When I first saw this in a Kinematograph Weekly, I was more interested in the films -that were advertised – still am – but I couldn’t help seeing that it was from Renown Pictures Corporation Ltd – currently a very well know name alongside Talking Pictures. I wonder if Noel and Sarah purchased this Company which may have been dormant

Looking at the films ABOVE – ‘Scrooge’ with was and is a classic with Alistair Sim producing a wonderful performance and portrayal which in my book has never been equalled

‘Pickwick Papers’ was another cracker

I had heard of ‘Mother Riley Meets the Vampire’ with Be4al Lugosi but not heard of ‘Mother Riley’s Trip to Mars’

I am surprised to see that ‘The Great Caruso’ tops the Box Office Winner’s chart ABOVE – but not surprised to see ‘Samson and Delilah’ right up there

ABOVE – More picks from 1951 – ‘King Solomon’s Mines’ – I loved that one with all the publicity that went with it

‘Across the Wide Missouri’ another popular one but I found it quite dull although I didn’t see it at the time of release and have only viewed it on Television

There are some talking points here – just imagine getting together with friends of a similar age and interest – you could discuss these for hours !!

The one below I did see along with my Mother and Dad and Brothers – it was good !!

It was in Technicolor and this was – and remains – impressive.

This is one of Alan Ladd’s lesser known and seldom-seen Westerns, a Civil War story with an excellent cast.  Alan Ladd plays Brett Sherwood, a captain from Georgia who has gone West in April 1865 to Colorado Territory to meet up with “Gen.” William Quantrell. 

Lizabeth Scott was the female lead in this – her first Western.

ABOVE – Alan Ladd with Lizabeth Scott – and BELOW she is with Arthur Kennedy

Here is a name that is so recognisable – Peter Noble a man with a Show Business connection throughout his whole life – he could be summed up in so many ways king of the name-droppers, Memory Man of the Movies and so on.

He wrote and edited so many books including the ones here

What a varied career he had as this Obituary in one of our Newspapers describes :-

Peter Noble was born in Clerkenwell, which in 1917 was still known as Little Italy. His father, a watchmaker, was dead by the end of the First World War, and the slum orphan was sent to live at the Farningham Home for Boys. His Aunt Betty sent him a copy of Arthur Mee’s Children’s Newspaper every week, and he spent his pocket money watching silent films – His favourites were the cowboy star Hoot Gibson, the serial hero William Desmond, and Charlie Chaplin’s “Kid”, Jackie Coo[er

His first job was as apprentice to Boots the Chemist in Cheapside, but childhood visits to the local variety theatres had given him a taste for the stage. At 17, nattily attired in green shirt, red tie, grey suit and tan suedes, he went to the Theatrical Garden Party. Noel Coward took one look at him and said, “What a delightful ensemble!” Despite that, the two later became friends.

Like many thinking young men at the time, Noble went to the Unity Theatre at King’s Cross where the mighty Paul Robeson sang and acted in a political piece called Plant in the Sun. (“I sat next to Michael Redgrave”, he was fond of recalling.) Noble immediately joined the company, did his first acting in a political travesty of Babes in the Wood , and toured in the famous Waiting for Lefty. (“With John Slater, Alfie Bass and Bill Owen – when he was still Rowbotham!”) In 1939 Noble narrated Symphony of Youth in an open-air production in Brockwell Park. Joss of the Star caricatured him; Noble bought 25 copies.

With the start of the Second World War, Noble, using his chemistry training, volunteered as a stretcher bearer in Civil Defence. One day a wall collapsed on him, and that was the end of his weekly wage of pounds 2 18s 5d. He returned to the stage as Strindberg’s rapist butler in Miss Julie opposite Marcella Salzer, and a first flutter in films followed.

Noble’s screen roles were so small that he seldom rated mention in the credits. He was an auxiliary fireman supporting Tommy Trinder in Ealing’s The Bells Go Down (1942), the head boy of an acting school in Gainsborough’s version of Tommy Handley’s top radio series It’s That Man Again (1943), a prisoner of war in Powell and Pressburger’s The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp (1943), and a bewhiskered musical hall chairman in Butcher’s Variety Jubilee (1943). A larger appearance in a smaller picture was The House of Dr Belhomme, a B-movie which ran out of money and eventually turned up in 1947 as Escape Dangerous. On the film he co-starred with Marianne Stone, the actress who became his second wife the same year.

