The Magnificent Two

Dir: Cliff Owen

1967

****

The Magnificent Two (also known as What Happened at Campo Grande?) is the third and final film of Morecombe and Wise’s trio of feature films of the 1960s that usually saw them getting mixed up in crime syndicates, espionage and even a revolution. Like the first two films (sometimes known as the Intelligence Men trilogy) The Magnificent Two wasn’t a huge hit with the critics, however, the public loved it and even though it is no masterpiece there is something timeless and utterly watchable about Morecombe and Wise, one of Britain’s best loved comedy duos. The droll title is clearly inspired by The Magnificent Seven, released seven years before to great acclaim and also set in South America. In this scenario, Eric and Ernie are travelling salesmen who are selling action men around South America. It’s not the greatest set up admittedly but actually the ridiculousness of it and the fact that their sales pitch is rather good, seems to work regardless. I think only Eric and Ernie could accidentally kill someone in the first ten minutes of a film and make it funny. Arriving in the fictional town of Campo Grande, Parazuellia, Eric and Ernie soon become mistaken for revolutionaries, Eric being mistaken for Torres the head of their movement. After discovering their true identities and not realising that Eric had accidentally killed Torres, the revolutionaries decide he looks enough like him to impersonate him so that the revolution can go ahead. After the revolution is successful, the film takes a wry look at history and sees Eric gain an inflated opinion of himself, one dictator being toppled by another. As ever, Ernie is mostly the straight guy while Eric gets all the laughs but Ern does get a little more involved than he usually does on their television shows. There are moments of unfortunate misogyny that Morecombe and Wise weren’t really known for but the jump from small screen to big screen seemed to always throw up these sorts of things back in the day. On the whole the writing was good, not really Morecombe and Wise’s style but somehow they made it their own. Put Eric and Ernie in any situation and they would make the very best of it and The Magnificent Two is no different. Morecombe and Wise purists may not like it as much as their TV work but I grew up on this sort of thing and I still love it now. Cliff Owen’s direction is impressive and he captures the feel of old westerns and South American cinema rather well, even though it was filmed in Pinewood Studios. The supporting cast is also very good, with Virgilio Teixeira (who was in Return of the Magnificent Seven) on fine form, Margit Saad holding her own and refusing to succumb to stereotype and I have to say, seeing the great Cecil Parker, in what would turn out to be his penultimate performance in a feature length film, is always a treat. I liked how they snuck in their famous ‘Boom oo yata-ta-ta’ song in. Not a classic to everyone but much better than most remember it.