
  • PGPG
  • 1h 36m
IMDb RATING
6.6/10
13K
YOUR RATING
POPULARITY
17,005
246
John Cleese in Clockwise (1986)
Watch Official Trailer
Play trailer1:23
1 Video
31 Photos
Comedy
An obsessively punctual comprehensive school headmaster sets out to give an important speech at the annual Headmasters' Conference.An obsessively punctual comprehensive school headmaster sets out to give an important speech at the annual Headmasters' Conference.An obsessively punctual comprehensive school headmaster sets out to give an important speech at the annual Headmasters' Conference.
IMDb RATING
6.6/10
13K
YOUR RATING
POPULARITY
17,005
246
  • See more at IMDbPro
    • Director
      • Christopher Morahan
    • Writer
      • Michael Frayn(original screenplay)
    • Stars
      • John Cleese
      • Penny Leatherbarrow
      • Howard Lloyd-Lewis
    Top credits
    • Director
      • Christopher Morahan
    • Writer
      • Michael Frayn(original screenplay)
    • Stars
      • John Cleese
      • Penny Leatherbarrow
      • Howard Lloyd-Lewis
  • See production, box office & company info
    • 68User reviews
    • 40Critic reviews
    • Awards
      • 1 nomination

    Videos1

    Official Trailer
    Trailer 1:23
    Official Trailer

    Photos31

    John Cleese in Clockwise (1986)
    John Cleese and Benny Hill in The Best of Benny Hill (1974)
    John Cleese in Clockwise (1986)
    John Cleese and John Bardon in Clockwise (1986)
    John Cleese and Sharon Maiden in Clockwise (1986)
    John Bardon in Clockwise (1986)
    John Cleese and Sharon Maiden in Clockwise (1986)
    John Cleese and Sharon Maiden in Clockwise (1986)
    John Cleese and Sharon Maiden in Clockwise (1986)
    John Cleese and Penelope Wilton in Clockwise (1986)
    John Cleese, Geoffrey Davion, and Richard Ridings in Clockwise (1986)
    John Cleese in Clockwise (1986)

    Top cast

    Edit
    John Cleese
    John Cleese
    • Brian Stimpson
    Penny Leatherbarrow
    • Woman Teacher
    Howard Lloyd-Lewis
    • Ted
    Jonathan Bowater
    • Clint
    Stephen Moore
    Stephen Moore
    • Mr. Jolly
    Alison Steadman
    Alison Steadman
    • Gwenda Stimpson
    Mark Bunting
    • Studious Boy
    Robert Wilkinson
    • Streaker
    John Bardon
    John Bardon
    • Ticket Collector
    Mark Burdis
    • Glen Scully
    Nadia Sawalha
    Nadia Sawalha
    • Mandy Kostakis
    • (as Nadia Carina)
    Dickie Arnold
    Dickie Arnold
    • Man at Station
    Angus MacKay
    Angus MacKay
    • First Class Passenger
    • (as Angus Mackay)
    Peter Needham
    • Porter
    Peter Lorenzelli
    • Taxi Driver
    Chip Sweeney
    • Paul Stimpson
    Sharon Maiden
    • Laura Wisely
    Joan Hickson
    Joan Hickson
    • Mrs. Trellis
    • Director
      • Christopher Morahan
    • Writer
      • Michael Frayn(original screenplay)
    • All cast & crew
    • Production, box office & more at IMDbPro

    More like this

    Privates on Parade
    4.8
    Privates on Parade
    The Missionary
    6.2
    The Missionary
    Fierce Creatures
    6.4
    Fierce Creatures
    Dirty Old Town
    7.4
    Dirty Old Town
    Clair de Lune
    7.3
    Clair de Lune
    A Fish Called Wanda
    7.5
    A Fish Called Wanda
    Briefest Encounter
    7.5
    Briefest Encounter
    Micky Love
    7.6
    Micky Love
    Nuns on the Run
    5.9
    Nuns on the Run
    And Now for Something Completely Different
    7.5
    And Now for Something Completely Different
    Monty Python's Fliegender Zirkus
    8.1
    Monty Python's Fliegender Zirkus
    A Private Function
    6.5
    A Private Function

    Storyline

    Edit

    Did you know

    Edit
    • Trivia
      The name of the school was Thomas Tompion Comprehensive School. Tompion (1639-1713), a famous clockmaker, is regarded as the father of English clockmaking. He constructed some of the first spring-balanced watches, and some of the timepieces he made are still operational.
    • Goofs
      When Stimpson is informed the train for Norwich is on the adjacent platform, he could not have been on the Plymouth train, as that would leave from London Paddington, not London Liverpool Street which is where Norwich trains depart from.
    • Quotes

      Brian Stimpson: It's not the despair, Laura. I can take the despair. It's the hope I can't stand.

    • Connections
      Featured in At the Movies: The Color of Money/Sid and Nancy/Down by Law/Clockwise (1986)
    • Soundtracks
      This Is My Lovely Day
      by A.P. Herbert (as Herbert) & Vivian Ellis (as Ellis)

      Sung by Ann Way (uncredited)

      Chappell Music Ltd

    User reviews68

    Review
    Review
    Top review
    7/10
    I Can Take the Despair. It's the Hope I Can't Stand.
    In "Clockwise" John Cleese plays a character who has much in common with Basil Fawlty from the television series "Fawlty Towers". Like the manic Torquay hotelier, Brian Stimpson is a control-freak who finds his own life going out of control. The headmaster of a small-town comprehensive school, he is a stickler for discipline, with a particular obsession with punctuality. He is the sort of man who knows the school timetable off by heart; upon seeing a pupil idling about the school he can instantly tell that pupil exactly what lesson he or she should be attending at that precise moment. (The school is, in an in-joke, named after the famous English clockmaker Thomas Tompion).

