The Rebel

The Rebel (US title: Call Me Genius) is a 1961 British satirical comedy film about the clash between bourgeois and bohemian cultures. Starring Tony Hancock, it was written by Ray Galton and Alan Simpson. The film was made by Associated British Picture Corporation and distributed by Warner-Pathé (ABPC's distribution arm). Plot Tony, a disaffected London office clerk catches the train to Waterloo Station every morning. Each commuter wears a bowler hat and carries an umbrella. In the City he is one of many identical clerks in a dull office. One day his boss catches him drawing faces instead of working, and he is asked to produce his ledgers, which are full of poor quality caricatures. Back at his mid-terraced Victorian house lodgings, Tony dons his artist's smock, and resumes work on "Aphrodite at the Waterhole", a horrendous and huge sculpture. His landlady Mrs Crevatte complains about the hammering noise. He explains he cannot afford a model and it represents "women as he sees them". She threatens to evict him if he does not remove the statue. As he remonstrates with his copy of Van Gogh's self-portrait on his wall, the statue crashes through the floor. At a local cafe he orders a coffee "with no froth". This annoys the owner, who tells Tony he has just bought an expensive froth-making machine. Inspired by a poster on the wall Tony decides to go to Paris. He takes a train to Dover with his Aphrodite on a wagon to the rear; she is decapitated as the train goes through a tunnel. At the port, Tony is furious, but worse is to follow: while being loaded onto a ship it bursts through the bottom of its net and is lost in the sea. On the ferry he throws his bowler hat and umbrella into the sea; unfortunately it is raining heavily when he arrives in France.