A good "value for money" film demonstrating just how well the British (and even Yorkshire folk) can laugh at themselves. A good supporting cast headed up by Diana Dors who is irresistible to our hero Chayley from "oop north" and uses all her ample charms to help the poor lad to get value for his money. Unfortunately only a minor role for Leslie Philips in one of his earlier films.
13 Reviews
Loose change
Prismark1019 November 2018
Diana Dors was billed as the British Marilyn Monroe. A few years before her death I saw her opening an arcade in the Isle of Man. By that time she had ballooned in weight but she still could bring out the crowds. I was only a kid so did not really know what all the fuss was about.
In Value for Money, Dors plays glamourous singer and actress Ruthine West who gets enticed up to Batley to open a children's play area.
The cause for her relocation from chic London is Chayley Broadbent (John Gregson) who has inherited his father's textile fortune. Like his later father Chayley is a miser who watches the pennies. His long suffering fiancée Ethel, a local journalist wants Chayley to go to London to enjoy himself and find a purpose away from his father's penny pinching ways. He finds Ruthine in a show instead and instantly falls in love with her.
So Chayley, Ruthine and Ethel are in Batley. Ruthine hates the grim Yorkshire industrial town but likes Chayley's money. Ethel hangs around patiently for Chayley to come to his senses.
Value for Money is a colourful light romantic comedy, with a couple of nice musical numbers.
Chayley is a shallow fool who is always hearing his late father's muttering about not driving a hard enough bargain. It is a bit of froth and fun. Dors does look slim and sexy. It is a mildly entertaining movie with dated views on women.
In Value for Money, Dors plays glamourous singer and actress Ruthine West who gets enticed up to Batley to open a children's play area.
The cause for her relocation from chic London is Chayley Broadbent (John Gregson) who has inherited his father's textile fortune. Like his later father Chayley is a miser who watches the pennies. His long suffering fiancée Ethel, a local journalist wants Chayley to go to London to enjoy himself and find a purpose away from his father's penny pinching ways. He finds Ruthine in a show instead and instantly falls in love with her.
So Chayley, Ruthine and Ethel are in Batley. Ruthine hates the grim Yorkshire industrial town but likes Chayley's money. Ethel hangs around patiently for Chayley to come to his senses.
Value for Money is a colourful light romantic comedy, with a couple of nice musical numbers.
Chayley is a shallow fool who is always hearing his late father's muttering about not driving a hard enough bargain. It is a bit of froth and fun. Dors does look slim and sexy. It is a mildly entertaining movie with dated views on women.
Value for Money
CinemaSerf10 February 2023
"Chayley" (John Gregson) comes from good Yorkshire stock where thrift and prudence are the order of the day. That attitude is thrown to the wind, though, when on a visit to London he encounters the glamorous and charming nightclub entertainer "Ruth" (Diana Dors). Now she knows when she is onto a good thing, as soon has this poor lad hook line and sinker. Despite his upbringing, and the ghost of his father warning him of the coming dangers, he is powerless - he is addicted to her, and soon she has come to his town, they are engaged, and she is looking for a nice big house. Can he see reason before it's too late? Is she really quite such a gold-digger? For the first half hour, when it's just the two at the top of the bill, then the film - and the dialogue - work quite well. You can see her manoeuvring the vulnerable but proud young man and it looks like both are having fun. For the rest of this, though, it really is just a bit of a stereotype-fest that runs through the joke as quickly as she would run through his inheritance. It's always good to see Ernest Thesiger (the doting "Lord Dewsbury)" and there are a few lively cameos but not enough to sustain this after about an hour when the writing is on the wall for a rather tame solution that lets it all fizzle out. The moral might be, though - always check your restaurant bill!
A Run for Your Money
richardchatten7 March 2021
Batley as it looked in the fifties got the film star treatment photographed in Technicolor & VistaVision by top cameraman Geoffrey Unsworth masquerading as the fictitious mill town of Barfield in this silly farce in which parsimonious northerner John Gregson inherits £62k from his old man (seen solely in pictures played by an uncredited Frederick Piper) and visits the fleshpots of London where we're treated to a breathtakingly vulgar and gaudy musical number before he falls for the voluptuous charms of hard and brassy Diana Dors.
Miss Dors (who at one point dives into a swimming pool in a bikini, plainly doubled for the dive itself, and emerging from the water her blonde mane still dry & set) demonstrates she sure knew how to spend money in those long-ago days when a seven-bedroom timbered house in the North of England cost a eye-watering £5,800.
Miss Dors (who at one point dives into a swimming pool in a bikini, plainly doubled for the dive itself, and emerging from the water her blonde mane still dry & set) demonstrates she sure knew how to spend money in those long-ago days when a seven-bedroom timbered house in the North of England cost a eye-watering £5,800.
