Peter Sellers went into this film as character support and came out a star. David Niven is the ostensible lead in a rather dull setting up of the plot, in which the bumbling Inspector Clouseau is called in to prevent the theft of a precious diamond known as the Pink Panther. But Sellers's dud officer was so scene-stealingly comic that director Blake Edwards inserted new scenes. The rest is hysterical history. See it from the beginning: the cartoon title sequence with its Henry Mancini theme is an in-the-pink joy.

The trademark of The Phantom, a renowned jewel thief, is a glove left at the scene of the crime. Inspector Clouseau, an expert on The Phantom's exploits, feels sure that he knows where The Phantom will strike next and leaves Paris for the Tyrolean Alps, where the famous Lugashi jewel 'The Pink Panther' is going to be. However, he does not know who The Phantom really is, or for that matter who anyone else really is...