One Wish Too Many

(1956, U.K.) black and white 54 minutes
Children's Film Foundation / Realist Film Unit
Story: Norah Pulling
Adapted for the screen by Mary Cathcart Borer
Screenplay: John Eldridge
Cinematography: Adrian Jeakins
Editing: James Clark
Production Designer: Bernard Sarron
Sound: Terry Cotter, Ken Cameron
Special Effects: Bowie and Margutti
Music: Douglas Gamley
Music conductor: John Hollingsworth
Produced by Basil Wright
Directed by John Durst

With: Anthony Richmond (Peter Brown), Rosalind Gourgeny (Nancy), John Pike (Ian), Terry Cooke (Burt), Gladys Young (Miss Mint), Sam Costa (Mr. Pomfret, the Schoolmaster), Bay White (Mrs. Brown, Peter's mother), Frank Haydn (Mr. Brown, Peter's father), Arthur Howard (Headmaster), Paddy Joyce (Barrow Boy)

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SYNOPSIS: In East London on a winter afternoon, children depart from the Lansbury Road School. One small boy, Ian, is teased by a gang of bullies lead by the mean Burt. Ian and his good friend Peter Brown walk part of the way home together. Peter takes a detour to the marketplace, and browses in a toy kiosk. He picks up a strange and wonderful marble and ponders its significance. He recognizes his good friend, Nancy, ans shows her the new marble he found. The kids fancy what toys they would buy if they could get anything. Nancy contemplates about how wonderful it would be it one could wish for anything they desired. They try it out but alas, magic is impossible.

Peter and Nancy encounter Peter's Father, who is an interstate lorry driver. Mr. Brown drives the kids home in his big truck. Nancy's aunt, Miss Mint, who also happens to be the Browns' landlord, meets the girl at the door. She is mean, and complains about everything. Once home, Miss Mint makes her poor neice do chores all afternoon, when all she really wants to do is play. Later, Peter and Mother see Father off. Peter sits down to tackle his homework. Instead, he plays with the marble he just found. It falls on the ground, and rolls under a bureau. It starts to glow. Peter wishes that his homework would be magically done, and the glowing orb does it for him! Peter tells Mother of this miraculous act, but she doesn't beliebve it. Peter, however, knows what has happened -- the marble is a magic wishing marble! All one need do is wish for what one wants, and it magically appears. Peter demonstrates for Mother, but alas, no magic happens the second time.

Peter goes outside to play after "finishing" his homework, and stops in an alley. He is lonely, and he wishes that his good friend Nancy were here. Suddenly, Nancy appears out of nowhere! Nancy doesn't even remember coming! Peter still can't figure out what activates the marble to its magical acts. Nancy thinks the marble may be dirty, so she rubs it on her dress. When Peter then wishes for a dolly for Nancy, it materializes in her arms. Peter finally understands that in order to activate the marble, one must rub the icon, ala Aladdin's magic lamp. Peter rubs the marble, and wishes for a toy steamroller, which magically appears. The two ecstatic children now run all over East London with their new magic toys. Miss Mint orders Nancy inside, but Peter is still happy about his supernatural discovery. Peter's mother goes to market, and Peter decides to redecorate the apartment, with the help of his new magical friend. He turns their old lamp into a fancy new one, and then a candlestick. He eventually replaces the furniture, the drapes, everything in the apartment.

When Mother returns home, she is horrified, not delighted, to find her home completely rennovated. Before she has a chance to take in what's happened, the nosy Miss Mint pokes in the window, and is suspicious that the furniture she supplied to her tenants has been replace with fancier items. Miss Mint comes in and demands the rent. Peter sends the old biddie off with a wish from the marble, and the old biddie totters into the street, knocking over a produce cart and its barrow boy. Peter sees his mother's grief, and agrees to revert the apartment back to its former state. Mother takes the marble away from him. Miss Mint returns, with Nancy and her fancy doll. Miss Mint assumes the children stole the doll, and demands they return both "magical" toys. Peter retires to bed, taking the steamroller and dolly for safekeeping.

Early next morning, as the milkman delivers his goods door to door, Peter prepares for school. As Mother leaves the room to fetch a clean handkerchief for him, Peter idly wishes that he could take the magic marble to school with him. The marble obediently floats into his pocket, and Peter decides not to tell his mother. Peter goes to Nancy's house, and gives her back her doll, which Nancy hides inside the piano. The two children walk off to school. In the schoolyard, Burt and the bullies again attack their freind Ian, and Peter, holding his marble, wonders if there is anything he can do about this injustice.

In class, the Schoolmaster complains about the poor quality of the homework turned in by all the students. All the students, that is, except for Peter, who mysteriously has turned in a perfect paper! The Schoolmaster, of course, is suspicious of this sudden burst of brilliance on Peter's part, and asks him to demonstrate his newly-found mathematical prowess in front of the class. Up at the blackboard, Peter is prepared to use his marble to cheat, but the Schoolmaster notices it and takes it away. Peter is thusly reduced to the well-meaning but mediocre student he really is. The Schoolmaster forces him to stay after class.

Later, as the other boys take a lively swim in the school's pool, Nancy visits Peter in detention. At the pool, the Burt and his gang steal Ian's clothes, and lock the door to the gymnasium. The Schoolmaster soon allows Peter to have dinner in the dining hall, returning the marble to him beforehand. Peter soon discovers the conspiracy against his friend Ian, and rushes to the gymnasium to rescue him. Finding the doors locked, Peter yells out to Ian, who tells him of his predicament. Peter wishes Ian's clothes back to him, and helps him out of the gym with the marble. As an act of righteous revenge, Peter magically transports Burt into the changing room, and drenches him with the showers.