Early Dors
malcolmgsw5 March 2012
Warning: Spoilers
Diana Dors plays a Joan Blondell type of ro;e in what can best subtitled "Gold Diggers of 1955"She doesn't appear till the half hour mark but gives the film the boost it sorely lacks at that time.The problem is that the film tries to extract far too much comedy out of regional stereotypes.For some reason filmmakers of that era characterised all Yorkshiremen as tight with their money and knowing little of anything outside the county.Dors is the rather unlikely woman whom Gregson becomes besotted with.Today he would be called a stalker !Even more unlikely is her trip to Gregsons home.The complications that arise between her and Susan Stephen are only mildly amusing,Maybe the film makers were trying to exploit Gregsons success in "Genevieve".If so they failed totally.
Today looks a bit dated and silly.
JamesHitchcock20 February 2019
Warning: Spoilers
When John Henry Broadbent, a wealthy and notoriously miserly Yorkshire industrialist, dies, he leaves his son Chayley a legacy of £62,000, a princely sum in 1955. (Chayley, apparently, acquired his unusual name when the registrar, a southerner unused to the Yorkshire way of speaking, misheard the name "Charlie", which is what his father really wanted to call him. As the pronunciation of "Charlie" would be much the same in Yorkshire and southern dialects, this seems unlikely). At first the young man seems to be just as tight-fisted as his father, much to the dismay of this long-suffering girlfriend Ethel, a journalist on a local paper. On a trip to London, however, Chayley decides to visit a nightclub where he meets a beautiful young showgirl, Ruthine. At first Ruthine does not take much interest in Chayley, but when she finds out how much he is worth she decides that he is a catch worth pursuing, and a battle breaks out between her and Ethel for his affections. Guess who wins.
"Value for Money" follows the standard romantic comedy formula of A+B-C=D, where A stands for "boy loves girl", B for "girl loves boy" and C for the obstacle to their love which much be removed to achieve happy ending D. In this case, however, there are two obstacles to the love of Chayley and Ethel, the first being his meanness with money and the second Ruthine. This is, however, a good-natured film, so there has to be a happy ending even for the mercenary Ruthine, who discovers that there is more than one wealthy young man in town.
Had this been an American film, there would doubtless have been a scene in which Ethel takes off her glasses and lets down her hair to show Chayley and the world that she is just as lovely as Ruthine, if not more so. As this is a British film, Ethel is nowhere near as attractive as her rival, but the implication is that her Yorkshire grit and her solid, dependable girl-next-door character count for far more than Ruthine's flashy, superficial beauty. This being the fifties, Ruthine is inevitably played by Diana Dors, but the film strengthened my view that comedy was not really her forte, even though that was the genre in which most producers wanted to employ her. There seemed to be a preconceived idea that brunettes were for serious drama and blondes- especially platinum blondes- for the funny stuff.
This is, in fact, one of those romantic comedies which revolves around preconceived ideas, the two main ones being "all northerners, or at least all Yorkshiremen, are tight-fisted", and "all beautiful woman are gold-diggers". Whether you find the film amusing probably depends upon whether you find those two ideas believable. In 1955 there were probably quite a lot of people who did, or at least enough people who did to make it worth the studio's while to churn out a film with this particular plotline. Today the whole thing just looks a bit silly and dated. 5/10
"Value for Money" follows the standard romantic comedy formula of A+B-C=D, where A stands for "boy loves girl", B for "girl loves boy" and C for the obstacle to their love which much be removed to achieve happy ending D. In this case, however, there are two obstacles to the love of Chayley and Ethel, the first being his meanness with money and the second Ruthine. This is, however, a good-natured film, so there has to be a happy ending even for the mercenary Ruthine, who discovers that there is more than one wealthy young man in town.
Had this been an American film, there would doubtless have been a scene in which Ethel takes off her glasses and lets down her hair to show Chayley and the world that she is just as lovely as Ruthine, if not more so. As this is a British film, Ethel is nowhere near as attractive as her rival, but the implication is that her Yorkshire grit and her solid, dependable girl-next-door character count for far more than Ruthine's flashy, superficial beauty. This being the fifties, Ruthine is inevitably played by Diana Dors, but the film strengthened my view that comedy was not really her forte, even though that was the genre in which most producers wanted to employ her. There seemed to be a preconceived idea that brunettes were for serious drama and blondes- especially platinum blondes- for the funny stuff.
