Dumb Daddies

It is a great shame that the first reel of this film appears to be missing (with the exception of stills) because it is a very fine dark comedy with a nightmarish feel to it, superbly executed in minimalist by the much undervalued Max Davidson. Unlike other Davidson films, he gets away rather here from the Jewish caricature (while maintaining the persona) and the usual farcical elements acquires here a zany quality bordering on the surreal - as where he is transfixed by the neck to a fence (as a result of the attentions of a dog on the other side and a cord round his neck, and is incapable of controlling his responses to an investigating policeman or the moment later in the film where a woman slipping is transfixed with horror as she mistakes a false leg for her own.