Track the Films You Watch (2008)

Re: Track the Films You Watch (2008)

12/05/08: THE ALL-NEW POPEYE HOUR: POPEYE AND BIG FOOT (N/A, 1978) (TV)

12/05/08: THE ALL-NEW POPEYE HOUR: POPEYE’S ENGINE COMPANY (N/A, 1978) (TV)

12/05/08: THE ALL-NEW POPEYE HOUR: GETTING POPEYE’S GOAT (N/A, 1978) (TV)

I used to lap these up as a kid but, catching an episode of the series comprising three cartoons back-to-back now i.e. several years later (they preceded the theatrical screening of the pirate yarn RAIDERS OF THE SEVEN SEAS [1953]), I can see how they don’t hold up all that well! The character of Popeye isn’t exactly sympathetic to begin with, Olive Oyl distinctly overbearing and Bluto’s antics failed to elicit much interest either – in short, the scripts were alarmingly thin, fairly awful and generally unfunny to boot. They’re strictly juvenile fare, yet I doubt today’s kids would even have the patience to stick with them!; furthermore, the animation style is unattractive.

Taking each short per se, I guess they improved from one to the other: after the initial shock, one adapted to its mediocre quality as it were, so that the third cartoon easily results in being the most enjoyable of the lot – Popeye is entrusted with a mascot army goat whose immense appetite causes him no end of mischief (hardly original, I know, but always an amusing ploy). One interesting element here was that the shorts were bookended with Popeye delivering moralistic bits of wisdom to the kids in the audience.


12/05/08: RAIDERS OF THE SEVEN SEAS (Sidney Salkow, 1953)

My fourth trip to the Maltese sexton who’s been an avid film buff/collector/projectionist all his life provided me with the opportunity to watch this solid seafaring adventure (albeit opening rather incongruously in a Moroccan Sheik’s harem!) which, in the words of the award-winning lyricist friend who (as usual) set up the screening, was very popular locally in its day among schoolboys and is still fondly remembered today among people of his generation. Although perhaps not one to be mentioned in books on film history (much less criticism) – I don’t think I’ve ever come across it in essays I’ve read specifically dealing with the swashbuckler genre – the title itself has a familiar ring to it and, actually, I do recall catching a glimpse of it in the early days of Cable TV.

Another reason for the film’s relative neglect over the years is the fact that it was not a major studio effort (Global Productions but released theatrically through United Artists) and has second-league stars (John Payne and Donna Reed) as leads. Furthermore, the film-makers behind the low-budget studio-bound RAIDERS OF THE SEVEN SEAS may not have had the required dough to erect the necessary sets but at least proved savvy enough to shoot it in Technicolor – by pioneering color cinematographer W. Howard Greene, no less – for added vividness (even though the print I saw screened theatrically boasted the tell-tale signs of aging via a constant reddish hue for most of the film’s first half). Having said that, this negative aspect is ironically suited to the material at hand since Payne stars as legendary Pirate Barbarossa (Red Beard) with his hirsute attributes appropriately colored in that fashion (even when posing as a beggar in his nemesis’ household, which begs the question of why he wasn’t suspected at all); wondering why Payne seemed to drop off the cinematic radar in the late 1950s, I learned from his IMDb biography that that he had suffered facial scars in a terrible car accident in 1962! For the record, I have obtained (and have further access to) several John Payne movies of late – although, regrettably, not his other Technicolor pirate yarn CARIBBEAN (1952).

Anyhow, to get back to the film proper: no self-respecting pirate goes without a genial sidekick by his side and Lon Chaney Jnr. (as the one-legged old sea dog Peg-Leg) fits the bill here and in turn has a resourceful kid to take care of. Perhaps thankfully, however, we are spared the would-be comic relief characteristics that usually pervade both these personalities in similar fare and, in truth, it must be said that RAIDERS OF THE SEVEN SEAS has an admirably somber tone throughout that is atypical for pirate adventure pictures. Indeed, having Peg-Leg murdered by a duplicitous member of their gang (Anthony Caruso) and the awaiting folk – including, so we are told, women and children – mercilessly wiped out at their hide-out by the villainous Spaniards (Gerard Mohr and Henry Brandon) gives the whole an unexpectedly Shakespearean tragedy feel a` la “Henry V”!

