Bless This House (DVD)

Sid and Jean Abbott are a happily married couple, living with their two teenagers, Sally and Mike, in suburbia. Life is never without its ups and downs though, and the Abbotts certainly get to see their share of the downs. Mike is a student who happily lives off his parents. Sally is a environmental protester, much to her dad's embarrassment. Then the Baines move in next door and are quickly at loggerheads with the Abbotts. Mike disregards this though, falling for the Baines' daughter. Will the warring families ever see eye to eye? In the seventies, it became popular to make one-off films out of television series; this one was based on the popular series of ...  Read the complete review

Look at that face - that wizened, wrinkly, creased up old face - the face of Mr Comedy, Sidney James. He could have been 360 years old for all I know, this ancient old genius with the distinctive cackle. Sid James is probably best known for his appearances in the empire of the double entendre, the Carry On films, but he had a long tradition in comedy, stretching back as far as being the sidekick to the enigmatic and tortured genius, Tony Hancock, but he really made his mark as the grizzled Jack the Lad in films like Carry On Dick. In the early 1970’s he was at the peak of his success and popularity and he leapt straight from the film ...  Read the complete review

Based on the popular 1970s TV sitcom of the same name, the film Bless This House (1972) is well worth watching, if you are a fan of this era of comedy – which I am. I would also recommend it for any Carry On fans, as there are plenty of familiar names there from those films too, and it is produced by Peter Rogers. There are some major changes between the television and film versions, the main ones being that two of the main actors are different – Peter Butterworth taking over as the neighbour, Trevor and Robin Askwith playing Sid’s son, Mike. They are good enough, but I did miss the original actors. In the TV version, we only really ...  Read the complete review

Bless This House falls into the category of most 70s films that are basically feature length episodes of popular television programmes. That, however, is not to say that Bless This House, and indeed many of those films are not enjoyable, because they are. Bless This House is never going to win any awards for acting, storyline, set design, costume etc. But I am fairly sure that the people making it were under no illusions at the time! For anyone that liked the television series, or indeed were/are fans of the Carry On films, Bless This House is a delight. This is mainly because of the comedy genius that is Sid James. OK, so ultimately he is the same ...  Read the complete review