I’m All Right Jack

Just enough time today to mention I’m All Right Jack, which I finally finished watching on DVD. Had to do it in installments, about six of them. Better to watch it that way than get on the entrance ramp to perdition by buying a second TV.

An entertaining movie, only remembered now because Peter Sellers played one of the leads, and apparently not that well remembered anyway. The only reason I ordered it, in fact, was to see Sellers, who was indeed worth watching. But there was more to it: A deft satire of both management, who are corrupt, and labor, who are eager to work as little as possible, in late ’50s Britain.

You might ask, why the interest in something so removed from my life—by 50 years and an ocean and a workplace setting (and in black and white too). But isn’t that one reason to watch a movie in the first place, to remove yourself from your own place and time?

Besides, how often do you get to see Malcolm Muggeridge in the movies? He had a small part as a TV moderator, and though he wasn’t addressed by name in the script, his actual name appeared on a nameplate in front of him, which is how I knew it was him.

Finally, there was that rockin’ title song, “I’m All Right Jack,” sung by one Al Saxon in rockin’ late ’50s style. My guess would be that it was written for the movie, since it seems to be about taking care of number one at the expense of everyone else. Very brief research doesn’t turn up much about Al Saxon, except that he seems to have had a big band in the 1940s before doing a few early rock songs.