Main Cast: Terry-Thomas, Peter Sellers, Peggy Mount, Shirley Eaton, Dennis Price
Release Year: 1957
Country: UK
Run Time: 92 minutes
Plot
Released in the U.S. as Your Past Is Showing, the British The Naked Truth is a wickedly funny satire of the tabloid-press industry. Dennis Price plays a scandal-sheet publisher named Nigel Dennis who lives high on the hog by blackmailing his wealthy targets. Several of Dennis' victims, including peer Lord Mayley (Terry-Thomas) and model Melissa Right (Shirley Eaton), plot to kill the extortion-grabbing publisher, to no avail. During a wild ride in a malfunctioning blimp, Dennis manages to accomplish by accident what his enemies have tried to do to him on purpose. Though second-billed, the real star of The Naked Truth is Peter Sellers as a smarmily "sincere" TV personality. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
Review
A prescient satire of tabloid journalists and celebrity culture, The Naked Truth, is a well-acted British comedy that doesn't quite succeed in melding its black and broad comedy. The film centers around the exploits of four celebrities -- politician Lord Mayley (Terry-Thomas), model Melissa Right (Shirley Eaton), author Flora Ransom (Peggy Mount), and television personality Sonny MacGregor (Peter Sellers) -- trying to assassinate rag reporter Nigel Dennis (Dennis Price) who demands payment from the rich and famous to suppress his damning stories. When the film was released, in 1958, Peter Sellers' radio program The Goon Show was at the height of its popularity. He was known as a master of many voices, so it's not surprising that he was hired to play plays ace mimic Gregory. However, at this point in his career his vocal impersonations are far more skilled than his acting ability. Far more successful are Terry-Thomas as the flighty, tightly wound Mayley and Mount as the pompous self-centered grand dame Ransom. The main comic set pieces center on the group's elaborate attempts to have Dennis killed, but director Mario Zampi's blocking of the action is too stiff and stuffy, suffocating the comedians' and narrative's giddiness. Too many scenes fall flat. Don't be confused by the MGM DVD, which uses the original U.S.-release opening credits, when the film was titled Your Past Is Showing. ~ Michael Buening, All Movie Guide
Ivan King - Art Director, Mario Zampi - Director, Bill Lewthwaite - Editor, Stanley Black - Composer (Music Score), Stanley Pavey - Cinematographer, Mario Zampi - Producer, Michael Pertwee - Screenwriter
Nigel Dennis (Dennis Price) is a blackmailer who threatens to publish embarrassing secrets in his magazine The Naked Truth. His latest targets are Lord Henry Mayley (Terry-Thomas), television host Sonny MacGregor (Peter Sellers), writer Flora Ransom (Peggy Mount), and model Melissa Right (Shirley Eaton).
Several of them decide independently that murder would be a better solution than paying. However, it is Mayley who by sheer bad luck nearly ends up the victim of both MacGregor's and Ransom's schemes. The four eventually join forces and try again. That attempt also fails, but Dennis is then arrested for an earlier crime.
When Dennis threatens to reveal all at his trial, Mayley comes up with a scheme to break him out of prison and send him to South America, with the help of hundreds of Dennis's other victims. They phone in numerous fake calls for help, distracting the London police, while Mayley, MacGregor, and MacGregor's reluctant assistant Porter (Kenneth Griffith), disguised as policemen, wisk Dennis away.
Knocking Dennis unconscious periodically, they finally end up in the fully enclosed cabin of a blimp on the way to a rendezvous with an outbound ship. To their dismay, when he comes to, Dennis refuses to go along with their plan. Unaware of where he is, he then steps out for some air and plummets to the ocean below. However, when MacGregor celebrates by shooting his pistol, it punctures the blimp.
