Jack Hawkins, excellent as always, heads a superb cast in this marvelously entertaining look at the moral decay of Britain's upper classes in the post-war period. Some of Britain's greatest film talent was at work on this project, including screenwriter Bryan Forbes, director Basil Dearden, and cinematographer Arthur Ibbetson. If you want to see the granddaddy of caper films, this is it. It's also your chance to see Oliver Reed playing a flaming queen: believe it or not!

Release just 12 days apart and on both sides of the Atlantic were a pair of caper films involving a group of war veterans pulling off a big heist. On the American side was Ocean's Eleven the first and best of the Rat Pack film where Frank Sinatra and his ring-a-ding army pals try to rob five casinos in Las Vegas. And on the British side was Jack Hawkins recruiting The League Of Gentlemen for a caper of his own.

We never learn the reason why Hawkins is so disgruntled, but I'm sure it was a good one. And unlike Sinatra who recruited friends Hawkins did some meticulous research and came up with seven total strangers all of whom had disgraced the uniform in some manner. With all their resumes in front of him, Hawkins is sure he's found his crew. And they include Nigel Patrick, Roger Livesey, Richard Attenborough, Bryan Forbes, Kieron Moore, Terence Alexander, and Norman Bird.

Ocean's Eleven depended on the chemistry of the players and since all there were buddies in good standing with Sinatra, it had a casual kind of feeling even during the scenes of the actual robbery. In The League Of Gentlemen it was a different kind of chemistry as Hawkins forges a unit together. Not without problems because these guys are by definition individualists who did not take kindly to military discipline in the first place.

Besides Hawkins who seemed to like the idea of being back in the army so to speak, the best performances were from Nigel Patrick as the most individual of the lot who gives Hawkins some reasonable concern and Roger Livesey. I don't think Livesey's character would have been allowed on the American cinema as the Code was still in place. He plays a disgraced and defrocked chaplain. When we meet all of them in their dwellings as they get the mysterious invitation to join Hawkins at his club, we see they don't exactly have the best domestic situations going. Part of why they were easy to recruit.

This one has to rank as one of Jack Hawkins's stellar cinematic efforts. And it holds up very well for today's audience.