It's interesting that the BFI (British Film Institute) chose to add this and the Lionel Bart 'Oliver!' Musical to their 100 Greatest British Films Of The 20th Century, as apart from the obvious differences - The musical having a better cast and of course songs - there really isn't much difference between the two. I think I would have picked The Musical and added a different story to the list.
You can clearly see in this one, the inspiration for its remake. Alec Guinness, while in his own way very good as Fagin (If a little bit like Dr Teeth from 'The Muppets' to look at and with a slight 'Keith Lemon' twang to listen to) is quite clearly an early version of Ron Moody's Fagin. Ron wins that one though, because his performance is more polished and believable.
The other actors all generally give a good performance for 1948 and the sets, costumes et al live up to expectations, if not great, (ha ha). They were probably used again in 1968 to dress the next cast, so similar as they were and yes I do realise that both films were set at the same time, but Bumble's outfit matches almost button for button.
There are definitely different elements in this one that were omitted from its counterpart, the character of Monks for instance and he confused me for a while as I couldn't work out who he was supposed to be. I can only assume I will understand it all better when I finally get around to reading Dickens' book that has been on my shelf for what seems like a millennia. There were a couple of moments where I got a bit lost, but the story was generally easy to follow.
There is one moment here where you can almost feel Lionel getting his inspiration, as Fagin and the boys show Oliver about pick-pocketing and in those seconds it is just crying out to be a musical.
As versions of this story go, it is my second favourite, but I haven't seen Disney's 'Oliver & Company' in some time. It's done well and I believe it was probably the best it could be for the time. I don't think I need to rewatch it though, but I wouldn't turn it off if I was bored in my old age on a Saturday afternoon.
You can clearly see in this one, the inspiration for its remake. Alec Guinness, while in his own way very good as Fagin (If a little bit like Dr Teeth from 'The Muppets' to look at and with a slight 'Keith Lemon' twang to listen to) is quite clearly an early version of Ron Moody's Fagin. Ron wins that one though, because his performance is more polished and believable.
The other actors all generally give a good performance for 1948 and the sets, costumes et al live up to expectations, if not great, (ha ha). They were probably used again in 1968 to dress the next cast, so similar as they were and yes I do realise that both films were set at the same time, but Bumble's outfit matches almost button for button.
There are definitely different elements in this one that were omitted from its counterpart, the character of Monks for instance and he confused me for a while as I couldn't work out who he was supposed to be. I can only assume I will understand it all better when I finally get around to reading Dickens' book that has been on my shelf for what seems like a millennia. There were a couple of moments where I got a bit lost, but the story was generally easy to follow.
There is one moment here where you can almost feel Lionel getting his inspiration, as Fagin and the boys show Oliver about pick-pocketing and in those seconds it is just crying out to be a musical.
As versions of this story go, it is my second favourite, but I haven't seen Disney's 'Oliver & Company' in some time. It's done well and I believe it was probably the best it could be for the time. I don't think I need to rewatch it though, but I wouldn't turn it off if I was bored in my old age on a Saturday afternoon.