Basically a retread of Carry On Camping modernised to cash in on the ‘70s explosion in caravanning, Carry On Behind — the tagline ran “We gave you Loving, we gave you Dick, now we give you Behind — throws up the usual assortment of henpecked husbands, innuendo, nagging wives, more innuendo battle-axe-mother-in-laws, even more innuendo and dolly birds with little in the way of tampering with the formula.
The only differences this time round is that it features a Hollywood starlet in Elke Sommer, star of A Shot In The Dark, who enjoys some entertaining cavorting with Williams as two randy archaeologists. (Interestingly enough, Sommers was paid 5 times more than series regular Williams). And also, in the scenes of romantic reconciliation at the end of the film — particularly in the reunion of Joan Sims and Peter Butterworth — the film aims for the heartfelt, something that few Carry Ons truly do.
But, despite the exotic co-star and stabs at emotion, there is something depressingly ‘70s about Behind. Set in the height of summer but shot in the depths of winter, the whole film is a grey, overcast reminder of a Britain shot through with retarded sexual politics and bad domestic holidays. Yet there is also something grim about the series trotting on when its glory days are long behind it. By the point in the movie when the caravan site begins to sink into the soggy ground. It is a beautiful metaphor for the franchise itself.