Private's Progress

This pleasing mix of satire and nostalgia was unusual at the time for suggesting that not every tommy who went to fight in the Second World War was a hero. Ian Carmichael is superbly cast as the hapless Stanley Windrush, whose natural ineptitude is seen as a God-given gift by the roguish Richard Attenborough and Dennis Price. Although the Boulting brothers rather lose track of the plot once Carmichael goes after Nazi art treasures, this is still richly entertaining, not least because of the smashing performance of Terry-Thomas. Carmichael and Terry-Thomas reprised their roles in the classic Boulting brothers comedy I'm All Right Jack three years later.