THE MILLION POUND NOTE, a quite amusing British-made comedy from 1954 was taken from Mark Twain’s 1893 short story “The Million Pound Bank Note”. After filming Roman Holiday in—guess?—Gregory Peck, 38, took a working vacation from the States for a year, shooting this (in London), the neat Cold War suspenser Night People in West Germany and the quite good WW2 survival saga The Purple Plain in Ceylon/Sri Lanka. Updating a decade from Twain’s tale, the script for this mirth-with-a-moral lark was done by Jill Craigie, and direction was steered by Ronald Neame. For the US release the title was changed to Man With A Million. A solid hit in Britain, it did just fair in America, a gross of $2,300,000 landing on 114th place.

“What a charmingly whimsical gesture!”

1903. Penniless and stranded in London, American seaman ‘Henry Adams’ (Peck) is given a shot at being salvaged—maybe even secured—when the ‘Montpelier’ brothers, rich and eccentric, make a wager on the Yank’s honesty vs. the lure of lucre. He gets a bank note worth a million pounds, and when others—pub owners, clothiers, hoteliers and eventually socialites—get that the disarming if rumpled fellow is seemingly loaded for bear (or foxes) they lavish him with attention, respect and pay-when-you-wish offers of credit. But Henry can’t claim any actual money for a month, when the bet is settled. Then his good luck is furthered by falling for ‘Portia Lansdowne’, niece of a rather important Duchess. Fortune, compounded. Or confounded?

Peck, relishing the chance to do something light, something Twain and something he could get to dress to the nines in (plush costuming courtesy the estimable Margaret Furse), is deft and charming, and he’s surrounded by a gallery of sharp larkers. The sets are attractive, Geoffrey Unsworth was on camera and there’s a plucky score from the prodigious William Alwyn. The scene of Peck chasing the wind-blown note down the street is a treat.

Reginald Beckwith, 1908-1965: film critic, playwright, BBC war correspondent, actor.

The supporting cast is a lock. To kick it off, the wily brothers are played by the clearly tickled Ronald Squire and Wilfrid Hyde-White. Much fun comes from Joyce Grenfell (the ‘Duchess of Cromarty’) and 84-year-old A.E. Matthews as the put-out ‘Duke of Frognal’. The sparked lady in question is 24-year-old Jane Griffiths, with a pleasing manner similar to Glynis Johns. After this, the rest of her career was relegated to B-movies; she only lived to be 45. Getting more chuckles than everyone else is the great Reginald Beckwith as ‘Rock’, a mute circus strongman who becomes Peck’s manservant and partner in enjoying the good life, while it lasts: without a line of dialogue, his range expressions is delightful.

90 minutes, with choice bits from familiar hardies Maurice Denham, Bryan Forbes, Laurence Naismith, Ernest Thesiger, Gudrun Ure, Hugh Griffith, Ian Wilson and Harold Goodwin.

* Though the makers didn’t own up to it, the 1983 megahit Trading Places owes at least something to this movie, Mark Twain, or both. As for credit and cost-value, the million pound note from 1903 that is fulcrum for the plot would in 2025 be worth around £155,384,576.  Enough to cover a week in London.