Benny Hill, Complete & Unadulterated, Set 1: The Naughty Early Years (DVD)

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The second run of Benny Hill´s BBC television career began in November of 1969 with a variety comedy/musical program that comes directly from the brain of the poster child of ADHD himself, Benny Hill. "The Benny Hill Show" is equal parts Jack Paar and Monty Python with madcap humor and crazy skits. The hour-long show features a half dozen bits that bare little, if any, relation to each other. For the most part they are simply an excuse for Benny Hill to cut loose and make the audience laugh.

To fully appreciate Benny Hill, you do need to have an understanding of British humor as a whole. Although "The Benny Hill Show" is as dry as its contemporary situation comedies, it´s also far sillier. Hill´s trademark pantomimes are present along with the overtly sexual humor to create a program that has incredibly quick pacing. The laughs are fast and furious and only broken up by Hill´s decision to include songs by his in-house singers.

It is amazing how outrageous this show is. The sexual content that marked Hill´s career isn´t exactly subtle as he fixates on certain female body parts to no end. Hill himself also spends about a third of each episode dressed in drag, seemingly right at home. The humor of these situations is pulled through is the elfish, mischievous glimmer in Hill´s eyes and the all-out manner in which he plays his characters. His madcap dialogue and zany delivery is hypnotic and hilarious. And the best part is that half the time I have no idea what is coming out of his mouth.

Occasionally the skits do run a little long, such as the "European Song Contest" where the comedy doesn´t manage to fill out the length of the bit and runs out of steam. Others, like the "This Is Your Life" bit from the second episode seem almost improvisational and fly along. For the most part, because he´d been perfecting this formula for fifteen years on television already, the pacing of the episodes is even and diverse enough to hold my attention its full hour.

Video:
Presented in its native 4:3 aspect ratio, "The Benny Hill Show" is comparable to most A&E BBC products of the era like the aforementioned "Monty Python and the Flying Circus." The show is recorded on video and the transfer suffers for it, with a lack of definition in many scenes and the common problem of lens flares. The colors are accurately reproduced and there aren´t many film artifacts or scratches on the print, however it does vary based on where the sequences were shot, though that´s certainly no fault of the transfer. Considering it´s nearly 35 years old, "The Benny Hill Show" looks pretty good.