Noir Alley: Eddie Muller on Cash On Demand (1961)

Cash On Demand (1961) -- (Movie Clip) One Of The Few Dignified Businesses

We’ve just been meeting the staff of a provincial English branch bank, two days before Christmas, when their oppressive manager (Peter Cushing as Fordyce) arrives, taking bites out of Miss Pringle, Pearson, and Sanderson (Edith Sharpe, Richard Vernon, Norman Bird), a little kinder to Peter and Sally (Barry Lowe, Lois Daine), early in Hammer Films’ Cash On Demand, 1961.

Cash On Demand (1961) -- (Movie Clip) Someone Of Consequence

Wholly new character (Andrè Morell as Col. Gore-Hepburn) pulls up outside our Haversham, England bank branch, meeting first Harvill (Barry Lowe), then chief clerk Pearson (Richard Vernon), who’s already in a job-threatening pre-Christmas conflict with fastidious manager Fordyce (Peter Cushing), early in Hammer Films’ Cash On Demand, 1961.

Cash On Demand (1961) -- (Movie Clip) Open, Give This Christmas

Tight opening to the well-received Hammer Films’ production, based on an episode of the British TV anthology series Theatre 70, not released in the UK until December, 1963, but with a holiday setting an a twist on Dickens’ A Christmas Carol, Cash On Demand, 1961, starring Peter Cushing and Andrè Morell.

Cash On Demand (1961) -- (Movie Clip) You Look Ridiculous

Only uptight manager Fordyce (Peter Cushing) knows that Col. Gore-Hepburn (Andrè Morell) is really a suave robber holding his family hostage while posing as an inspector from the bank’s security firm, so beleaguered staffers Harvill, Pearson and Sanderson (Barry Lowe, Richard Vernon, Norman Bird) exhibit some team spirit, in Hammer Films’ much-praised Cash On Demand, 1961.