Noble tried his hand at composing music, and the song “You Do Things To Me” sung by the Welsh comedienne Maudie Edwards in the Will Hay comedy My Learned Friend (1943) was by him, as were all the songs in the very minor, virtually unseen musical film Walking on Air (1946). This starred a shy, slender newcomer Patsy Sloots; Noble suggested she rename herself and as Susan Shaw she swiftly shot to stardom.

Years later Noble would return to films, this time behind the camera. He worked as associate producer on The Runaway Bus (1954), a starring vehicle for the young Frankie Howerd, To Dorothy a Son (1954), with Shelley Winters, Lost (1955) with David Farrar, and Fun At St Fanny’s (1956) which was built around Cardew “The Cad” Robinson, with the fat Fred Emney as the plump Dr Jankers. Noble co-wrote the screen play.

But the real career of Peter Noble, show business journalist, writer and film historian began in 1946 – 1945 if we include his first book, Transatlantic Jazz. An incredible number of one-off paperbacks flew from his typewriter during those post-war years. Small companies like Pendulum Publications issued his series of shilling film quiz books, and even a Peter Noble Film Book Club was launched with cinema books sent to members on subscription.

There was Spotlight on Filmland, Screen Survey (20 star biographies with stills), Hollywood Screen Stars, and on the heavier side, biographies of Orson Welles, Bette Davis, Erich von Stroheim and Ivor Novello. He edited magazines called Cinema Monthly and Film Quarterly. He wrote the first book to treat black cinema seriously, The Negro in Films (1947), and made his greatest contribution to the history of the medium with the first ever British Film Year Book, which started in 1946 with an introduction by the tycoon J. Arthur Rank and continues in differing form to this day. This first volume is a true collectors’ item, with its detailed history of British cinema and a near complete listing of all the feature films produced during the Second World War.

This massive amount of work made Noble the best known name in popular screen journalism, seconded only by Raymond Leader, the pen name he was forced to use when his own appeared rather too frequently. Soon he was broadcasting regularly in the BBC’s Film Time, where he resided for four years, and Luxembourg’s Movie Magazine, hosted by Wilfrid Thomas and sponsored by Silvikrin Hair Tonic. (“The studio was so cold that Godfrey Winn lent me his black overcoat – it was lined with mink!”)

Then came the television years. Current Release, hosted by John Fitzgerald, used Noble as their film star interviewer. His first was the teenager Joan Collins. (“I got just one crit”, recalled Noble, “Peter Noble seems to need a haircut!”). This series led to The Other Screen (1956) on Associated- Rediffusion, the first London commercial station, followed by Film Fanfare (1957) every week on ABC-TV. He was seen on a quiz panel with Richard Todd, Glynis Johns and Hollywood’s June Havoc.

Noble’s biggest television hit was as a panellist on the game show Find the Link (1955), teamed with Moira Lister, Jo Douglas and Kenneth Horne. (“I took Gilbert Harding’s advice – if you can’t sing, act, dance or be funny, then television is the place to make your name!”) It made Noble’s, and he went on to chair the all-girl chatterama, Yaketty-Yak (1956), perhaps the first feminist chat show, which sported the glamour queens Therese Burton, Shirley Ann Field and Carole Leslie. Later in life he would return to television quiz games on the nostalgia show Looks Familar (1980).

Collie Knox, the famous newspaper critic, called Noble “Britain’s walking encyclopaedia of films” when he introduced “Can You Beat the Expert”, a new regular feature to the monthly magazine ABC Film Review in March 1951. Readers’ tricky questions were pulled out of the hat and Noble’s off-the-cuff answers were taken down and published. The first was an easy one – “What was Alfred Hitchcock’s first American film?” – as Noble had recently written on Hitch for the British Film Institute. “Rebecca”, came the answer. But he was eventually caught by Mr Atkinson of Sheffield when he identified Things To Come as George Sanders first film. The answer should have been Strange Cargo, but even the editor got this wrong, giving the date as 1929 when it should have been 1936!

Eventually Noble’s writings disappeared from the public’s prints, for he was signed as columnist for the trade paper Daily Film Renter. This later conjoined with Today’s Cinema to form a new glossy weekly, Screen International, on 6 September 1975. Noble was appointed editor. But far from fading out, his gossip writing grew. At last he was legitimately part of cinema showbiz. His weekly column, called “In Confidence”, name- dropped at a rate of one per line, it seemed, the first one embracing Herbert Lom, Michael Winner, old-timer Sebastian Shaw’s return, Harry Alan Towers setting up two productions abroad, and Tony Hancock’s widow Freddie running a Brook Street Bureau in San Francisco. Noble wrote his last column on 11 September 1992, when with some reluctance he retired. He signed off, as ever, with his catch-phrase: “So what else is new?”.

