This is 40 minutes of total insanity. Peter Sellers, Spike Milligan and Dick Emery are the ultimate comedy group; I'm in the US and it's difficult to get more of the Goon Show episodes, but I'd kill for it after watching this. All Spike has to do is look at the camera and squint his eyes, and I can't stop laughing.
The plot is just there to hang the insanity on. Peter is Superintendent Quilt, Scotland Yard's ace detective; Spike plays his devoted assistant, Brown. They are brought in to solve the disappearance of the fabulously rare Mukkinese Battle Horn from a museum. During the investigation, when Spike says "Look, sir, an impression of a heel!", and points to the floor at a footprint in only the way Spike can point, Peter says "Very clever, Brown, but we've no time for your impressions now." A rock is thrown through a window; attached to it is a note with "Al Smith, window repairs" on it. Spike holds Peter's hat up, and Peter walks out from underneath it to engage in swordplay; Spike suddenly looks surprised, looks inside the hat and says "My God, he's disappeared!"
This is a sample of the silly jokes that they do through the entire thing, but they are completely fresh when done by this group. Everyone plays four or five roles in this, and all do a great job. Peter plays the Police Commissioner, Jervis; Police Superintendent Quilt; and the ancient owner of a pawn shop. Spike plays Sergeant Brown; Mr. White, the museum night watchman (who also plays the mysteriously alluring belly dancer in Maxie's, and succeeds in charming Sellers before he/she lifts her veil); the bleating voice of Minnie, the pawn shop owner's wife; and Catchpole Burkington, star of silent films who blunders into the police headquarters looking for the unemployment office. Dick Emery plays the day watchman at the museum, who gets a-walloped on the head a gazillion times during the robbery; Mr. Nodule, curator of the museum; Mr. Such, manager of Maxie's place; and Maurice Ponk, a weird little man who accidentally burns down his log cabin (on which the insurance had expired the day before) and then is shown to us as a truly complete idiot.
They end up the investigation in café called Maxie's Place, where Nodule is unmasked as the head of an international ring of Mukkinese Battle Horn smugglers. Peter and he have a sword fight using a minestrone-drenched gun and a broken sword, and then Peter wounds Nodule. He rolls around on the floor, vowing to live though the script says he has to die. Suddenly the three Musketeers show up, and Brown joins in the fracas, shouting "Excalibur!". The fight continues, till Peter and Spike are thrown from the place covered in bruises and with torn clothes. As we hear horn music in the background, they vow to continue to search for the Mukkinese Battle Horn. They walk right by a street musician playing the (surprise!) Mukkinese Battle Horn, trying to beg money for the Mukkinese old soldiers home, and don't pay a bit of attention. The musician gives us a sly smile, and the credits role. Those are not even quite the end of the show.
I don't know where this can be found since our copy was off cable 16 years ago, but if you ever run across it, buy it, or anything else by the Goons. Everything they made was a lot of fun.