It also goes without saying that Reed is, at first, understandably miffed that Payne has abducted her from her pampered surroundings to his island hideaway and that she bribes Caruso to set her free but, what is also unusual here is that Payne’s predictable love for Reed actually seems to cloud his judgment and make him see red [sic] with jealousy whenever she’s around Caruso and, if that wasn’t enough evidence of his true feelings for her, he gives up the gold ransom he had been paid for her freedom! Director Sidney Salkow – who was an old hand at this type of thing, including a Sterling Hayden/Rhonda Fleming swashbuckler called THE GOLDEN HAWK (1952) which, happily, also proudly forms part of the above-mentioned projectionist’s collection – doubled as a co-writer/producer here but, at least from this one preliminary viewing, it’s rather unfortunate that, for all its incidental pleasures and uncommon ingredients, RAIDERS OF THE SEVEN SEAS lacks the requisite number of memorable sequences or characters (perhaps even strong musical backing would have sufficed) which might have made it a much-better known film of its type – rather than being relegated to the hazy recollections of an age-old theatrical visit in their childhood days of an appreciative few.


12/06/08: THE SHAKIEST GUN IN THE WEST (Alan Rafkin, 1968)

The second Don Knotts star vehicle that I've watched is perhaps more readily enjoyable than the first - THE GHOST AND MR. CHICKEN (1966) – but the fact that it was an unnecessary remake of the classic Bob Hope comedy THE PALEFACE (1948) hurts the overall effort. In fact, Knotts takes the role of a dentist out West who comes up (at least, initially) against an attractive sharp-shooting female robber (Barbara Rhoades) - played in the original by Jane Russell; when the latter is pardoned by the U.S. government and enrolled as their agent in hot pursuit of Indian gun-runners (one of whom is played by Jackie "Uncle Fester" Coogan), she is forced to hastily take the understandably awed Knotts for a husband as a cover (following the killing of her original intended).

The amusing opening sequences depict Knotts' misadventures in dentistry – highlighted by his energetic encounter with a generously-built female patient who beats him up repeatedly within an inch of his life - but he is soon on his way westward because his hometown is already overrun with dentists. His wagon train is attacked by marauding Indians before long and, consequently, he earns himself a reputation as a fast gun (even though, in reality, it was Rhoades who mowed down ten Indians). After their marriage, Knotts is naturally more of a hindrance than a help to Rhoades in fulfilling her mission - even going so far as to bring about her abduction by the two villainous gun-runners to a nearby Indian camp when he follows her to a midnight rendezvous in a chapel.

However, he proves his real mettle to his wife when, dressed up as a squaw(!), he infiltrates the Redskins' camp at night and frees Rhoades - but not before stirring up trouble (of the romantic jealousy type) between two Indians who, incongrously enough, had found Knotts' sinewy figure attractive in their eyes! At the end, yet another Indian wants to exert his lawful rights on the squaw-attired Knotts but he has to contend with the now-gushing Rhoades and her gunmanship. A harmless, moderately entertaining Western comedy, therefore, but nowhere near the shining examples of the genre (which, incidentally, include THE PALEFACE itself).


12/06/08: THE SARACENS (Roberto Mauri, 1963)

It may well be because I'm watching too many movies of a similar nature in too short a time-frame but, lately, I've found myself almost totally forgetting about the events occurring in a particular movie after a mere couple of days have elapsed from its first viewing. This obscure Italian peplum is another such example alas because, frankly, the only two things that have stayed with me after these three days were: that it was a slight step up from the dismal (and similarly-titled) 'sword-and-sandal' flick I had watched previously on that same day i.e. ALI BABA AND THE SEVEN SARACENS (1964), and also the fact that I couldn't stop myself from laughing for a couple of minutes on end afterwards when, during a court dance sequence, a man comes tumbling down to the floor and drags his dancing partner with him; that it was a goof and not an intended gesture is borne out by the way the woman giggles in embarrassment after regaining her composure!! All I can add at this juncture is that the film stars Richard Harrison, a staple of this type of unassuming fare, but his character - and, by extension, characterization - is too bland to merit more than a footnote in this already skeletal review...


