Peter Sellers
was a more talented actor than many people realise. Say his name these days, and a large majority
of people would smile and begin to ape his most famous film character,
Inspector Clouseau. The ‘Pink Panther’
films were US productions, made when the flame of the British film industry had
finally guttered out. These films were
OK, but not a patch on some of his earlier work. I have already discussed ‘I’m Alright Jack’
and ‘Heavens Above!’ in the course of this blog, both of which were good
British films and starred Sellers as strong leading characters. Of course, he was also an excellent support
character in one of my top five favourite films ‘The Ladykillers’. However, the true test of an actor is to be
able to successfully bring a lifeless character onto the screen. By lifeless, I
mean one that is boring, one that has no charisma and not a great deal to say.
In ‘The Battle of the Sexes’ (1959), Sellers does just this job with the role
of Mr Martin. Mr Martin is a Chief Clerk in an old family tweed firm called the
House of MacPherson. Their working
practices are Dickensian. He is quiet,
mild mannered and he indulges in no vices.
He has given his life to the MacPhersons and he requires no recognition
or reward – only for his life to continue on in the same vein. I think that it is fair to say that Mr Martin
is the polar opposite of Mr Sellers. In
real life, he was known to have been a very charismatic man. Liz Fraser writes about him in her
autobiography (“Liz Fraser…and Other Characters”). She says that he was a man of passions – the
latest technology, cars, cameras and women were acquired relentlessly and never
lasted long. But her telling line, when discussing his womanising is “Peter
being Peter, you just forgave him.” To be able to put all of that strength of
personality to one side and to play Mr Martin so convincingly shows how
talented he was. To share the screen
with such a larger than life co-star as Robert Morley – and be the one that all
eyes are on – it is a deft feat.
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| Sellers by @aitchteee |
So it is with
regret that I have to admit that ‘The Battle of the Sexes’ is an appalling
film. Despite Sellers’ highly watchable
performance, the storyline is mean spirited.
When old man MacPherson dies, his son (Morley) travels home to Edinburgh
to take over the business. While on the Sleeper train down from London, he
meets an American business consultant called Angela Barrows (Constance
Cummings). He takes her on at the House
of MacPherson in order to modernise and rationalise the business. Her ideas and
methods distress Martin, who sees no need for change and considers Barrows’
methods to go against everything his beloved old Mr MacPherson stood for. While
things are initially going her way, Angela Barrows is confident, clever and articulate. However, when Martin begins to quietly
sabotage her work she plays the “I’m just a woman” card in a painfully sexist
turn of events. This is a blatant attack
on women’s attempts to forge careers – and quite possibly an attack on
Americans and their fancy new methods too.
After the end
of World War Two, women were shoved back into the home and told to give up
their jobs to men returning from the forces. Films, magazines and advertising
gave propaganda support to this idea, the most virtuous women depicted as
housewives and mothers. But of course
another compartment of the Pandora’s Box of women’s liberation had been opened
by the war. Progress continued to be
made by trailblazing women in a range of jobs. This film appears to be a
rallying call to clerks everywhere to help put a stop to it. I don’t believe
that Angela Barrows’ nationality is a coincidence either. In the 1950s, Britain was dependent on US aid
to get the country back on its feet.
Their money and their culture began to infiltrate our culture, slowly
starting the globalisation that we are subject to today. Already the loss of the old ways was
beginning to be mourned.
Sadly, I don’t
think that the subject matter is as historic as I would like it to be. Globalisation has won hands down and there
are still some businessmen with archaic attitudes to women. We continually hear
about the need for more women in business and those that are successful face
many more pressures than their male counterparts. But we have won a few battles on the way and
taken a few steps forward.
‘The Battle of
the Sexes’ reminds me of the time at school, when the class bully singles
someone out with a comment that is so cruelly witty that you can’t help but
laugh along despite yourself. But
really, should this film be on television until the war of the sexes is finally
over, and we can view this impartially as a historic record of what once was?
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