Peter Noble, actor, producer, songwriter, journalist, writer and broadcaster: born London 18 July 1917; married first Sylvia Durham, second Marianne Stone (two daughters); died London 17 August 1997.

It was while writing the last article on Alan Ladd and ‘The Proud Rebel’ that I came across this advertisement which I found fascinating and in many ways surprising when I looked at the films paired together. Also looking at it made me think that I would have paid to see ALL of these

Just look at the first one – ‘Cinderella’ and ‘Treasure Island’ on the same bill and then ‘Carry On Sergeant’ alongside ‘Dial 999’ = this must have been the early film version rather than the series now on ‘Talking Pictures’

This time ‘The Proud Rebel# goes out with ‘Handle with Care’ – not a film I know

The classic ‘Dunkirk’ stands alone – a very fine picture

I recall going to see ‘Barnacle Bill’ at the local cinema and the film was quite good – here it has a James Mason film with it ‘ The Decks Ran Red’. Then James Mason is on again in ‘Cry Terror’

ABOVE – Not quite the Double Feature in the advertisement above – but a Walt Disney one including the classic ‘Treasure Island’

I am not that familiar with ‘The Brothers Karamazov’ but do remember it from the title all those years ago – it starred Yul Brynner and Maria Schell – and actress I really like having seen her a few years earlier in the wonderful film ‘So Little Time’ opposite Marius Goring

Apparently though Marilyn Monroe was first choice for the part she played and there seems to be co9nflicting reports on why she didn’t get – or take the part

Much of the film was made in London

Film Director Richard Brooks felt shackled at MGM because, as a contract director, he didn’t like to be told what to do or to have his creativity stifled.  However he seemed very pleased with the assignment he was given to direct a massive production of Dostoevsky’s tale of a feuding family in The Brothers Karamazov. 

This 1958 film seemed to gather more publicity in the run up to production because Marilyn Monroe made it known that she wanted to play the leading female role of Grushenka.  She wanted to get away from her sex kitten roles and to be taken seriously as an actress.  In this instance it didn’t work out for Marylin or for next choice Carroll Baker who MGM wanted but Warner Bros wouldn’t release.

So instead we got the very beautiful Maria Schell.  with a role that was as different from any other role she would play.  Grushenka is a temptress who torments men because of past treatment.  She is the girlfriend of the Karamazov patriarch and is spirited away by one of the sons.  By the end of the story, she seeks redemption.  Her famous scene was a gypsy dance.  She got on very well with her difficult costar, Yul Brynner

‘The Decks ran Red’ seems to receive good reviews

I have made no mention of ‘The Tommy Steele Story’ but that would certainly do good business at that time

This film is the story of a father (Alan Ladd), a Confederate veteran , and his mute son (David Ladd, ) who finds himself facing a 30-day jail sentence when he’s unfairly accused of starting a brawl in a small town

A local spinster (Olivia De Havilland) pays his fine , as father and son find shelter in a ranch , providing that he works it off on her farm .

Alan Ladd is searching for a doctor who can cure his son – the little boy had suffered frm a trauma which left him unable to speak

Alan Ladd finds himself involved in the struggle to keep Olivia De Havilland’s ranch from getting into the hands of local landowners -(Dean Jagger and Harry Dean Stanton) who are not pleasant characters.

The final showdown is exciting

I am surprised to see this US release going out with the British Hammer Film ‘The Abominable Snowman’ another film I like but it does seem an odd pairing. I remember ‘The Abominable Snowman’ being in VERY Wide screen – I think a process re-named as Hammerscope. No mention of Peter Cushing here – apparently the film was the first of many that Peter Cushing did for Hammer but ‘The Curse of Frankenstein’ was released first and did very well indeed at the Box Office in England and the USA. This one was not so successful

Back to ‘The Proud Rebel’ – Alan Ladd’s interpretation is top-notch alongside his son David Ladd . Olivia De Havilland comes over as a very warm character in a harsh environment.

Also what a Support cast – Dean Jagger , John Carradine , Cecil Kellaway , Mary Wickes and Harry Dean Stanton

.

