A brand-new 4K restoration of Clive Donner and Frederic Raphael’s Nothing But the Best is available on Blu-Ray, DVD, and Digital on August 26 on the StudioCanal Vintage Classics label.
By the mid-1960s, London was swinging to a new beat; the stuffiness of the 1950s was out, and a new technicolour age of youth-driven cultural change was in. Nothing was sacred during this period of change, as some parts of old London were flattened, from Euston’s famous Roman-inspired arch to the stunning Victorian train station the arch led to. There was little sympathy from young Londoners for historic London in all its Victorian finery, as this was a post-imperial age of modernity at any cost, built on colour, fashion, music and a belief in a new era of British cultural power.
London was a hive of social and cultural change, and by the early sixties, TV and film were hurriedly attempting to catch up with new shows like Top of the Pops, Doctor Who, That Was the Week That Was and even Play School, while in cinema, John Schlesinger’s Billy Liar, Richard Lester’s A Hard Day’s Night, Edmond T. Gréville’s Beat Girl and Michael Powell’s Peeping Tom shook up British cinema and helped usher in a new age. This was an era of quick turnaround screenplays and creative freedom.
Few films symbolise that change more than Clive Donner and Frederic Raphael’s Nothing But the Best, a wickedly sharp satire based on a short story by American mystery writer Stanley Ellin. Nothing But the Best had the British class system in its sights alongside the mid-sixties’ urge to transcend the restrictions of upbringing. As Donner’s film begins, our young protagonist, Jimmy Brewster (Alan Bates), sets out the film’s stall as he says, “There are some smashing things in the world, and I want them.”
Brewster is a hardworking estate agent at the bottom of the career ladder, and he is determined to work his way to the top and finally exorcise his working-class background and his biscuit and tea-loving mum and dad from his life forever. He wants it all: a beautiful and well-to-do wife, a lavish house, and a job that people respect, and he is willing to do whatever it takes to get those things. Even though she is in a relationship, Brewster already has his sights set on his boss, Mr Horton’s (Harry Andrews) daughter, Ann (Millicent Martin). And he has already made plans to ditch his own girlfriend, a gentle telephone operator who has no idea she’s dating a ruthless player.
However, Jimmy also knows he is missing something he needs to make his plan succeed: knowledge and understanding of the British upper class. He needs someone well-to-do to teach him, and it just so happens he is about to meet a man who fits the bill in a cafe: Charlie (Denholm Elliott), the enigmatic, sleazy playboy son of a wealthy father who has been cut off due to an addiction to forging cheques and gambling. Inviting Charles home, Jimmy makes his intentions clear when Charles asks, “What is it you want to forge?” Coolly and calmly, Jimmy replies, “You!”
Frederic Raphael’s daring and macabre screenplay is a pure delight as we follow Alan Bates Jimmy on his devilishly brilliant journey to the top alongside the utterly brilliant Denholm Elliot, who chews the scenery as Brewster’s alcoholic and unlikely upper-class mentor. The result is a fascinating and engaging mash-up of Patricia Highsmith’s The Talented Mr Ripley and Joseph Losey’s The Servant. As Brewster climbs the slippery ladder of success by removing several runs that he feels are no longer necessary, there are moments where Nothing But the Best leans into the macabre atmosphere of Hitchcock’s Rope, but it equally never loses sight of the wicked comedy that drives every interaction and conversation. Nothing But the Best is a devilishly brilliant slice of British cinema that has never received the attention it so deserved, with many focusing on Donner and Raphael’s second stunning partnership, Rogue Male, in 1976.
Surprisingly, despite its swinging sixties social commentary, Nothing But the Best was not a commercial success on its release in March 1964. But, it did rightly earn Frederic Raphael the Writers’ Guild of Great Britain Award for Best British Comedy Screenplay and Nicolas Roeg a BAFTA nomination for British Cinematography in 1965. A forerunner of modern movies like Saltburn, Nothing But the Best remains a masterclass in satire, wit and social commentary as it joyously carves chunks out of the British class system with a wry smile.
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