Mumsy, Nanny, Sonny and Girly [Girly] (1970, Michael Bryant, Ursula Howells, Pat Heywood, Howard Trevor, Vanessa Howard) – Classic Movie Review 8177

Director Freddie Francis’s twisted, sick 1970 British horror movie Mumsy, Nanny, Sonny and Girly [aka Girly] is The Addams Family without the laughs.

It is an appalling, shockingly inept shocker about two crazy teens, Sonny and Girly (played by Howard Trevor and Vanessa Howard), who kidnap homeless people and hippies, and take them home for family role-playing games and ritual killing, with Girly wielding the axe and Sonny wielding the home movie camera.

Pat Heywood is typecast as Nanny, Ursula Howells plays Mumsy, and Michael Bryant plays New Friend, one of their victims who has different ideas of fun and games. Also in the cast are Robert Swann as Soldier, Imogen Hassall as Girlfriend, Michael Ripper as Zoo attendant and Hugh Armstrong as Friend in No 5.

Based on Maisie Mosco’s play Happy Family, with a screenplay by Brian Comport, this is a waste of talent and celluloid.

Freddie Francis wanted to shoot a movie at Oakley Court, Windsor Road, Oakley Green, Windsor, Berkshire, England, and asked Comport to write him a story to take full advantage of the house’s filmic interiors. Little of the play made it into the film, as Comport did not like the play, even though it inspired his story, which he also novelised.

It would make a good bad double bill with Goodbye Gemini (1970), also released by Cinerama Releasing in 1970.

© Derek Winnert 2019 Classic Movie Review 8177

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