12/08/08: THE HELLFIRE CLUB (Robert S. Baker and Monty Berman, 1961)

Having been aware of this film from its poster found in an old scrapbook of my father's as well as Leslie Halliwell's positive write-up in his film guide and given my own partiality to swashbucklers, I made it a point to catch this one during its sole TV screening in my neck of the woods which occurred in the mid-1990s. Somehow, I didn't tape it back then but, thankfully, I subsequently acquired it via Dark Sky's double-feature DVD where it was coupled with another vintage British genre film (albeit of the horror variety) BLOOD OF THE VAMPIRE (1958; which I caught up with recently during this year's Halloween Challenge) produced by the same film-making duo behind THE HELLFIRE CLUB i.e. Robert S. Baker and Monty Berman. Swashbucklers had been Hollywood's most popular genres during the 1950s so it was almost inevitable that it should also flourish in Europe (Britain, France and Italy) as well. Other British examples were a handful of rather atypical Walt Disney productions and Hammer Films but also rare one-offs like THE MOONRAKER (1958) - another film whose poster graces that aforementioned scrapbook of my father's where he used to paste sundry posters and articles of movies released locally during the 1950s and early 1960s.

The plotline of a deposed aristocrat fighting to regain his rightful place is an age-old premise - think of Tyrone Power's South Seas adventure SON OF FURY (1942) for example - and this film follows in that fashion as well as Keith Michell is ousted by his villainous cousin (Peter Arne) who claims both his title and lands following the former's departure as a boy (played by the 1960 VILLAGE OF THE DAMNED's Martin Stephens) from under the clutches of his would-be Satanic father and his 'depraved' peers – hence the title which, incidentally, was an underground society that truly existed but, unsurprisingly, this is no historical account. Ironically enough, the flight of the child and his long-suffering (and ill-fated) saintly mother was precipitated by the boy's cousin goading him to witness the debaucheries of their elders being held in the basement! Needless to say, such wickedness is only mildly (in fact, too mildly if you ask me) depicted by the film-makers and these quaint orgies (relagated to the start and end of the film) are more prone to raise a smile than an eyebrow but, even so, there are three instances of censor-baiting where fetching females (including red-headed Adrienne Corri and Kai Fischer) are shown bare-backed!

The hero had been taken by his loyal guardian (David Lodge) to stay with a travelling circus troupe where he grew up a strong,agile man with a penchant for theatricality, qualities which he will be forced to rely on in his future run-ins with Arne and his men. Swordfights, floggings, prison escapes and impersonations (by Michell of a foppish French ally of Arne's) are the order of the day making for a pacy, full-blooded entertainment punctuated by Clifton Parker's rousing music score (not to mention an amiably goofy cameo from Peter Cushing as Michell's attorney) that, while perhaps falling short of more renowned entries in the genre, is reasonably representative of its British variant made during its time.

Re: Track the Films You Watch (2008)

I think the problem is that Chapman just isn't very interesting. In the movie he says he's a "nobody who killed a somebody" and that's pretty much true. Nothing, outside shooting Lennon, is very interesting so for a movie to really work it's going to have to be about Lennon and not the man who killed him. I'm sure whenever a bio pic comes along it will look at Lennon but for a low budget film it's probably easier going after Chapman.

I don't want to get inside Chapman's mind but both films seemed to do that through narration and reading from the Rye book, which just didn't work. I did love the stuff with the police trying to keep Chapman alive after the first twelve hours or so because they were fearing the fans were going to storm the hospital and kill him. It's funny that Lennon was always preaching peace yet those fans were ready for murder themselves.

From reading some fan reviews it seems this one here was more accurate with the story than CHAPTER 27.

Re: Track the Films You Watch (2008)

12/07/08: DOCTOR AT SEA (Ralph Thomas, 1955)

The second in the popular British comedy series already shows signs of flagging from the class evident in the original film. For one thing, the change of setting proves a bit of a quandary: it both opens up and cramps the jokes (while generally ship-bound, we do get a stretch on dry land – which sees the hero first involved with a drunken blonde and falling foul of her father and then put to jail for being ‘under the influence’ himself!).

Incidentally, while Dirk Bogarde reprises his role of Simon Sparrow, both James Robertson Justice and George Coulouris (who were also in DOCTOR IN THE HOUSE [1954]) play new characters here – the former’s gruffness, while amusing at first, borders on caricature eventually; similarly, Brenda de Banzie’s middle-aged passenger (pampered daughter of the seafaring company’s President) is somewhat over bearing, evoking memories of Kay Walsh in an episode from the portmanteau film TRIO (1950). Bogarde’s love interest, then, is rather incongruously filled by Brigitte Bardot – who’s undeniably attractive but not yet the sex symbol of subsequent repute (although she does get to be seen taking a shower at one point).

