The Ladykillers

The Ladykillers follows a gang of criminals who rent rooms in the home of an elderly widow, Mrs. Wilberforce, posing as a string quintet so their comings and goings will go unnoticed while they plot a robbery. Their landlady is an unwitting host, and once she begins to suspect what her lodgers are really up to, the group faces a problem they had not counted on: disposing of a witness they have grown fond of.

Alexander Mackendrick directed the film, his fourth feature after Whisky Galore!, The Man in the White Suit and The 'Maggie'. William Rose wrote the screenplay with Jimmy O'Connor, and Michael Balcon produced for Ealing Studios. Alec Guinness heads the cast as Professor Marcus, the gang's leader, alongside Cecil Parker, Herbert Lom, Peter Sellers and Danny Green as his associates, with Katie Johnson as Mrs. Wilberforce. Thirty actors appear in credited roles.

The film opened in December 1955 and runs 91 minutes. It holds an 8.8 out of 10 from 35 reviews, a stronger response from critics than from general audiences, where it rates 7.6 on IMDb from around 34,000 votes and 7.3 on TMDB from roughly 577 votes.