The film is produced by Samuel Goldwyn Jr and directed by Michael Curtiz

BELOW – A Close-up of Alan Ladd, who looks much older in this film but then again this film was made quite a few years after ‘Shane’ and films like ‘The Red Beret’

In a way I quite like this film but it was made a little’ on the cheap’ by using quite a lot of sequences from the very successful 1950 film ‘King Solomon’s Mines’ which starred Stewart Granger and Deborah Kerr

This one had George Montgomery, David Farrar and Taina Elg in the main roles

One comment I read concerns the use of the many action scenes from King Solomon’s Mines which was made just before the Wide Screen Cinemascope process became the norm. Consequently I read that the many scenes used were ‘stretched’ to fit the new format. However I think that was an unfortunate term really – because all that was done was to take the top and bottom off each frame to make it the same. It was not in any way stretched as the term might imply

The film, set in Africa but made in Hollywood although I have to say that it captured the feel of Africa well.

Also the film was successful at the Box Office

ABOVE – This animal stampede is a direct copy from ‘King Solomon’s Mines‘

BELOW – These are dramatic Scenes and not pulled from the previous production

‘Watusi’ was made in Hollywood so these actors never saw Africa

ABOVE =- Taina Elg joins the fray and looks very convincing

Mad About Men is the charming sequel to the 1948 comedy film Miranda in which a lonely mermaid captures a young man and only offers to release him on the basis that he will take her to London

That was directed by Ken Annakin who shortly after this found fame with ‘The Story of Robin Hood and His Merrie Men’ in 1952 for Walt Disney – the film ‘Mad About Men’ was made in Technicolor and directed by Ralph Thomas who did an excellent job with plenty of fun-filled moments

In Mad About Men, set in Cornwall, Miranda Trewella (Glynis Johns) returns and convinces her distant relative Caroline Trewella (Glynis Johns) to let her take her place whilst Caroline goes on a biking excursion with a friend. In order to do this, Caroline fakes an accident which leaves her wheelchair bound, explaining Miranda’s inability to walk and need to keep her ‘legs’ covered with warm blankets.

The pair hire Nurse Carey (Margaret Rutherford), who knows Miranda is a mermaid and helped her in the first film too.

However, even though Caroline is engaged back in London to the dull but stable Ronald Baker (Peter Martyn), Miranda playing as Caroline cannot help herself when she meets some of the town’s most handsome men, and she flirts, dates and kisses both Jeff Saunders (Donald Sinden) and Colonel Barclay Sutton (Nicholas Phipps).

When Ronald comes to visit ‘Caroline’ in Cornwall, Miranda takes an immediate dislike to him and ends up pouring cold fish soup over his head. The Colonel’s wife is suspicious of ‘Caroline’ and ends up discovering her secret, so, in a plot to expose her, she agrees to let ‘Caroline’ sing at a charity concert and plans to reveal her mermaid tail on stage.

However, Caroline gets back from her trip and takes Miranda’s place on stage whilst the Nurse feeds the microphone down to the cove where Miranda lives so her singing voice can still be heard. The film ends with the real Caroline and Jeff Saunders sharing a kiss whilst Miranda is safely back in the Cornish Sea.

This film is fun and light-hearted it and is difficult not to enjoy the story.  However, where it really shines is in highlighting the wistful and whimsical beauty of Miranda and the more prim and proper styling of Caroline. 

Glynis Johns’ acting helps us to differentiate easily between the Trewella girls.

The film was released to cinemas coupled with ‘African Adventure’ in Pathecolor as the supporting picture

I will have to look further into ‘African Adventure’ – it is in Colour and the filming took place in Africa so it has a lot going for it – plus it got an American and a British release

It seems that Catherine, the first wife of Richard Todd was in herself a classically trained actress who was building up a quite impressive career until she met and married Richard Todd and virtually gave it all up to support him. only for him to treat her cruelly later in life when he met someone else.

She appeared on the West End stage long before he did apparently – if this programme is anything to go by – and I am sure it is

She appeared in a leading role in that famous play ‘The Cherry Orchard’ at St James Theatre in London in 1948

This is quite definitely the very young Catherine Grant Bogle – billed in her career as Catherine Bogle.

Catherine is playing Anya – on stage in the West End – how impressive for a young 20 year old actress. She had been with Dundee Rep and starred alongside her future husband Richard Todd in ‘Claudia’ but after this she left to join Liverpool Rep on a 6 month contract – that would have been in mid 1947. This was one of the plays that she was in – her star was very much in the ascendancy.

