The Lavender Hill Mob

Director: Charles Crichton
Writer: T.E.B. Clarke
Cast: Alec Guinness, Stanley Holloway, Sid James, Alfie Bass, Marjorie Fielding, Edie Martin, John Salew, Ronald Adam
Music by: Georges Auric
Photography by: Douglas Slocombe
Runtime: 81 min.
Year: 1951

About: Holland for 20 years has worked as a bank transfer agent for the delivery of gold bullion. One day he befriends Pendlebury, a maker of souvenirs. Holland remarks that, with Pendlebury's smelting equipment, one could forge the gold into harmless-looking toy Eiffel Towers and smuggle the gold from England into France.

Trivia:
¤ Audrey Hepburn was considered for a larger role in this film, but stage work made her unavailable.
¤ Hepburn plays here Chiquita, the girl selling cigarettes in scenes in South America.
¤ During rehearsals for the Rio de Janeiro airport scene, Guinness was immediately impressed by the vision before him. He could not, for the most innocent of reasons, tear his eyes away from her. ‘She only had one line to say,’ Guinness would later explain, ‘and I don’t think she even said the line in any particular or interesting way. But her faun-like beauty and presence were remarkable.’ He excused himself from the rehearsal for a few minutes and telephoned his agent. ‘I don’t know if she can act,’ he said, ‘but a real film star has just wafted on to the set. Someone should get her under contract before we lose her to the Americans.

   

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