Before seeing this I had seen Tommy Steele in Half A Sixpence, Finian's Rainbow, and The Happiest Millionaire and Kill Me Tomorrow, the latter a British noir feature where he sang one song. To me he's not a rock and roll singer as such, but rather a most talented entertainer in the British music hall tradition. But he did make a few films while he and Cliff Richard vied for who was number one rock and roller in the United Kingdom before the days of The Beatles.
Tommy The Toreador was made while he was still a rock and roll singer and this film most likely never made it to this side of the Atlantic. I was struck at how similarly constructed this film was to what Elvis Presley was doing in the USA. Of course this film was constructed around Steele's persona just as Presley films were. And like Presley films he was given casts of veteran performers in support to insure their success. Colonel Parker saw to that with Elvis and someone was looking out for Steele as well.
At times Tommy The Toreador gets a bit silly, but on the whole it's a rather enjoyable 90 minutes or so as Tommy is a sailor on a merchant vessel and gets stranded in Spain. He meets another British subject stranded in Spain in the person of Janet Munro and winds up in the hands of some sharp promoters who need a bullfighter for the Corrida. Steele in the Corrida acts a whole lot like Lou Costello in Mexican Hayride.
But he sings a bunch of nice songs that I'm sure were popular in the UK back in the day. And such people as Sid James and Kenneth Williams, veterans of the Carry-On troupe are here as one of the promoter and the very stuffy if daft British consul. And Noel Purcell of the Abbey Theater plays Tommy's exasperated captain.
Steele could actually draw from his own experiences, in his memoirs Bermondsey Boy Steele recounts that he did his national service on an ocean liner as part of the crew before going into show business.
Tommy The Toreador is a pleasant musical diversion and a real treat for Tommy Steele's still strong fan legion.