She was a Sottish girl – her father was from Glasgow – he had inherited a brass foundry from his Uncle and her mother Margaret was from Rothesay on the Isle of Bute and her family had business and farming interests there.

Much later on after Catherine married Richard Todd who had found fame and fortune by then, they had moved to Haileywood House Nr Henley on Thames – that would be in 1957

In the middle of 1961, Mr Grant Bogle – Catherine’s father, had suffered a stroke and so decided it would be better for them to live near their daughter and so they came to a rented house in Henley on Thames. Mr Grant Bogle was not happy there so they then came to live in a flat at Haileywood House where Catherine and Richard lived. Mr Grant Bogle was never well though and became quite depressed and little bad tempered – they moved back to Scotland in 1964 maybe to the Isle of Bute area

Richard Todd said of Catherine ‘She was a lovely person and I felt as protective towards her as I had in our earlier rehearsals together. With my career prospects looking bright, I reckoned it would not be long before we could marry’ This was at the time that he had returned to London from Dundee and started his film career

BELOW – Here is a programme from 6 April 1948 when Catherine was in ‘The Cherry Orchard’ in Liverpool at The Liverpool Playhouse on Williamson Square and the play opened on 6 April of that year prior to it moving to the West End of London

Catherine is very much part of the Playhouse Company

Catherine Bogle was a good stage actress and may well have been discovered and gone into the film industry – instead she settled for marriage and raising a family. She was apparently a very good Mother to her children.

I have tried to give her, in this article and in previous ones, the credit she deserves because she is not well known, and the period after Richard Todd left her, I have the impression, was a sad and unhappy time for her. I imagine that she couldn’t quite understand what had happened and why it had happened.

She was in my view cruelly treated by her husband – I think that they never spoke to one another again after the day he packed his bags and left – and even then on that same day, they hardly shared a word between them.

She later went back to live in Rothesay on the Isle of Bute – I hope that she was happy there and that, in her life, she found the happiness that she deserved.

I will hope to do another article on Catherine as soon as I am able

BBC Television commenced a new serialisation of this famous novel with the first episode broadcast in September 1957.

I imagine filming would have been done a little earlier even if the actual broadcast went out ‘live’ because there were often filmed segments – usually exterior scenes – such as this one.

Bernard Miles again played Long John Silver and Dr. Livesey was played by Valentine Dyall – I can just see Valentine Dyall fitting this role perfectly. He had in fact played the same part in the BBC 1951 serialisation, again along with Bernard Miles as Long John

Also cast was Clive Dunn – later of Dad’s Army – as Ben Gunn

The ABOVE scene was being shot in Surrey with some young watchers in the foreground.

There is a similar picture to this which I have used before which was a few years before this when Walt Disney was filming his Technicolor classic in the summer of 1949 and the location for this scene was the Lake at Denham Film Studios.

About this time also, the BBC serialised ‘The Adventure of Ben Gunn’ a sort of spin off from Treasure Island in which Peter Wyngarde played a much younger Long John Silver

BE,LOW – I am re-printing this article I wrote some time ago :–

The Adventure of Ben Gunn – BBC Television.

Although I can’t remember much of this serial, it seems that it was an expensive production for those days and – as was the case at that time – it went out ‘live’ from the Ealing Studios that the BBC had taken on.

It is as though the BBC were trying to take on ITV who had had great success with ‘The Adventures of Robin Hood’ later ‘Ivanhoe’ and ‘Sir Lancelot’ .     However ITV were much cleverer here – they made these on film and so were able to sell them to America which in the case of ‘Robin Hood’ proved a great move.

With ‘Sir Lancelot’ some of the episodes were filmed in colour – had that happened with ‘Robin Hood’ then even greater success would have come their way.

It does seem that the BBC were a step behind here – surely it would have been obvious to them that on film it had much more potential

The Adventures of Ben Gunn tells the story of how Ben met Nick Allardyce, son of a local parson, who yearned for a life of adventure.

Nick had finished medical school before gaining his full qualifications, but he managed to get the job as  surgeon on a transport vessel, the Walrus (later to become Captain Flint’s pirate ship)

Nick and Ben meet John Silver and others from Treasure Island. We learn where  the buried treasure in Treasure Island came from.

