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Funny / The Ladykillers (1955)

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The film:

  • The local police officer stops by to chat with Mrs Wilberforce, but since the gang have told her to drive him away without making him suspicious, she doesn't invite him in as she normally would. Instead she blurts out all the excuses the gang had suggested— starting out with "You can't come in here without a search warrant!" and ending with "Now would you please buzz off!" (thanks, Harry).
  • Mrs. Wilberforce briefly forgets the suitcase (with the loot in it) that the gang is using her to pick up.
    [When driving past the police station, they see their case of money sitting in the doorway]
    Harry: I don't believe it. I don't believe it!
    Louis: Shut up.
    One-Round: It's just... sitting there. Look, couldn't we...?
    Professor Marcus: No one, I hope, is going to suggest that we steal it.
  • One-Round's losing it when he thinks someone's killed Mrs. Wilberforce ("I said nobody was to do Mrs. Lopsided!"), culminating in a brawl that comes to a shocked stop when Mrs. Wilberforce appears at the foot of the stairs (she was asleep).
    Mrs. Wilberforce: What are you doing? And who is "Mrs. Lopsided," may I ask?
  • Professor Marcus' death by railway semaphore.
  • The ending. Thanks to the implausibility of Mrs. Wilberforce's story, the police don't believe a word of it. So she gets to keep the money, just as Professor Marcus had said when trying to convince her not to go to the police!
  • The entire gang (except the Major) piling into a telephone box to find out what's happening at the station.
  • The Brick Joke of Mrs. Wilberforce forgetting her umbrella because she doesn't like it very much.
  • Louis grumbling about Mrs. Wilberforce's constant interruptions, culminating in "Give the parrot his medicine!" Then he realises what he just said and does a verbal Double Take: "Give the parrot his medicine?!"
    • Also, what happens when the gang attempt to give the parrot his medicine. One-Round ends up stuck in a chair, Harry gets his finger bitten, and Professor Marcus comes home to find the Major and Louis on the roof.
  • After Mrs. Wilberforce picks up the money for the gang (without knowing what it is), Professor Marcus says, "What Could Possibly Go Wrong?" Glad you asked, Professor...
  • Mrs. Wilberforce realises the truth about the gang just before her friends arrive for tea. Louis says they should kidnap her. One of her friends arrives. Louis says they should kidnap both of them. Then Mrs. Wilberforce's other friends arrive.
    Harry: What should we do? Charter a bus?
  • While he and Louis are disposing of One-Round's body, Professor Marcus madly rambles and starts to snap under the strain of his plan coming undone so spectacularly.
    Professor Marcus: It was a good plan, you know, I've worked on so many plans and they were all good! But this was the best! Except for the human element... all good plans include the human element, but I'll admit you were right. No really good plan could include Mrs Wilberforce. Unless, of course, we had more men! There were only five of us! Tiddle-iddle-um bom bom bom bom bom-
    Louis: What's the matter with you? Take it easy will you?
    Professor Marcus: -in fact it would take twenty or thirty or forty perhaps to deal with her because you could never be able to kill her Louis! She'll always be with us, for ever and ever and ever... and there's nothing we can do!

The stage version:

  • The Running Gag of Harry getting repeatedly hit in the face with the blackboard.
  • In the stage version Marcus' death is part of a Chekhov's Gag; characters keep treading on his scarf, which he then struggles to pull free. At the close, Marcus flees down a train tunnel, only to find his scarf caught yet again and... well you can guess what happens next.

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