Watch Carry on Follow That Camel For Free

It is a performances centric movie

How sad is this?

The performances transcend the film's tropes, grounding it in characters that feel more complete than this subgenre often produces.

This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.

Originally released under the title Follow That Camel, Carry On Follow That Camel is the 14th entry in the long running series. Story plays out as a historical parody of the Beau Geste type of movies, thrusting Jim Dale and Peter Butterworth into the French Foreign Legion. There they are at the mercy of Commandant Maximilian Burger (Kenny Williams) and Sergeant Nocker (Phil Silvers brought in to try and boost American ticket sales).Japery is prominent as the not so intrepid Legionnaires get involved with an angry army of Bedouins led by Sheikh Abdul Abulbul (Bernard Bresslaw). Joan Sims has a minor role as a big cleavage landlady, while it's Angela Douglas snagging the main gal role as Lady Jane Ponsonby, with a running gag of her sexual innocence being mined for all it's worth. It's actually a better film than the iffy reputation afforded it. True, missing big hitters like Sid James and Hattie Jacques is felt, but Silvers is ebullient playing a Bilko character, while it's nice to see the excellent Jim Dale bag the English lead and not letting anyone down.It sits somewhere in the middle scale of Carry On films, neither too bawdy nor like the genial black and whites. But plenty of laughs to be had and it's a good production, the Camber Sands locations surprisingly passing muster as the Legionnaires desert hell. Well constructed battle sequences for the finale as well. 7/10

Follow That Camel is the fourteenth of Carry On Series, which sees the Carry On gang join the French Foreign Legion. With Sid James being unavailable for the part of Sergeant Knocker, it was up to Peter Rodgers & Gerald Thomas to find a perfect lead. At this time Rodgers & Thomas thought this was a perfect opportunity to try & break the Carry On's into the American market by casting an American in the lead. Originally the first choice to play the lead was Woody Allen, however it was said Allen wanted to much money. Eventually producers managed to convince Sgt Bilko star Phil Silvers to take the lead. The part of Knocker was tailored to the style of Bilko.The rest of the Carry On regulars are present, Jim Dale as Bo West, Peter Butterworth as Simpson, Kenneth Williams as Commandant Burger, Angela Douglas as Lady Jane, Charles Hawtrey as Captain Le Pice, Joan Sims as Zig-Zig, Anita Harris as Corktip & Bernard Bresslaw as Abdul.Finally the review, I have to say Follow That camel is not the greatest of Carry on's, in fact I'd go as far as calling it one of the forgotten Carry On's. When you mention to people the title to this one, people seem to say "Is that the one with Phil Silvers in?". And that's probably what I mean, because apart from Phil Silvers presents not a lot of things in this stick out. The film feels a lot like Up The Khyber which we see a couple of films down the line, in fact a lot of things in this feels like it gets recycled in that, right from the plot to the actually scenery which you would probably recognize. The only thing you don't have in Up The Khyber is a Sgt Knocker character around.One thing to mention about this is Kenneth Williams for once is playing a slightly less Campy role than usual. In fact he's playing a straight strict Commandant. At times when you watch this, you get this feeling your not watching Carry On, its like watching Columbus but with gang present if you get my drift. The film is funny yes, there's is the odd good one liner, I did enjoy the desert bit which sees them on a long trek across the desert to Fort Zuassantneuf, oh and "Musthavealeak"What about Phil Silvers? Silvers performance is okay, I think his presents was good for a one off, I do feel if he had appeared in a another one it wouldn't haven't worked, as mentioned he was playing Bilko in this with a different name and looking at the other Carry On's I don't know where he would have fit in plus people may got sick of his Bilko character keep popping up in the carry on's. His character in this is just right really. Another thing to mention is during production Silvers health wasn't particularly great and his mind was going, cause of this Silvers permanently kept forgetting his lines and it forced producers to hold up his lines alongside the camera. Where does this film fail? I just feel there isn't a great deal to remember in this, yeah the regulars put in a good performance and can't fault that but as mentioned it doesn't feel like a Carry On.The film is watchable and far from the worst, yeah of course give it a look in. It's not one of the carry on's where you'd probably watch it again and again, you'd probably need a few years gap. If Sid had been here would it have been different? I dunno maybe if Sid was present it would have felt more like a Carry On, however put it this way if he was in this then Up The Khyber probably wouldn't have been so great.

Lesser Carry On which welcomes a guest star in the form of Phil Silvers. none other than Sergeant Bilko himself. Silvers, in his only Carry On, makes the most of a pretty disapointing script and the gang[Williams, Dale, Butterworth, Sims] are nearly completly eclipsed by the US star. Not a bad entry to the series, but one that goes way over the top and doesn't make the most of the stalwarts.

This film features Anita Harris, cast against type as a Middle Eastern dancer and temptress. I always regarded Anita Harris as a wholesome family entertainer, so to see her performing a belly dance in this film wearing a skimpy costume was something of a trouser-popping surprise.