Peter Sellers plays the most normal of the characters, even if he is a convicted felon, which is unusual for those of us familiar mostly with his later films. Sellers plays one of a group of guys behind bars who plan the perfect crime - they'll commit a jewel robbery and be back in prison before anybody notices. Their current guard is about to retire - as in BEFORE the heist, but they figure the same easy-going type will replace him. They are dead wrong. Instead, Lionel Jeffries was hysterically funny as the tough guard ready to shape up the prisoners. Favorite line: "SILENCE when you're talking to me!" And will it be possible when doing jumping jacks not to think of a particular scene in this film? How are they ever going to pull this off with this guard around? And there are other problems as well.Irene Handl was also wonderful as the mother of the none too bright prisoner Lenny, played by Bernard Cribbins. Mom is upset that he isn't living up to the family tradition of trying to escape from prison.   Of course, there's also Maurice Denham as the prison warden whose vegetable marrow is the subject of several double entendres, and Liz Fraser as Sellers' Monroe-esque girlfriend, and, well, the whole cast, every one of whom knows how play this comic style. I had never heard of the director, Robert Day.   See it if it comes your way.

A trio of prisoners, aided by outsiders, plan and execute an elaborate escape plan from under the nose of militant prison guard (Jeffries) and the gardening fanatic warden (Denham). Sellers is superb as the mischievous Dodger, with David Lodge and bumbling Bernard Cribbins his cohorts on the inside. Criminal mastermind Soapy Stevens (Hyde-White) who engineered Sellers' incarceration is top of the wanted list, and Sellers is determined to get him his comeuppance. Also hilarious is Irene Handl and Liz Fraser as the 'girls', using their collective skills (brains and beauty, respectively) to aid and abet Sellers' escape plan.Jeffries is the real sleeper here; his comical, gestapo like prison captain, continually tortured by Sellers' antics, earns him the ire of the usually passive warden Maurice Denham (Denham more concerned with the quality and size of his garden produce than Jeffries' constant bleating about Sellers). The bane of his existence, Jeffries promises to catch Sellers out, but of course, he only ends up with egg on his face, again and again. Poor Lionel.Liz Fraser is a voluptuous beauty, and her thick cockney accent and dumb-blonde demeanour make her the ideal vice. Her knack for these type of parts earned her recurring roles in several "Carry On" films later in the sixties, a series that excelled at 'accentuating' her talents, you might say. The mercurial Bernard Cribbins, a relative newcomer in this picture, also had the good fortune to team up in a couple of "Carry On" films, as well as several other Sellers' vehicles.Not just a Sellers picture, all the cast succeed with their timing and delivery, but it's Lionel Jeffries who showed here his diverse ability to express humour, in addition to the straight roles he played throughout his long and distinguished career. Slapstick and farce, simple to enjoy, highly recommended.

There was a time in the early 1960s when people took a new Peter Sellers comedy for granted. You could count on a clever if lightweight plot, an established cast of colorful supporting actors, and the man himself showing off a new comic accent. "Two-Way Stretch" falls right into place.This time Sellers is "Dodger" Lane, a robber doing time at the cushy H.M. Prison Huntleigh with pals Jelly Knight (David Lodge) and Lennie the Dip (Bernard Cribbins). Their imprisonment is the perfect alibi for a jewel heist planned by their shady partner Soapy Stevens (Wilfrid Hyde-White). Just as the boys are about to sneak out and steal the lolly, a nasty guard named "Sour" Crout (Lionel Jeffries) turns up on their cell block.Sellers sprinkles Lane with a touch of Cockney but doesn't push himself much. The opening scene, of him yawning in bed as his mates assemble a posh breakfast, sets us up on the right note. The friendly old warden (George Woodbridge) knocks on the cell door before entering. "Oh, come on in, Chief, it ain't locked!" Dodger calls out from his pillow.With Lodge, Woodbridge, Cribbins as well as Irene Handl, Liz Fraser, and Thorley Walters all on hand, it's like a convention of Sellers supporting players. Did Graham Stark and Kenneth Griffiths have doctor's notes that month? The film manages to be entertaining without being that sharp. The amiable nature of prison life pre-Crout is enjoyably established (complete with shop classes where Jelly instructs on safe-cracking techniques), and Crout's own arrival leads to some Wile E. Coyote hi-jinks. Crout even manages to get blown up without any damage except to his clothes (and pride).A long-running side joke about the prison governor showing off his prize squash becomes the subject of labored double-entendres ("I brought this off myself" he tells a trio of society ladies as the camera angle suggests they are staring not at his plant but his crotch.) Many other one-liners also fall flat, but the camaraderie of the three lead prisoners and the way the film plays out the big heist keeps you engaged and entertained, if never quite laughing out loud.Sellers plays Dodger as very much focused on the jewel caper, even to the point of ignoring Fraser's panting efforts to kindle some romance. It's as if he and director Robert Day didn't trust the thin storyline to handle any of Sellers' typically wilder and more solitary comedy stylings. Jeffries emerges as the principal butt of humor, while the other actors all get turns in the spotlight. Hyde-White is especially good as the film's most crooked character, smiling beatifically throughout, while Cribbins, Lodge, and Handl mesh together quite well.Like AdamFontaine noted in his review here, Sellers doesn't seem terribly necessary; any leading comic actor who could play a crook would have done just as well. Maybe Sellers really was as tired as he acts it here (he starred in seven films in just 1960 and 1961); maybe he was trying to be less selfish on camera. If the latter, he succeeds!"Two-Way Stretch" may have been a time-killer for its star, but at least it was a pleasant one. Like other commenters note, it comes from a time when comedies were supposed to make you laugh, not hit you over the head with attitude or social comment. "Two-Way Stretch" is not much of a stretch in any direction; just easy to enjoy.

Despite "Two way stretch" usually being described as a "Peter Sellers film" it is an ensemble piece featuring some of the best British character actors of the 1950s and 60s.Maurice Denham,George Woodbridge,Thorley Walters,Wilfred Hyde-White and the wonderful Lionel Jefferies decorate this movie.Mr Jefferies in particular was never better than as CPO Crout the slightly mad successor to the kind-hearted veteran George Woodbridge. "Basket weaving?.....I'll get you baskets weaving !" he rants on being told that the cons are being taught that country craft. The usual lovable Cockneys and middle-class dunderheads make up the rest of the cast. It is the sort of film knocked out in a few weeks for silly money that the British Film Industry once excelled at.It wasn't "Great Art" but it was great fun.Now you need millions from the Lottery to make something a first-year Film Studies person would leave on the cutting-room floor. "Two way stretch " had no sex,no violence and no bad language,three of the requisites for comedy writers these days.It still makes a lot of people laugh.Not many modern comedies do.Is this a "Duh" moment?