Monthly Film Bulletin

Sidney Stratton, laboratory dish-washer at a textile mill, is secretly at work on the invention of a new fabric that will never get dirty and never wear out. After many vicissitudes, the invention succeeds : it is brought to the notice of his employer, who gives him money and facilities to develop it. When the news of Stratton's invention breaks, however, industry is threatened with chaos. The trades unions and the mill owners find themselves in an artificial alliance, both determined that the fabric must never go on the market, because of the unemployment - to mills, workers, laundries and so on - it will create. A rival mill owner calls in an aged but still powerful industrial tycoon: an attempt is made to trick Stratton into signing away his rights. When he refuses, the mill owners imprison him. He escapes, goes to the trade unionists for help, and is imprisoned by them too. In a final chase, he is cornered both by workers and employers. By this time it has been discovered that the fabric will not last - it comes to pieces as they tear at the humiliated Stratton's white coat and trousers. Stratton goes, Chaplin-like, on his way, determined to find the technical flaw in his formula and start again.

This is a comedy with an original flavour. It starts with refreshing leisureliness, detailing Stratton's various setbacks. before he finally brings his fabric to the attention of the industry: irony, slapstick and some apt social observation are well combined. In the second half, attention is shifted from Stratton himself to the various machinations of capital and labour, which are also wittily described. The scene of Stratton's final humiliation makes it clear that The Man in the White Suit is in fact a tragi-comedy, but that Alexander Mackendrick has not followed through all its implications. The impact of the adventure on Stratton himself is never really clinched: he remains a distant, ambiguous figure, motivating events but never clearly reacting to them. This combined with the fact that the fabric turns out to be useless anyway, makes the film contract instead of expand in the final sequences.

Nevertheless, the picture is very enjoyable. Its observation of people, its carefully sustained tempo, its apt incidental thrusts. have real individuality and distinction. More ambitious than some recent Ealing comedies, its best sequences are more memorable: it will certainly remain one of the liveliest and most interesting experiments in British films this year. The acting - notably Alec Guinness, Joan Greenwood, Ernest Thesiger and Vida Hope - is exceptionally good.