Oliver!
I have a special feeling for this film. Some articles put it low in the pantheon of Best Pictures, but I think it's great, even better than The Lion in Winter. But I'm biased, because I saw this film when I was seven years old and was enraptured. My dad bought the soundtrack album and I played it incessantly. I've probably seen it now close to ten times and when I watched it on Sunday last it still hooked me in.
To start with, it's deliciously Dickensian. Dickens, who turned a gimlet eye on the treatment of the poor in his day, had a grim view of workhouses, which took orphans and put them to work on a treadmill. In Oliver! the first scene in set in such a place, and in a nice touch, a huge sign reading "God Is Love" adorns the wall, There is neither in this place, as the boys are in rags, eating gruel. The opening song is "Food, Glorious Food":
"Food, glorious food,
We're anxious to try it."
A little boy, seated at the long dinner table, pulls the long straw, which compels him forward, where he asks the imperious beadle, Mr. Bumble (Harry Secombe). "Please sir, I want some more," the lad says, which puts Bumble in an uproar. The boy is Oliver Twist of course, and this starts his adventure.
Eventually he will make it to London and fall in with a gang of boy pickpockets, including The Artful Dodger, led by Fagin (Ron Moody), who acts a fence for a villainous thief named Bill Sikes (Oliver Reed). Sikes' wife, Nancy, (Shani Wallis) takes a shine to the boy, and when it is established that he is the grand-nephew of a rich man, she tries to help him escape.
Oliver! was directed by Carol Reed, who also made The Third Man (I can't think of two more diametrically opposed films). The film is so rich, with so much period detail, that it almost overwhelms the senses. Reed treats the characters as iconic, almost larger than life. Fagin is introduced by coming out of a room full of smoke, like a devil out of Hell, while Sikes is introduced only by his shadow, preceded by his vicious bull terrier, Bullseye.
Of course Oliver! is a musical, and the songs are great. They were written by Lionel Bart, who was something of a one-hit wonder. When I was a kid my favorite song was "I'd Do Anything," in which the boys express to Nancy their love. I suppose I identified with the boys, because I remember feeling special when older girls (who were probably only about twelve or thirteen) fawned over me.
Today I have to say my favorite is "Reviewing the Situation," in which Fagin contemplates going straight. Fagin, in the book, was obviously Jewish, but that isn't mentioned in the film, but this song, with its slithering clarinet, has a klezmer feel to it:
"I'm reviewing the situation,
Can a fellow be a villain all his life?"
I also love the big numbers, such as "Consider Yourself," when the Dodger (Jack Wild) and, it seems, the entire city of London welcome Oliver to their city, and "Who Will Buy," when Oliver, in his first morning at his uncle's house, observes the beautiful day while peddlers sing about their wares:
"Who will buy this wonderful morning,
Such a sky you never did see
Who will tie it up with a ribbon,
And put it in a box for me?"
There are many more great songs. Fagin has two more: "You've Got to Pick a Pocket or Two," and "Be Back Soon," which reflects the complexity of the character: he's a crook, but he loves the boys. Moody was nominated for an Oscar for the part, and is just magnificent.
The film is different than the musical and especially the book, which goes into Oliver's mother and has a much more intricate plot. When I first read it, long after seeing the film, I wondered what was going on. One of the best thing the movie changes is the ending. In the book, Fagin is hanged and the Dodger is sent to the workhouse. But in the film, they go off together into the sunrise, silhouetted as the two iconic figures they are. A few of the book's memorable lines are intact, such as Bumble's declaration that if the law presumes a husband has control over his wife, "then the law is an ass...the law is a bachelor!"
Wild, who later starred in the children's TV show H.R. Pufnstuf (I was a dedicated viewer), and sadly died at a young age, was 15 when he played the role, and is also terrific (and got an Oscar nomination). Oliver was played by Mark Lester, only nine years old, as cute a kid as you could imagine. Reed, who was the director's nephew (but was recommended for the part by someone else) is particularly menacing. If the intention was to frighten little children, they succeeded. I don't know if Reed could sing, but they did cut Sikes' song from the film.
I was just the right age when I saw Oliver! for the first time, and it is a sentimental favorite. But after these many viewings, it holds up time and time again, and the art direction, costumes, choreography, and orchestrations, in addition to a wide range of great performances, earned it its Oscar.
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