The story also tells how Ben came to be marooned on the island years after he had fled the ‘Walrus’ pirate ship

The television series, which starred Peter Wyngarde as John Silver and John Moffat as Ben was a six-part serial which began at 5.35 pm on 1 June 1958 with The Parson’s Son. 

The last episode was broadcast on 6 July.

The BBC spent a large amount of money on this production

 They even had a giant wave machine and a Spanish galleon for the scenes on board the ship.

During a sword fight between Peter Wyngarde and Olaf Pooley,  Peter sustained an injury but luckily only in a rehearsal.

This as we have said was done ‘live’ so had this sort of thing happened, I really don’t know what would have been done.

Peter Wyngarde was taken to hospital with the  sword still protruding from his leg which to say the least must have been pretty alarming at the time.

Peter Wyngarde played John Silver as a young man. He did say that “I played Long John absolutely straight. In this series he was a young man – about 30 years before the Long John of Treasure Island.”

He was also played as a quite well to do type from a good family who later fell into bad ways.

One role I well remember from Peter Wyngarde was in the 1961 film ‘ The Innocents’ with Deborah Kerr

This was a real Adventure film that all us youngsters loved when we were lucky enough to see it at the local cinema. Plenty of action and adventure in Technicolor

The Trailer gives us a taste of what is to come

When you viewed this, you just had to go and see it

After this film. I always think that Burt Lancaster became more and more unpleasant and, as we say, got too big for his boots

He could appear brutal on screen, and he sometimes seemed that way behind the cameras too.

He was the boss as well as the star and British directors often seemed to fall foul of him. Charles Crichton (the ex-Ealing comedy director whose credits include The Lavender Hill Mob and A Fish Called Wanda) was sacked a few weeks into the shooting of ‘Birdman of Alcatraz’

Lancaster was equally savage with another Ealing comedy director, Sandy Mackendrick, firing him from the George Bernard Shaw adaptation The Devil’s Disciple (1959.)

“Sandy was a very clever director and a very nice guy but he took one helluva lot of time,” Lancaster later said. At least, by then, Mackendrick had directed Lancaster in one of his greatest performances, as the columnist JJ Hunsecker in Sweet Smell of Success (1957.) Ironically, that film seemed remarkable precisely because of Mackendrick’s inventive camerawork.

It helped, too, that Mackendrick made known an aspect of Lancaster’s character that had hitherto only been hinted at – his capacity for bullying.

One film Director that he didn’t bully or even try to bully was Byron Haskin who directed him in ‘His Majesty O’Keefe’ – and had directed him a few years before in ‘I Walk Alone’ – he just wouldn’t even try or even dare because Byron Haskin had the measure of Burt Lancaster

ABOVE – Don’t mess with me, Mr Lancaster

Walt Disney had started his ‘Live Action’ films in 1950 with ‘Treasure Island’ 1950 and the ‘The Story of Robin Hood and His Merrie Men’ 1952 which were very successful – and made in England. Then to ‘The Sword and the Rose’ and ‘Rob Roy The Highland Rogue’ and these two were not anywhere near the previous two at the Box Office. So he then started production in Hollywood with ‘Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea’ which did really well – However the decade finished with, up to that time, the most successful film he had had with ‘The Shaggy Dog’ – it was a surprise to all because it didn’t have a big budget and the expectations were, at best, normal run of the mill. What a surprise when this one struck gold with Cinema-goers just loving it.

I have read that Fred McMurray was Walt Disney’s favourite actor

In many ways, The Shaggy Dog launched a new style for Walt Disney’s live-action films.

 The Shaggy Dog was the most profitable film at the box office beating out the likes of Some Like It Hot, North by Northwest and even Disney’s Sleeping Beauty. Only Ben-Hur ruled over The Shaggy Dog at the box office in 1959. The crazy plot element combinations kept young audience entertained.

What other film at the time could give you talks of the Cold War, plotting Russian spies, a rivalry over two different girls, and a horror fantasy about a teenage boy morphing into a dog from a magical ring

Only Walt Disney could pull this off and keep the insanity going with many more films that shared a similar theme of ” A story that treated the younger generation and it’s problems in a light-hearted manner,” as said by Walt Disney. 

The Shaggy Dog 1959

It may have been a surprise hit but it certainly made Walt Disney and his colleagues look anew at projects – they were always pretty adept at reading their fans and what those fans wanted – but this one took them aback

They were quick learners though.

Another really great Walt Disney film of 1959 was ‘Darby O Gill and The Little People’ but it did not do anywhere near as well – in my view it deserved to