In truth, there is barely enough story here to make a film.

While it doesn't offer any answers, it both thrills and makes you think.

One of the best movies of the year! Incredible from the beginning to the end.

Strong acting helps the film overcome an uncertain premise and create characters that hold our attention absolutely.

It doesn't seem that long ago when I saw this on the big screen complete with an intermission and a glossy programme.As a matter of fact it was the height of the "Swinging Sixties" and perhaps not the most obvious time to make a musical set in Edwardian times with an ex-fifties pop star in the lead role.The words "British" and "musical" are of course antithetical,the list of disasters and near disasters in this bastardised genre too long and too well-known to recount here.Presumably the producers hoped that by bringing in George Sidney they could breathe life into an already mouldering corpse.Sadly "Half a sixpence" was not a Lazarus-like project. The best Mr Sidney could do was to give it a semblance of life,even his considerable talents could not provide that vital spark to set the heart beating and the blood pulsing. Mr Tommy Steele,a decade earlier the archetypal cheeky cockney pop singer who was the best Britain could do in the rock n' roll industry's birth-pangs,had gamely fought his way from guitar-slinging to "family entertainer"status via pantomime and Variety bills.Shrewdly managed,he did not try to compete with the emerging "Beat Group" generation but capitalised on his broader appeal and toothy charm.Sadly it was not enough to smile and shake his blond hair a lot when it came to making a big movie, you needed that special quality that forces people to look at you rather than those round you,and he didn't have it. Watching "Half a Sixpence" is like indulgently watching your favourite nephew perform after Christmas dinner.While he chirps away merrily your eyelids droop and every so often when he gets extra loud you wake up with a start and pretend to be enjoying it. It isn't actually bad - it's just totally non-involving.The songs are blandly - if competently- performed,the dances likewise.The "Big Number","Flash,Bang,Wallop" neither flashes,bangs nor wallops. Miss Julia Foster has clearly been instructed to reign in her effervescent personality(and dye her hair so as not to rival Mr Steele's)but she still manages to be the best thing about the film. A lot of talented people did their very best to make "Half a sixpence" work.It must have been heartbreaking for them to put in so much effort to so little avail.Opening out the production from the relatively modest confines of the theatre destroyed it's warmth and intimacy.Replacing those attributes with brassiness and wide grins was,I'm afraid a retrograde step.

HALF A SIXPENCE on the London stage was good. When it came to Broadway,trimmed and faster paced, it was better. The film, therefore, was keenlyanticipated by anyone, myself included, who loved one or both versionsof the play. What a disappointment. Bloated and overlong with new andinferior orchestrations and arraingments, the film loses all the charmthat made the musical so delightful. Filters are used for no purpose (ala Josh Logan with SOUTH PACIFIC), lyrics are dumbed down to inanity,cameras are moved in and out for no reason and dance numbers areunimaginative and fall flat! The only saving grace of this mess is thedelightful Tommy Steele who starred on stage and brings his charm andcharisma to the big screen. Without him, HALF A SIXPENCE would be adisaster; with him it is simply a dreary mis-fire at the end of thegolden age of musical films.....

This is a very well acted and energetic musical. Tommy Steel and Julie Foster in the lead parts were brilliantly cast.The banjo scene in this was well choreographed, put together and acted out. To top the whole scene the banjo playing was superb.A brilliant family musical it gets a 10/10 from us. But then we are Tommy Steele fans.

Master showmen were at work in the production of this perhaps over long but nevertheless delightful picture. It would be impossible to visualise the film without the warm performance of Tommy Steele, and it was an inspired move to bring in George Sidney, one of Hollywood's finest directors of musicals, to give the picture a very special flare. The budget was obviously huge and it all shows on the screen in the very lively production numbers, especially those shot on location. A super piece of screen entertainment which stands up well to occasional re-watching.