Love in Pawn

Woeful comedy from journeyman director Charles Saunders that contains very few laughs. A second-rate cast (apart from the dependable John Laurie) is led by Bernard Braden, whose monstrous bearded chin is a constant distraction. He plays a struggling artist whose wife (Barbara Kelly) pawns him in order to raise enough cash to finance a dinner for the solicitor of his Uncle, who has promised...well... nope, nope, can't be bothered...

Bernard Braden and Barbara Kelly are a happy couple. True, he doesn't earn much money as a painter of pigs, but his gig as a cartoonist pays enough to keep them going on a raffish houseboat, far from Canada and his uncle Laurence Naismith's logging and milling company. But more money is always nice, and when lawyer John Laurie shows up with ten thousand pounds from his uncle if he can demonstrate he's hard working and keeps himself and his wife decently, they agree. Laurie proposes to drop over to make sure, and they agree. However, when the young couple checks out the accounts to afford a few luxuries for Laurie, they discover themselves two shillings short of half a crown. They recall a recent story, head over a pawn shop, and put Braden in hock.

The next day, Laurie having been impressed, Miss Kelly returns to the shop to redeem Braden. Not only has she lost the pawn ticket, but the daughters of the house are making too much of a fuss over her husband. So she leaves him in pawn.

And the rest is the story, filled with minutiae of the pawn shop industry, painting, and Naismith's turn as Braden's uncle. He seems to have modeled his comic character on John Carradine, and is quite amusing. The rest of the movie is engaging enough, if a trifle mechanical in its progress. Even so, 80 minutes passed pleasantly.

This was an unknown film to me before it turned up in the small hours on TV. For older viewers, Bernard Braden is remembered as a witty presenter, big in the 1960s, a contemporary of David Frost and a forerunner of (ugh) Esther Rantzen. Here, in 1953, he is paired with wife Barbara Kelly in a farce about a struggling artist (complete with goatee) as his wife living on a houseboat. To raise money she hocks him to a pawnbroker! His new family kind of like him, particularly daughter Jean Carson (before her move to America) who does what she can to seduce him. Soon the situation becomes a national sensation, as Kelly is reluctant to retrieve her now confused hubby. Farcial situations abound. The couple of lots of sharp, punning dialogue, presumably supplied by "additional" scripters, Frank Muir and Denis Noren. The real revelation here is Barbara Kelly who is vibrant and sexy (she has a hot scene posing for Braden). A pity she never had a significant film career. She did stick to Bernard though.

The film is not as bad as fellow reviewers have implied, and for a ' U ' certificate film back in 1953 it was quite a sophisticated film, and you do actually believe that the couple in the film have a rich and sensually happy marriage. The dialogue is raunchy, and Bernard Braden who plays the husband draws some quite explicit cartoons which I hope the censors of the time did not cut out. Barbara Kelly who was popular at the time on Radio as well as later on television was a household name. It is part of the UK's entertainment for many years, and those still alive will fondly remember them. No spoilers as the plot has been more or less revealed already, and verbal humour is at the fore with a few slapstick touches in between. Enjoy it if you get to see it and I promise afterwards never to ' pawn ' their partners. Even the title promises a lot and for most of the time delivers. And Bernard Braden was just as good as many others at the time. Barbara Kelly was a gem of an actor, and yes I believe she could have had better roles.

Barbara Kelly could have had a career playing glamorous secretaries like the American actress, Eve Arden. However, she was never given the substantial roles which could have given her a career path in A films. Instead, she got lumbered with unfunny scripts and films with threadbare story lines. Here she is playing second fiddle to her husband, Bernard Braden, who simply couldn't act. The story revolves around her trying to raise money for a ludicrous financial idea, so she hocks him to a pawnbroker. It's painful to watch a wooden actor like Braden, with a ludicrous stick on goatee beard, trying to be funny. After 20 minutes, I had to keep fast forwarding, as the inane story was of zero interest, with acting, apart from Kelly and Laurie, pretty dire. To say this is a B film is being generous! Give it a miss.