This is, in fact, one of those romantic comedies which revolves around preconceived ideas, the two main ones being "all northerners, or at least all Yorkshiremen, are tight-fisted", and "all beautiful woman are gold-diggers". Whether you find the film amusing probably depends upon whether you find those two ideas believable. In 1955 there were probably quite a lot of people who did, or at least enough people who did to make it worth the studio's while to churn out a film with this particular plotline. Today the whole thing just looks a bit silly and dated. 5/10
Rags and Riches and Rugby League
stewart-mccartney14 March 2006
Filmed partly on location in the West Yorkshire town of Batley (given the name Barfield in the film), you know what you are going to get as soon as you watch that Salvation Army band marching up the cobbled market place in the drizzle and soot. Good fun for those of us who live in the town spotting the landmarks. Batley's a lot cleaner now, and the buildings are sandstone again instead of black - it still rains a bit though.
Chaley (John Gregson) owns a rag mill, the economy of the town for much of the twentieth century being based on recycling rags into reconstituted cloth known as either 'Shoddy' (now used as an adjective), or 'Mungo'. And he does what all Rugby League fans do once a year, and that's head south for the sport's Challenge Cup Final. Taking the local stories into account, the weekend trip is as traditional as ever, involving a lot of beer, food and going to clubs and pubs - and the final itself of course.
However, it's not usual for one of the girls in a club to follow you back north in the hope of parting you from your money - and that's when the fun starts in 'Value for Money', especially if you already have a girl back home who's 'sweet on you'.
Good-natured comic shenanigans follow that pulls the legs of stereotypical northerners and southerners alike. Luckily, the twain shall meet after a few plot twists and turns, and it all works out right in the end.
Note - Fifty years after the film was released, people in the town still sometimes refer to Batley as Barfield, and you can here the name being shouted from the terraces at Mount Pleasant (Batley RLFC's ground) on many occasions.
Eh, it's grim 'oop north.
Chaley (John Gregson) owns a rag mill, the economy of the town for much of the twentieth century being based on recycling rags into reconstituted cloth known as either 'Shoddy' (now used as an adjective), or 'Mungo'. And he does what all Rugby League fans do once a year, and that's head south for the sport's Challenge Cup Final. Taking the local stories into account, the weekend trip is as traditional as ever, involving a lot of beer, food and going to clubs and pubs - and the final itself of course.
However, it's not usual for one of the girls in a club to follow you back north in the hope of parting you from your money - and that's when the fun starts in 'Value for Money', especially if you already have a girl back home who's 'sweet on you'.
Good-natured comic shenanigans follow that pulls the legs of stereotypical northerners and southerners alike. Luckily, the twain shall meet after a few plot twists and turns, and it all works out right in the end.
Note - Fifty years after the film was released, people in the town still sometimes refer to Batley as Barfield, and you can here the name being shouted from the terraces at Mount Pleasant (Batley RLFC's ground) on many occasions.
Eh, it's grim 'oop north.
Good value indeed!
JohnHowardReid27 December 2015
Warning: Spoilers
One of the best of the later British regional comedies, this one is most entertainingly plotted, sharply observed and delightfully characterized. In fact, this entry provides delightfully strong roles for John Gregson, Derek Farr, Charles Victor, Ernest Thesiger and company. The skillful plot introduces the super-lovely Diana Dors as a delightful catalyst. Production values are excellent. Directed by Ken Annakin with a commendable feeling for locale and stylish contrasts, this is a movie that fascinates from go to whoa. Best of all, the film is stunningly photographed in Technicolor by Geoffrey Unsworth, whose cinematography brings out both the beauty of the scenic locations and the squalor of the appropriately grimy townscapes.
Bluebeard of Barfield
Brucey_D17 August 2018
This is a gentle comedy that meanders along in a fairly charming and harmless way. It isn't one of the best comedies of this period but it features a good cast, is nicely directed and is beautifully shot.
Gregson's accent is not that of a Batley (Barfield) resident but whether he could have managed it or not, the real thing might have been too much for most UK audiences leave alone those in the rest of the world.
The film portrays a few stereotypes; the Yorkshire folk who are pretty straightforward but 'careful' with money and those in London, many of whom are little better than two-faced thieves by comparison. They could easily have gone further, but they went far enough as it was. I found the interjections of Chaley's deceased father rather funny, but not that much else was any more than pleasantly amusing. The scenes in which Diana Dors (real name 'Fluck', which was understandably changed "should one of the bulbs go out when my name is in lights") appears in public and generates a major stir are probably quite realistic; at the time she was a star/sex symbol on the up (amongst other things there were 3-D nude photos of her published the previous year) and this film was one of five she did that was released in 1955.
If you like Britsh comedies of the period, have a local connection to Batley, or are a big Gregson or Dors fan, this should certainly be seen. For others it is still well worth viewing just for Unsworth's excellent photography and as something of a period piece.