Gags and innuendo sometimes approach the broad humor one normally associates with the rival “Carry On” series (which was actually still three years away from its inception) and CARRY ON CRUISING (1962) in particular (both films, in fact, culminated in a party on deck which ends in disaster).


12/07/08: CAR WASH (Michael Schultz, 1976)

This modern ‘black’ comedy is something of a cult but also patchy overall: surprisingly, it was written by future Hollywood film-maker Joel Schumacher and director Schultz, then, would eventually go on to make the fiasco that was the film version of The Beatles’ seminal album SGT. PEPPERS’ LONELY HEARTS CLUB BAND (1978). It basically provides a microcosm of mid-1970s American attitudes (and converging cultures) in its ‘day in the life’ depiction of the titular workplace: characters, costumes, hairstyles, soundtrack, even language are so obviously of their time that they both make and date the film.

Popular stand-up comics put in an appearance as well: George Carlin is a taxi driver forever in search of a female customer who ditched him but then doesn’t recognize the girl when he comes face to face with her(!), while Richard Pryor has a showy role as a millionaire (i.e. hypocritical) evangelist. It’s telling that perhaps the film’s funniest gags are both gross in nature: one has a boy constantly throwing up and another in which an old man’s piss sample-bottle is mistaken for an exploding liquid and destroyed!


12/07/08: SHAME OF THE JUNGLE (Picha and Boris Szulzinger, 1975)

I was first intrigued by this via a still in “The Movie”, an early 1980s British film periodical, where it was mentioned in an entry dedicated to animation; I also recall my father renting it on VHS – under its U.K. title of JUNGLE BURGER – in the mid-1980s but, of course, I was too young to be allowed to watch this or even understand it. The edition I acquired had the benefit of the English-dubbed soundtrack (with the hero, spoofing the popular character of Tarzan, voiced by Johnny Weissmuller Jr.[!] – son of the screen’s most famous “Ape Man” – and the participation of many a “Saturday Night Live” exponent) but I opted to watch the original French version (accompanied by Italian rather than English subtitles).

Anyway, while the film is moderately amusing, it’s in no way a classic (falling far below the standard of even contemporary artist/film-maker Ralph Bakshi); incidentally, it exhibits a similar predilection for explicit violence and sexuality (indeed it’s swamped by the latter, particularly during the second half, with the hero depicted as impotent and where both characters and landscape are shaped like male and female genitalia)! The villainess, then, is a bald lady with fourteen breasts (perhaps a nod to the then-latest Bond adventure THE MAN WITH THE GOLDEN GUN [1974] – speaking of cinematic references, there’s an obscure one involving the maligned but not-too-bad religious epic THE SILVER CHALICE [1954], which I watched for the first time only last month): she’s flanked by a mad scientist with two heads who, typically for such evil “Siamese twins” caricatures, are constantly quarrelling among themselves.


12/08/08: WHO WAS THAT LADY? (George Sidney, 1960)

I’d always wanted to check out this well-regarded if rarely-seen comedy – for the record, some years back I missed out on its sole Italian TV screening (that I know of). For Tony Curtis, it meant something of a follow-up to the classic SOME LIKE IT HOT (1959) – where he’s forced, with his co-star (in this case, Dean Martin), to pass himself off as something he isn’t (an F.B.I. agent), leading to misunderstanding, various complications and imminent danger.

Similarly, a female is involved in the shenanigans (Curtis’ on and off-screen wife Janet Leigh) though, here, the whole ruse starts off because of her: Chemistry Professor Curtis’ fling with a female student is discovered by his jealous wife, so he turns for help to his best pal – TV writer Martin – who procures him with papers (and a gun) denoting his Bureau affiliations; Leigh is finally convinced of this and, soon after, is contacted by a real F.B.I. operative (James Whitmore) who uses her to keep track of just what Curtis and Martin are up to!

One of the highlights of the film is the extended yet splendid incident in a restaurant: Leigh accepts Curtis’ excuse to go on the town with Martin, believing it to be another federal job – but, in her over-eagerness to help, effectively blows his cover…which then lands the F.B.I. itself in hot water! The biggest trouble, however, is that enemy agents take the two men to be the real deal and kidnap them (and Leigh) in order to extract vital information they believe Curtis is in possession of! The aftermath of this sequence is again hilarious as, dazed by the drug he’s been given, Curtis thinks they’ve been taken to a Russian sub and persuades Martin to flood it…but it transpires that they’re in the basement of the Empire State Building!

