Review of Oliver! (1968) by Jonathan B — 29 Aug 2012

To today's audience Oliver! may well appear a bit overly shiny and a bit twee yet this is undoubtedly one of the best musicals of the 1960s. It has some cracking tunes and lovely set pieces with strong performances from the principal and supporting cast members.

Lionel Bart's witty lyrics and some great choreography make the story whip along at mean that the movie, despite its length, is never dull. The central child actors of Mark Lester as Oliver and Jack Wild as Artful Dodger hold their own against superb turns from the brilliant Ron Moody, Oliver Reed and Shani Wallis.

This could perhaps be viewed as the final swan song of that era of classic musicals as the next few years saw the musical genre fall out of favour and produced some really turkeys. There's plenty of songs that you'll hum along to and if you've ever been to a school in Britain, you may well have performed Food Glorious Food, Be Back Soon, As Long As He Needs Me and the rest as part of concerts and productions when you were younger.

A perennial favourite and a cracking good story.