The Carry On ensemble in something of a homage to Howard Hawks's Man's Favorite Sport tackle the subject of the great outdoors and man wanting to commune with nature.

It all begins with Sid James and Bernard Bresslaw see a nudist camp in a newsreel and make up their minds to go camping somewhere in that vicinity. The wives Sylvia Sims and Dilys Laye have something to say about it. In any event James and Bresslaw wind up nowhere near the nudists and with the wives and a whole lot of other strange folks who like camping.

Prissy schoolmaster Kenneth Williams is taking the girls in his charge camping and along with them is their matron Hattie Jacques. She's one formidable woman, but when she starts developing amorous feelings for Williams that's also a good laugh. The young girls themselves are merciless with their pranks.

Last but not least is everybody's favorite interloper Charles Hawtrey who somehow interjects himself between marrieds Terry Scott and Betty Marsden. Hawtrey buying sporting goods is good for chuckles and Scott asserting himself and dealing with Hawtrey is more than chuckles.

This is a good entry in the Carry On series.

I know the Carry On films were very popular--after all, they made 1038312 of them (more of less). However, as an American who did NOT grow up watching them (and no one in the States did),I have a very, very hard time understanding why they were so loved. After all, at least to me, they look like an extended episode of "The Benny Hill Show" with actual nudity along with all the smarmy and low-brow humor....very, very low-brow humor.

This installment finds two morons trying to get their girlfriends to accompany them to a nudist colony by tricking them. When I said it reminded me of Benny Hill--but this also looked like a 1980s slutty teen comedy but with older and unattractive leads. If you LIKE smutty humor that has absolutely no cleverness or finesse, then this film is for you! In addition to genuinely broad and dim writing, there are some horribly broad performances. The worst was the guy who played Dr. Soaper--most 6 year-olds are more subtle and professional! Not all the actors are THAT bad, but most are at least in the same ballpark as Soaper.

I am sorry, but I am the dissenting voice. I hated this film and just saw it as smutty and unfunny. About 2/3 the way through the movie, I just turned it off--life is too short.

If you ask people to name a carry on film, many name Carry on Camping, perhaps due to the famous scene of "flinging" Barbara Windsor. However, it deserves to be memorable for other reasons, namely: * Sid James is at his comedic best (particularly when he mistakes Joan Sims' stew for his foot bath) * Amelia Bayntun (Joan Sims' screen mum, Mrs Fussey) is a perfect representation of the overbearing mother in law/overprotective mother. (She reprises this role as Charles Hawtree's mother in Carry on Abroad a few years later).

* The winning-formula familiar pairings of Sid James/Joan Sims and Kenneth Williams/Hattie Jacques.

* The 60s references work well, and echo the times in places (Terry Scott looking at holiday brochures, at a time when foreign holidays were becoming viable for ordinary people, the hippy ending showing the class of generations).

* The quaint references to pre-decimalisation money, notably when Sid James and Peter Butterworth are talking about the camping fees.

For my money, Camping was the last great carry on. Convenience and Abroad were good, but Camping saw the regulars at the height of their powers, and it showed. Wonderful little film.