Trivia for
The Lavender Hill Mob (1951) More at IMDbPro »

• Arriving in Paris, Pendlebury recites the words, "Gay, sprightly land of mirth and social ease"; Holland later repeats the phrase in reference to Rio de Janeiro. This line is a subtle reference to the movie's plot, because those words come originally from the 1765 poem "The Traveller" by Oliver *Goldsmith*.
  
  
• Audrey Hepburn was considered for a larger role in this film, but stage work made her unavailable. Alec Guinness was impressed with the young actress and arranged for her to appear in a bit part. This is considered to be Hepburn's first appearance in a major film.
  
  
• First feature film of Frank Forsyth.
  
  
• Robert Shaw's first film.
  
  
• Ealing Studios, planning a bank-robbery film, asked the Bank of England to devise a way in which a million pounds could be stolen from the bank. A special committee was created to come up with an idea, and their plan is the one used in the film.
  
  
• T.E.B. Clarke was originally meant to do a sequel to the popular police drama, The Blue Lamp (1950), but he quickly decided he'd much rather write a comedy instead.
  
  
• Most of Robert Shaw's performance ended up on the cutting room floor.
  
  
• One of the rationales the filmmakers considered in not allowing the mob to get away with their crime is that prevailing censorship criteria in the U.S. would have cost them the lucrative American market.
  
  
• "Of all sad words of tongue or pen, the saddest are these - it might have been" is a taken from 'Maud Muller', a poem by John Greenleaf Whittier.
  
  

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