ianlouisiana Review of Tommy the Toreador

Tommy the Toreador (1959)

Was this blond,blue- eyed cockney Britain's Elvis?...

[5/10 · 23 April 2016]

Well,he was a refreshing change from impresario Larry Parnes' usual indenti - kit smouldering,greased - up Teddy Boys whose pimply faces adorned the bedroom walls of many a middle - class English schoolgirl in the late 50's. Tommy had nice teeth,loved his mum and came from Bermondsey which might as well have been Bermuda for all that most of his fans knew about it. He wasn't rally rock ' n ' roll,we all knew it. Now Gene Vincent..there was the real thing,and Jerry Lee till he married his 13 year old cousin. So Tommy was loved by mums and dads,a fact that immediately alienated him from 80% of his potential audience and before "Tommy the Toreador" was released he was already moving from pop star to entertainer. He did his best but the material,which defeated some of Britain's top comic talent of the time,sadly,did for him. Filmed determinedly at Elstree,it looked about as Spanish as The Old Kent Road apart from a few stock shots of a fiesta that scarcely blend seamlessly with the rest of the movie. The overwhelming impression is that the makers were desperate to milk this worn-out cash cow one more time before it dries up. The songs are very poor and that's suspending my critical faculties for the sake of courtesy. Some of our favourite actors make hurried almost furtive appearances before hurrying off to cash their cheques. Ten years later Tommy,his brief rock ' roll career mercifully forgotten, sung and danced gloriously in the excellent "Half a sixpence". That,I feel sure,is how he'd rather be remembered.