Rent Good Morning Boys (1938)

Passing With Flying Colours - Good Morning Boys review by CH

Rarely have there been such outsize schoolboys as those here again with Will Hay as their master. A situation which the viewer soon accepts as they taunt the ever-gullible and incompetent man who, true to form, finds that higher authorities are about to sack him. This gives pedagogue and pupils common cause in finding a way to preserve the status quo. That is a phrase that one and all would be as hard put to render into English as they do the French which is the subject of an imminent exam.

No need to explain here how they all pass haut la main, so to speak; sufficient to say that this purported display of linguistic brilliance brings them the award of a visit to Paris. Neatly enough, this coincides with the development of opening scenes about a plot to steal the Mona Lisa.

The plot might sound as creaky as Hay's attempts to speak French but it would not shame the Marx Brothers and, as with them, is more than covered by an array of gags - including a sultry, even bottom-slapping foray to a night club and unabashed references to short and fat people.

Smart viewers could gain an extra mark for saying that the Mona Lisa on display in what passes here for the Louvre (it was made in Islington) is larger than the one which had originally sat on da Vinci's easel. Her enigmatic smile would surely have broken into a broad cackle had she lived to see this diverting film.