The script (adapted by Norman Krasna – who also produced – from his own play) balances witty dialogue with inspired zany situations, which are then delightfully put across by an excellent cast. Both male stars, in fact, were already adept at this type of thing (crooner Martin also sings the title tune), but Leigh surprisingly proves a fine comedienne in her own right: it’s a pity that her marriage to Curtis was crumbling by this time which is doubly ironic given the film’s plot, but they were professional enough not to let the real cracks show in their performances.


12/08/08: SKIN GAME (Paul Bogart and, uncredited, Gordon Douglas, 1971)

Though highly rated in the Leonard Maltin Film Guide, this comic Western isn’t as popular as star James Garner’s two other genre spoofs – Burt Kennedy’s SUPPORT YOUR LOCAL SHERIFF (1969) and SUPPORT YOUR LOCAL GUNFIGHTER (1971) – but it’s very much in the same vein.

For the record, Garner had earlier collaborated with Paul Bogart (even if Gordon Douglas seems to have been involved as well at some point) on MARLOWE (1969), a failed attempt at a noir revival (and on which I’m kind of lukewarm myself); incidentally, I’ve just taped another thriller by this director – MR. RICCO (1975), starring Dean Martin – off TCM U.K. Anyway, while I was disappointed that the version I acquired of SKIN GAME was panned-and-scanned, I was glad to have caught up with it, as the film proved ideal lightweight/entertaining fare for the Christmas season; the same is true of the film I followed it with – coincidentally another Western comedy revolving around sparring partners, TEXAS ACROSS THE RIVER (1966), with Dean Martin himself and Alain Delon.

This, in fact, has con-men Garner and Lou Gossett Jr. cleaning up small towns by having the two posing as master and slave – with the former purporting to sell the latter to the highest bidder and then have the black man run away to rejoin his pal (who, by this time, has already left)! This ruse has been kept up for quite some time (as seen in flashback) and it’s garnered [sic] the duo a fair sum of money; however, things take a different turn when they run in, first, real slaves (which causes Gossett, born a free man, to rethink his situation) and, then, another con artist in Susan Clark (who targets Garner himself). Gossett even falls for a black girl who’s to be sold at auction (where he too will be present) – so he asks Garner to buy her out of his share of the money…but the whole elaborate scheme is interrupted by the arrival of notorious anti-slavery crusader John Brown (played by Royal Dano)!

Furthermore, after Garner and Gossett make the mistake of returning to one of the towns they had already ‘hit’, the former lands in jail and the latter (along with his lady friend) is sold off as a slave for real by unscrupulous dealer Edward Asner to despotic Southerner Andrew Duggan. Surprisingly sprung from jail by Clark herself, Garner determines to save his ex-partner: they too take up disguise, this time as preacher and nurse, and start visiting Asner’s clients one by one claiming a slave of theirs is actually a leper! By the time they reach Duggan’s mansion, Gossett has befriended (or, rather, learned to control via his spouting of mumbo-jumbo!) a group of African slaves who subsequently go along with them when our heroes, with their respective women in tow, take off for Mexico. Incidentally, this sequence also contains the film’s biggest laugh-out-loud moment as Gossett, all dressed up to wait at the family table, is fondled by one of Duggan’s pubescent daughters – causing him to jump and drop the contents of his bowl!

While, as I said, the quality of the film’s widescreen photography is somewhat compromised by the altered aspect ratio in this presentation (culled from a TV screening), David Shire’s fine score retains all of its original impact – incidentally, being remarkably somber, it effectively counterpoints the breeziness generally on display.


12/09/08: TEXAS ACROSS THE RIVER (Michael Gordon, 1966)

I had missed out on this when it was shown as a weekday matinee` on Italian TV ages ago; while not particularly outstanding, it’s a thoroughly engaging (and attractively shot, mostly in exteriors) Western spoof with an amiable and willing cast led by Dean Martin (typically relaxed playing a Texan cattleman), Alain Delon (handsome and charming as a Spanish aristocrat), Rosemary Forsyth (her Southern belle is delightful), Tina Marquand (a cute Indian squaw) and Joey Bishop (in the role of Martin’s wisecracking “Kronk” sidekick).

