THERE will probably be many young readers who have never heard of (a) the British cartoonist Ronald Searle, now 88 and still going strong, (b) the cartoons he drew illustrating the juvenile delinquents at a girls' school called St Trinians and (c) any of the five films based on Searle's creations, beginning with The Belles of St Trinians in 1954.
Opening now is a sixth film based on Searle's belles but this one, simply called St Trinians, rated M, is, sadly, a poor imitation of the first (and the best).
The 1954 film had the great British comic actor Alistair Sim not only in drag as the headmistress, Miss Fritton, but also as Miss Fritton's bookmaker brother.
In 2008 we have Rupert Everett also in twin roles as the headmistress and the brother who, this time around, is an art dealer.
Another difference is that in 1954 the girls made gin in the school lab to on-sell to a character called Flash Harry, played by George Cole.
Now, it's vodka, but Flash Harry, now played by Brit comic Russell Brand, is still buying!
In both films, the girls save their beloved school from bankruptcy: in 1954 with a bit of race fixing; in 2008 by stealing the painting The Girl with a Pearl Earring (yes, from the film of the same name) and then by receiving a reward for "finding" it and by cheating their
way through to the final of a television quiz hosted by Stephen Fry.
OK, so it's not as good as the original but those Ronald Searle characters can still raise a laugh. Or two.
It's bad enough being bombarded with daily emails of funny/shocking clips from YouTube.com without now finding YouTube in the movies.
Early in St Trinians those nasty girls film a new student having a shower which, of course, ends up on YouTube.
In Never Back Down, rated M, also opening this week, a teen football star, Jake, played by Sean Faris, moves from one school to another and is welcomed by classmates who had seen him on YouTube violently bashing a man who had insulted his dead father.
Jake is invited to join an underground school fight club called MMA meaning mixed martial arts where the fights are also recorded for YouTube. And despite its M rating, the MMA fight scenes are very violent.
You can close your eyes to avoid excess the blood but "the amplified sound of bodies being slammed together or scraped along the floor or of kicks administered full force to limbs creates a picture in your mind even if you're not looking," said Ruthe Stein in the San Francisco
Chronicle.
Also opening for a mostly arthouse release is the French film Apres Lui (After Him) with Catherine Deneuve as a mother who, while mourning the death of her son in a car accident, becomes obsessed with her son's best friend.
Have you seen any of these films? Tell us what you thought of them.