Remembering John Mills

The Mills family, according to David Thomson, has ‘crowded us out with insipid, tennis-club talent’, which is a cruel verdict, but hard to disagree with. When the gals tried being naughty, you felt embarrassed and sorry for them. Juliet Mills’s skinnydipping in Billy Wilder’s Avanti! (1972) is the only topless scene I’ve ever wished would end, and then, when Jack Lemmon starts trying to bring it to an end by holding up wet socks and other bits of business in front of her breasts, you start wishing the laboured shtick to bring the scene to an end would end.

As for dad, if Britain’s other theatrical knights had the best screen careers they could manage under the prevailing local conditions, John Mills always gave the impression that the British film industry was his natural level. The world changed, Britain changed, the army changed, eventually even the British film industry changed, but decade in, decade out there were still officer roles for Sir John.