Another Shore

It's a sad fact that not all Ealing comedies were created equal. The brand has become synonymous with top notch British comedies with their near perfect portrayals of Britain of yesteryear, frequently imbued with a slightly sinister twist. Films like 'The Ladykillers', 'The Lavender Hill Mob', 'Passport to Pimlico' and 'Whiskey Galore' are timeless classics that bear almost limitless repeated viewing. 'Another Shore' is not one of these, despite a sterling cast and crew. (It was directed by TV and film stalwart Charles Crichton).



The film is supposedly set in Dublin and features an earnest looking Robert Beatty as an Irish day-dreamer who hopes that fate will transport him to a sunny Tahitian island. Nothing unusual about this and so far so good. But then, in a bizarre leap of logic that can only be attributed to poor scripting, he decides the only way to achieve his goal is to hang around the centre of Dublin waiting for a rich person to have an accident so that, when he runs to their help, he will be richly rewarded and will then be able to afford to travel to Tahiti. Which if course, is utterly ridiculous.

But the ludicrousness doesn't stop there. We are asked to suspend disbelief again when, by strange coincidence, our hero takes up with a wealthy alcoholic who (coincidentally) is looking for a travelling companion for his trips to Tahiti and is willing to pay. Lucky that.




In the meantime though, our selfish hero has fallen for a young girl (Moira Lister) and she seems determined to break him of his endless dreaming and get him to settle down - probably as a shipping clerk, the role he gave up to pursue his dream.

Beatty is miss-cast in the main role as he never seems to be able to raise even an ounce of enthusiasm for anything - even the Tahiti trip. Neither he nor the creaking and convoluted plot ever quite gel.



Then, as if to rob its audience of any crumb of satisfaction, just as our hero is about to set off on his dream trip he has an accident (with his fiancé in the other car) and is unable to travel, having to settle for married life and a civil service job after all. Which leaves you wondering what the film was all about in the first place.



Stanley Holloway is worth watching in his role as the wealthy lush, and it's fun spotting characters like Wilfred Brambell (Albert Steptoe) in early roles. But overall, this is one to avoid unless you really are an Ealing completist.

The transfer is, in common with other recent Optimum releases, very good indeed. It's presented in 4:3 aspect ratio which isn't a million miles from the film's original Academy standard. Audio is perfectly acceptable mono.

It's worth noting that this rarely gets aired on TV, probably as it's a bit of a turkey by Ealing standards, so it's good that Optimum have seen fit to release this as part of their Ealing programme. It will certainly please the collectors amongst us.

For the rest of you though, there are many better Ealing films to cut your teeth on.