Tomorrow is the birth anniversary of British actor David Niven, so it's unsurprising that TCM is spending the morning and afternoon with Niven's movies. One that I haven't blogged about before is Tonight's the Night, which will be on at 11:45 AM.
Rathbarney is one of those typically whimsical small villages in Ireland that populate the mind of John Ford and, apparently, some parts of the British entertainment industry. The village is more or less owned by General O'Leary, who seems to own all the land in the area but who is very generous with his tenants. He runs an annual hunt and has let everybody run up substantial debts.
But this year's hunt is different. The General is past 80, and rides a horse that's getting as elderly, in equine terms, as the General. He foolishly tries to take a jump that he'd done every year in the past, but this time around, the horse balks, throwing the General over a stone wall and down a small embankment. It's not an immediate death, although it is terminal. But before he dies, he gets to dictate some final wishes, among them being that all debts should be cancelled.
The General, having lived more or less alone, only with his servand Thady (Barry Fitzgerald) and no family, has as his nearest relative a great-nephew, Jasper O'Leary (David Niven). Jasper shows up in Rathbarney, apparently never having seen the place before. Also returning to the village is Serena McGlusky (Yvonne De Carlo). She's one of the two daughters of second-tier landowner Major McGlusky (Michael Shepley), and she left to go to Canada with her husband, who has since died and left her flat broke. Before she left, there was some talk that she might wind up with the local doctor, Michael Flynn (Robert Urquhart), although after her departure there was suggestion the good doctor might marry Serena's sister Kathy (Noelle Middleton).
At any rate, when Jasper arrives, he's shocked at what he finds. The General wasn't much of a property manager, although his generosity helped the village function. Jasper isn't very well off despite being an heir, and he has no intention of living in Rathbarney. His plan is to bleed the townsfolk dry, at least as much as he can get out of the town, before moving on to greener pastures. Complicating things is that the General's dying wishes somehow never made their way into the will, despite there being quite a few witnesses to those wishes. So Jasper is probably within his legal right to do what he's doing.
The townsfolk, understandably, resent it. Perhaps they were taking advantage of the General, but he was the only person with any means in the area, and it was those means that allowed the village to function in what seems to have been a symbiotic relationship. (How much longer the place could have gone on is never mentioned.) But now, there's no way they'll have either any prosperity, or even any fun in life. So they want to drive Jasper out, by violent means if necessary. They draw lots, and getting the short straw is the barkeep's assistant, Terence (George Cole).
There are a lot of elements here that should lead to a very fun comedy, but I have to admit that in watching it, it wound up being less than the sum of its parts. I think part of it has to do with the characters being unnaturally quirky, to the point of obnoxiousness at times, not being helped by the presence of Barry Fitzgerald. I can't blame Jasper for wanting to get rid of Thady. Niven does well with the material he's given, as does De Carlo. All of the non-Hollywood people do an adequate enough job, although everybody's brought down a notch by the material. And, according to IMDb, none of the movie was filmed in Ireland.
Still, as always, this is the sort of movie you should probably watch and judge for yourself, since it's the sort of quirky movie that some people will probably really like. It doesn't seem to be available on DVD here in North America, so you'll have to catch the TCM showing.
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