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Decline and Fall... of a Birdwatcher

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Decline and Fall... of a Birdwatcher
Theatrical release poster
Directed byJohn Krish
Written byIvan Foxwell
Alan Hackney
Hugh Whitemore
Based onDecline and Fall
1928 novel
by Evelyn Waugh
Produced byIvan Foxwell
StarringRobin Phillips
Donald Wolfit
Geneviève Page
Felix Aylmer
Colin Blakely
CinematographyDesmond Dickinson
Edited byArchie Ludski
Music byRon Goodwin
Production
company
Ivan Foxwell Productions
Distributed byTwentieth Century Fox Film Corporation
Release dates
  • 25 September 1968 (1968-09-25)
(London)
  • 26 January 1969 (1969-01-26)
(United States)
Running time
113 minutes
CountryUK
LanguageEnglish
Budget$1,970,000

Decline and Fall... of a Birdwatcher (also known as Decline and Fall) is a 1968 British comedy film directed by John Krish and starring Robin Phillips, Geneviève Page and Donald Wolfit.[1][2] It was adapted by Ivan Foxwell, Alan Hackney and Hugh Whitemore from the 1928 novel Decline and Fall by Evelyn Waugh.

It was the final film role for Wolfit.

Plot summary

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Paul Pennyfeather is an Oxford divinity student who finds himself sent down after a group of drunken undergraduates remove his trousers and he is accused of exposing himself.

Forced to look for work, he seeks the services of an employment agency who secure for him a position at a sleazy Welsh boys' boarding school, presided over by the colourful Dr. Fagan.

The school's staff are an assortment of eccentric characters: Mr Prendergast, a withdrawn former clergyman; Captain Grimes, a one-legged philanderer with his eye on Fagan's daughter; and Solomon Philbrick, an undercover criminal posing as Fagan's butler. Paul, who tutors Peter Beste-Chetwynde, is enchanted at the school’s annual sports by the boy’s rich mother. Peter thinks Paul her perfect husband so invites him to vacation at their country home. The two are taken with each other but on the day of their wedding, Paul lands in prison for his inadvertent role in her tawdry business deals. There he runs across everyone from his school days, only to be sprung and sent back into the world by the powerful husband she’s married in his absence.

Cast

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Production

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The film was made with a budget of $1,970,000.[3]

Reception

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Box office

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According to Fox records the film required $3,100,000 in rentals to break even and by 11 December 1970 had made $1,475,000 so made a loss to the studio.[4]

Critical

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The Monthly Film Bulletin wrote: "John Krish has directed a fast-moving and funny Decline and Fall with enough familiar faces to ensure its commercial success. But unfortunately, in adapting Waugh's novel, Ivan Foxwell has taken too literally the author's claim that it belongs to no particular period, and has set Waugh's sharply observed comedy of manners in the present day. Though the scenes in the Dickensian school and in the futuristic King's Thursday retain – thanks to Jonathan Barry's inventive sets – most of their outrageous charm, the characters fare less happily: abstracted into the 1960s and uprooted from any recognisable social setting, they are relegated from the realms of satire into those of farce. ...The answer is perhaps to forget about the novel and simply enjoy the acting. ... Carry On Countess might have been a better title, but on its own level the film is enough of a success to make it worth seeing."[5]

The Radio Times Guide to Films gave the film 1/5 stars, writing: "Ex-documentary director John Krish has a stab at Evelyn Waugh's partly autobiographical 1928 work, Decline and Fall. It was a vainglorious attempt, as the joys of this hilarious comedy of upper-class manners lie solely on the page; neither Krish nor his trio of scriptwriters have the satirical wit or irreverent verve to translate them to the screen. They are not helped by Robin Phillips's ghastly performance."[6]

Leslie Halliwell said: "Flabby, doomed attempt to film a satirical classic which lives only on the printed page. Odd moments amuse."[7]

References

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  1. ^ "Decline and Fall... of a Birdwatcher". British Film Institute Collections Search. Retrieved 21 March 2024.
  2. ^ "BFI | Film & TV Database | Decline and Fall (1968)". British Film Institute. 16 April 2009. Archived from the original on 14 January 2009. Retrieved 13 February 2012.
  3. ^ Solomon, Aubrey. Twentieth Century Fox: A Corporate and Financial History (The Scarecrow Filmmakers Series). Lanham, Maryland: Scarecrow Press, 1989. ISBN 978-0-8108-4244-1. p255
  4. ^ Silverman, Stephen M (1988). The Fox that got away : the last days of the Zanuck dynasty at Twentieth Century-Fox. L. Stuart. p. 328. ISBN 978-0-8184-0485-6.
  5. ^ "Decline and Fall... of a Birdwatcher". The Monthly Film Bulletin. 35 (408): 168. 1 January 1968. ProQuest 1305839174 – via ProQuest.
  6. ^ Radio Times Guide to Films (18th ed.). London: Immediate Media Company. 2017. p. 239. ISBN 9780992936440.
  7. ^ Halliwell, Leslie (1989). Halliwell's Film Guide (7th ed.). London: Paladin. p. 261. ISBN 0586088946.
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