    Stimpson is disliked by his pupils and staff, who see him as authoritarian and patronising, but he is evidently held in high regard by the wider teaching profession, because he has been elected Chairman of the prestigious Headmasters' Conference. The film tells the story of what occurs on the day on which Stimpson is due to address the annual meeting of the Conference in Norwich. Things start to go wrong when, due to his misunderstanding what he is told by a ticket-collector at the station, he finds himself on the wrong train and ends up missing the train he should have caught. Told that there will not be another train to Norwich for several hours, he decides to make the journey by road and returns home, only to find that his wife has taken the car. He meets Laura, one of his sixth-form pupils, and in desperation persuades her to drive him on the 163-mile journey to Norwich. A further chain of misunderstandings leads to them being pursued across the English countryside by the police, by Laura's parents (who suspect that their daughter is having an affair with her headmaster) and by his wife (who suspects the same thing). On the way they kidnap a former girlfriend of Stimpson's whom they meet by accident, drive the car into a field and get stuck, find themselves in a monastery and, in their desperation to get to Norwich on time, end up holding up a passing motorist in order to steal his clothes, his money and his car.

    The film's central joke is that a man who is so obsessed with punctuality should find himself running very late in his attempts to get to the most important meeting of his life. Although Stimpson is the sort of man that most people would automatically dislike if we were to meet him in real life, Cleese manages to arouse a certain sympathy for his character, whose sense of panic arises from a sense that he is the victim of circumstances, that the entire universe is united in a vast conspiracy to prevent him from fulfilling what should have been a relatively simple task. His desperation is increased by the remote possibility that he might just be able to get to Norwich on time. ("It's not the despair, Laura. I can take the despair. It's the hope I can't stand). There can be few of us who have not had, at some time or other, a similar feeling.

    Although the film is sometimes described as a farce, that word should not be taken as implying that it is a purely mechanical comedy; character also plays an important part. Fortunately, Cleese is not only a very good technical comedian- his timing in this film is superb- but also a very good character actor. (A gift shared by another ex-Python, Michael Palin). Cleese also receives good support from the rest of the cast, particularly from Alison Steadman as his long-suffering wife Gwenda and Sharon Maiden as the wild and headstrong Laura, for whom driving her headmaster cross-country is a much more interesting way of spending her day than a few hours of boring lessons.

    The film is not quite in the same class as Palin's two great post-Python comedies, "The Missionary" and "A Private Function". For most of the time it is very funny indeed; for most of the first hour and a bit I was laughing out loud. (Remarkably, my wife was too- normally she loathes the Pythons and all their works). Unfortunately, the scriptwriter Michael Frayn was unable to maintain this sense of comic invention to the end. The story needed some dazzling twist to finish on, but instead it fizzles out rather tamely and the last quarter of an hour or so, after Stimpson finally arrives at the Conference, is rather disappointing after what has gone before. Nevertheless, this is still one of the better British comedies of the eighties; I certainly prefer it to the overrated "A Fish Called Wanda". 7/10
    helpful•14
    2
    • JamesHitchcock
    • Mar 7, 2006

    Details

    Edit
    • Release date
      • October 10, 1986 (United States)
    • Country of origin
      • United Kingdom
    • Language
      • English
    • Also known as
      • Clockwise - Recht so, Mr. Stimpson
    • Filming locations
      • Hull Paragon Railway Station, Hull Paragon Interchange, Ferensway, Kingston upon Hull, East Riding of Yorkshire, England, UK
    • Production companies
      • Thorn EMI Screen Entertainment
      • Moment Films
    • See more company credits at IMDbPro

    Box office

    Edit
    • Gross US & Canada
      • $1,476,356
    • Opening weekend US & Canada
      • $156,066
      • Oct 12, 1986
    • Gross worldwide
      • $1,476,356
    See detailed box office info on IMDbPro

    Technical specs

    Edit
    • Runtime
      1 hour 36 minutes
    • Color
      • Color
    • Sound mix
      • Mono
    • Aspect ratio
      • 1.66 : 1

    Related news

    Contribute to this page

    Suggest an edit or add missing content
    John Cleese in Clockwise (1986)
    Top Gap
    By what name was Clockwise (1986) officially released in India in English?
    Answer
    • See more gaps
    • Learn more about contributing
    Edit page

    More to explore

    View list
    List
    The Best Movies and Shows to Watch in August
    See the full list
    View list
    List
    Fall TV Guide: The Best Shows Coming This Year
    See the full list
    View image
    Photos
    These Stars Are on the Rise
    See the gallery
    Back to top

    Recently viewed

    Please enable browser cookies to use this feature. Learn more.
    Get the IMDb App
    Sign in for more access
    Sign in for more access
    • Get the IMDb App
    • Help
    • Site Index
    • IMDbPro
    • Box Office Mojo
    • IMDb Developer
    • Press Room
    • Advertising
    • Jobs
    • Conditions of Use
    • Privacy Policy
    • Interest-Based Ads
    IMDb, an Amazon company

    © 1990-2022 by IMDb.com, Inc.