Gregson's accent is not that of a Batley (Barfield) resident but whether he could have managed it or not, the real thing might have been too much for most UK audiences leave alone those in the rest of the world.
The film portrays a few stereotypes; the Yorkshire folk who are pretty straightforward but 'careful' with money and those in London, many of whom are little better than two-faced thieves by comparison. They could easily have gone further, but they went far enough as it was. I found the interjections of Chaley's deceased father rather funny, but not that much else was any more than pleasantly amusing. The scenes in which Diana Dors (real name 'Fluck', which was understandably changed "should one of the bulbs go out when my name is in lights") appears in public and generates a major stir are probably quite realistic; at the time she was a star/sex symbol on the up (amongst other things there were 3-D nude photos of her published the previous year) and this film was one of five she did that was released in 1955.
If you like Britsh comedies of the period, have a local connection to Batley, or are a big Gregson or Dors fan, this should certainly be seen. For others it is still well worth viewing just for Unsworth's excellent photography and as something of a period piece.
Fabulous film .... a must watch !
reviewmr16 March 2021
Just wait till I get you home
erizia25 October 2022
A number of (I presume, younger) reviewers regard this film with some distaste, citing dated regional and gender stereotypes.
I think that they need to relax a bit.
The film is a comedy that pokes fun on males, females, northerners and southerners alike.
Beautifully photographed and well acted, but really not to be taken seriously.
Two scenes stand out.
Firstly when the errant husband's return from their jolly in the capital and the wives await.
The camera pans along the coach as one by one the male passengers wipe the condensation from the window and view the reception committee.
Dramatic irony at its finest, followed by a wide panoramic shot as each emerging man is seized by the collar and frog marched away like naughty children, with the attending threat:Wait till I get you home!
The second is the scene later that day when Chayley proclaims to Ethel that Ruthin is the most "beautiful woman he has ever seen" ;followed by reassuring his fiance that She (Ruth in) is not for me. She is an ideal placed upon a pedestal.
One does not have to be Einstein to figure out what the reaction will be.
Enjoy John Gregson as the hapless Chayley, Diana Dors in her dazzling prime with great support from the ever excellent and sadly underrated Susan Stephen.
And wallow in world long gone.
I think that they need to relax a bit.
The film is a comedy that pokes fun on males, females, northerners and southerners alike.
Beautifully photographed and well acted, but really not to be taken seriously.
Two scenes stand out.
Firstly when the errant husband's return from their jolly in the capital and the wives await.
The camera pans along the coach as one by one the male passengers wipe the condensation from the window and view the reception committee.
Dramatic irony at its finest, followed by a wide panoramic shot as each emerging man is seized by the collar and frog marched away like naughty children, with the attending threat:Wait till I get you home!
The second is the scene later that day when Chayley proclaims to Ethel that Ruthin is the most "beautiful woman he has ever seen" ;followed by reassuring his fiance that She (Ruth in) is not for me. She is an ideal placed upon a pedestal.
One does not have to be Einstein to figure out what the reaction will be.
Enjoy John Gregson as the hapless Chayley, Diana Dors in her dazzling prime with great support from the ever excellent and sadly underrated Susan Stephen.
And wallow in world long gone.
Where there's muck, there's money.
mark.waltz30 June 2023
Warning: Spoilers
A fun, colorful British comedy has frugal heir to a small fortune learning that money needs to be like manure and spread around, and while those were Dolly Levi's words, they might as well been Ruthine West's words. The blonde bombshell, played by Diana Dors, has her eye on John Gregson, heading to London for the first time, and encountering Dors in the nightclub she works at. But he's really in love with the more pragmatic Susan Stephen, so it's a matter of coming to his senses through the help of the voice of his father's spirit to help him realize what's really important.
A few glamorous musical numbers are equivalent to the type of staged number in those big MGM musicals, and Dors gets to sing as well. The lovely Stephen has a voice similar to Jean Simmons, and she has a great encounter with the deluded Dors where two women after the same man actually get along. He ends up being sued for both women which is a delightful scheme to bring Gregson to his senses. Even though the cast is great, the film ends up being stolen by the unknown actor voicing Gregson's father, seen in front of some very imperious portraits. Truly a delight in every way.
A few glamorous musical numbers are equivalent to the type of staged number in those big MGM musicals, and Dors gets to sing as well. The lovely Stephen has a voice similar to Jean Simmons, and she has a great encounter with the deluded Dors where two women after the same man actually get along. He ends up being sued for both women which is a delightful scheme to bring Gregson to his senses. Even though the cast is great, the film ends up being stolen by the unknown actor voicing Gregson's father, seen in front of some very imperious portraits. Truly a delight in every way.
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