Back at the dining hall, Peter and Ian eat a well-earned meal. Meanwhile, Nancy returns home for lunch, just as her auntie locates the doll inside the piano. The furious Miss Mint drags Nancy across the street to yell at Mother. Miss Mint threatens to complain to the Headmaster, and further announces she is evicting the Browns, who have a week to vacate the premises! Meanwhile, Peter transports himself to the gymnasium, where Burt sits in a pool of water. Peter makes a deal with Ian not to bother Ian anymore, and the bully agrees. Peter then dries Burt off with the marble's magic, and the two reurn to class, now friends.

Looking outside and seeing that they are late for class, Peter freezes time so that they can sneak back into the classroom without being notoced. Suddenly, everyone in school stands frozen like statues! Peter and Burt run to class, stopping beforehand to put a roller skate under the Schoolmaster's frozen foot, so that he will trip when he "comes to life" again. Back again in their seats, Peter starts up time again, and the normal chaos of the shool returns. The Schoolmaster, of course, trips on the roller skate and almost breaks his neck.

Meanwhile, Nancy and Miss Mint head towards school, while the Schoolmaster makes the class write an essay about the history of roller skates. Peter shows his friend the magic marble, and rubs it in preparation for another demonstration, but before he can make his wish, the Schoomaster grabs the marble, and himself wishes that this cursed day was over! The marble obeys its new master, and suddenly, the long school day is ended! The kids all run screaming out of the schoolroom, to the consternation of the Headmaster, who at that moment is showing some new parents the grounds. The Headmaster demands that the Schoolmaster round up his class at once, and he runs off in a desperate search. Peter, Burt and Ian run off together, and play with the magic marble. Peter summons Nancy again, and the poor girl disappears right in front of her horrified Auntie! Nancy materializes in front of the boys, but only partially, a virutal ghost. Meanwhile, Miss Mint complains to the Headmaster that she has lost her neice. She shows Nancy's doll to the Headmaster, but it disappears before their eyes!

Peter shows everyone his steamroller, which runs right into Mother, who is surprised to see the boy out of school so early. Mother is angry at Peter for screwing things up with that cursed marble, but Peter promises to make things right. Peter and his friends return to the markeplace, and ponder whether to return the toys or not. Peter gives a passerby a beard for a quick laugh, but he must think of some way to return things to right. First, he decides he wants to take a ride in his steamroller. In order to do so, he must make the steamroller life size. he wishes for it, and the toy gorws and grows into an immense, life size toy

Peter winds up the giant clockwork toy, and the kids hop on the machine. The steamroller rides down the London streets, to the amazement of passerby. Peter finds that he doesn't know how to control the vehicle, which careens down the street, out of control. Mother sees the apparition and chases the kids, afraid they will hurt themselves. Peter drops the magic marble, and the steamroller crushes it. The Schoolmaster joins Mother in the chase after the runaway toy. Soon Miss Mint shows up, and the horrible toy almost runs her over. Father joins in the chase, and with the help of a freight hoist, rescues Miss Mint from the clutches of the monstrous toy.

Meanwhile, the steering wheel comes off the steamroller, making the machine even more out of control. It heads straight for the harbor, and Burt and Ian fall off. The machine heads for the water, and certain disaster, with Peter and Nancy stuck on board! Father uses a crane to reach the kids and drag them to safety mere seconds before the toy plunges into the depths of the Thames, where it shrinks back into nothingness. Miss Mint apologizes to the Browns for her un-Christian behavior, and invites them to stay at their apartment as long as they like. Everyone walks off happily, as the crushed magic marble reassembles itself and rolls off to find a new owner.

THE END

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ONE WISH TOO MANY, one of the earliest of the terrific features by the beloved Children's Film Foundation, is one of the most charming fantasies for children we have ever seen. It depicts a lower-middle-cass family with an uncanny combination of realism and whimsy, and depicts postwar London in all its squalor and glory, in a manner not dissimilar to Rosselini's OPEN CITY (1945)! Even the film's production company, REALIST FILM UNIT, suggests that indeed, the filmmakers were trying to make a neo-realist fantasy for children, and they succeeded brilliantly in manifesting this rarest of film genres.

The relationship between Peter and Nancy is especially dear, and evokes memories for any film viewer who had a best childhood friend of the opposite sex. The depiction of the modern elementary school is also superb, with its dowdy staff and political intruges amongst the students. The comic relief is provided by the villain of the piece, Miss Mint, who represents everything greedy and evil about the old world and its obsolete ways.

The special effects, spare yet delightful, are truly magical, and the giant steamroller which graces the film's finale is a wonderful depiction of a tin wind-up toy, certainly one of the gerat icons of postwar childhood. Other effects, such as the ethereal transportation of poor Nancy, are both whimsical and a little creepy. It is truly a shame that this exemplary fantasy has not been restored on DVD as of this writing, as it is surely one of the gems of British children's cinema.

ONE WISH TOO MANY was released in the UK in 1956, and some sources list a 1965 US release by Sterling Educational Films, but this is unverified. The 16mm print we have bears the Walter Reade Organization logo, but this may have been for educational rentals or television only.

Video/DVD availability: unavailable