Freddie Francis's masterpiece


Mumsy, Nanny, Sonny and Girly was Freddie Francis’ personal favourite.

Until the announcement that Scorpion Releasing (no affiliation to Code Red as so many people seem to think) were bringing Girly to DVD, to all intents and purposes it became something of a lost film due to poor distribution on its initial release. This film is British Gothic at its best – the only other films that spring to mind that have approached the rich vein of demented domesticity mined in this film are Whoever Slew Auntie Roo?, 1971 and American Gothic, 1987.

Girly is a ripe and rancid film, dripping with a playful and peculiarly British malevolence. The vast Victorian house in which much of the film is set seems preserved in aspic, evoking musty memories of another time, dim recollections stirred still further by the use of nursery rhymes which underpin the creepy visuals to perfection.

If ever a film screamed out for rediscovery then this witty, intelligent, and sharp-as-a-knife black comedy does. Scorpion Releasing did a superb job with Girly (avoid the English R2 Odeon Entertainment release – horrendous standards conversion) as they did with Silent Scream, 1980, Goodbye Gemini, 1970 and Doctor Death, 1973 marvellous releases of films a few years ago, I thought had bitten the dust in terms of redistribution / re-release. Scorpion has given us old horror fans a real treat.

This is what Freddie Francis had to say about Girly when he was interviewed by Alwin Dewaele and Nigel Burrell at the 15th Festival of Fantastic Film, Science Fiction & Thriller in Brussels:

Mumsy, Nanny, Sonny and Girly was a play that somebody had recommended I see, and which I had then scripted. We finished shooting the film, and we delivered it, and we came in a lot under budget. Unfortunately we delivered it to Cinerama almost at the second they went bust, so, because to them it was a little film, it almost got lost, though it did surface for a while in America under the title Girly. Anyway, I loved it, because it was the sort of film I wanted to make; there was a sort of dark humour in it which I loved. But it disappeared for years, and I was struggling to find a copy all over the world. I was promised a copy in Boston; they said, oh yes, it’s in peoples’ catalogue, but they don’t have a print in stock. And the last I heard of the actual film, there was a print at Pinewood studios, and the guy who owned this print said, “I will get a copy of this made for you”, and he sent the print from Pinewood studios to a laboratory which is only five minutes drive away… and it’s never been since. However, that’s neither here nor there, because at home now I have got two or three copies which came from different places. Various people occasionally send me video copies of my own films; I have also recently been sent some Hammer films I made which I like very much, and are more my sort of films than Hammer – Hysteria, Nightmare and Paranoiac, three films which I like to call thrillers as opposed to horror films.”

At the end of the interview, Nigel Burrell wanted to go back to Girly and asked Freddie if he was aware in 1987 a British/American co-production was made called American Gothic that used a similar storyline and thought it would amuse Freddie because it’s very obviously inspired by Girly, although not as good. Freddie responded saying:

“You know the terrible thing was that you hand over the film you’ve just made, just as the company goes broke, and it vanishes into limbo… But I remember that it was sold to television at the time when Halliwell (of the movie guides) was in charge for some reason or other – and he said it was not suitable for television showing! I must look into it because I’m sure that one of the television companies must have it.”

It’s such a shame Freddie isn’t with us to see the first official DVD release. Let’s hope Scorpion Releasing have gone the extra mile with their Girly DVD and hopefully this board will be buzzing in a few months as people rediscover Mumsy, Nanny, Sonny and Girly and it’s introduced to a new audience.

Frankly, I’m pleased the Salvation Group (t/a Redemption Films) didn’t get their hands on this one. I’ve a lot of respect for Nigel Wingrove because he, along with Marc Morris, was the first to conceive and produce the first authoritative publication The Art Of The Nasty covering films of the Video Nasty era, originally printed by Salvation in November 1998, recently reprinted by FAB Press in a fully revised, updated and expanded gorgeous hardback in 2009. Unfortunately, their DVD releases are generally worse than the cruddy VHS cassettes of the ‘80s we used to be so fond of until LD arrived to be superseded by DVD and now BD.


Suicide, it’s a suicide

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