Though the latter is nominally entrusted with carrying the film’s comic relief, the other redskins (“Comanche”) actually provide the funniest moments – especially the antics of the chief’s inept son (trying at one point to shoot a flaming arrow, he contrives to set his Dad’s feathered cap on fire!). Also notable is a scene in which a medicine man alienated in tracking heroes’ moves from afar bumps his head against a tree branch, not to mention the amusing charging command of the cavalry unit after Delon – who’s accused of murder – which is so muddled that not even all the soldiers themselves are able to comprehend it!

The film leads to a pretty good climax – actually redolent of RED RIVER (1948) – as Martin and Delon about to engage one another in duel can’t even agree on whether to do it the official way (stand back to back, walk ten paces in opposite directions, then turn and shoot) or Western-style (face each other at opposite ends of the street, walk closer and then draw). However, the girls (Delon had been engaged to marry Forsyth but, in the meantime, she’s caught Martin’s attention – which he tries to turn to his advantage by keeping his fever going, after being shot with an arrow, for three days straight – while the Spaniard has Marquand, whom he has saved from certain death, gushing over him) have it out between themselves, though it’s actually a ruse to put a stop to the intended showdown between their respective men. Delon is subsequently tried and convicted (with judge and defense counsel being the victim’s brothers!), but Forsyth contrives to demonstrate how it was all an accident; to cap everything, oil is struck soon after while a grave is being dug for the aristocratic Spaniard!

Curiously enough, just as SKIN GAME (1971) – the comic Western I preceded this with – the film features an incongruous but agreeable lounge score (by DeVol). In conclusion, another Dean Martin Western I own but have yet to watch also hinges on a dynamite star combo i.e. FIVE CARD STUD (1968) with Robert Mitchum – as does, for that matter, ROUGH NIGHT IN JERICHO (1967; with George Peppard) which I might also be able to get my hands on in the not-so-distant future (for the record, I’m not familiar with this one either).

Re: Track the Films You Watch (2008)

Naked Gun, The (1988) David Zucker

The dimwitted Lt. Frank Drebin (Leslie Nielsen) begins to investigate the attempted murder of his partner (O.J. Simpson) and soon gets involved with the attempted murder of the Queen. For my money this is one of the greatest, side splitting comedies ever made and it hasn't lost any of its charm in the twenty-years since it was released. What's so amazing to me is that the movie spits out one gag after another and most movies that attempt this end up having the jokes be hit and miss. I don't think I'm overstating this but to me this movie hits the mark on each joke it tries and that's why this will remain one of the greatest comedies ever made. It's really hard to explain any of the jokes or why they're funny because there's no doubt that they are childish and dumber than dumb itself. Just as you start laughing at one joke before that laugh is over you'll be starting over again on the next one. The jokes are rapid fast and Nielsen handles them with no trouble. His comic timing is perfect for the character and you can't help but feel that Drebin really is that stupid. The supporting characters are all wonderful as they perfectly set up all the jokes for Drebin to bat around. George Kennedy, Priscilla Presley and Ricardo Montalban are all very good and even Simpson comes off quite funny and that's especially true during his opening scene where he gets shot up. What really makes this film is classic to me are its final twenty-minutes, which usually leave me with tears in my eyes from laughing. Being a baseball fan it's priceless seeing Drebin getting involved in a game he clearly knows nothing about.

Naked Gun 2½, The (1991) David Zucker

Lt. Frank Drebin (Leslie Nielsen) is back, this time working in Washington D.C. when he uncovers a plot to kidnap an important scientist so that evil businessmen can push their products onto the American public. This sequel certainly isn't as good as the original film but there are still enough laughs here to make it highly entertaining. The 80's and 90's were full of sequels but what's so amazing about this one is that there isn't a single joke lifted from the previous movie and instead we get a fresh group of jokes. Whereas most sequels were simple remakes of the previous one, this here goes to the limit to create something different. This might be why it took three years for it to come out instead of following the original the next year. Being released a year before an election it's easy to spot all the political jokes with George and Barbara Bush taking quite a few potshots but they are all very funny. The abuse poor Barbara gets from the fists of Drebin are priceless as is the spoof of Ghost and another great sequence where Drebin and Hocken (George Kennedy) visit a sex shop. Once again a lot of the credit must go to Nielsen who owns this character from his speech to his walk. It's really amazing to watch Nielson work through this character that tries so hard yet it never quite ready to understand what's going on. Kennedy, Priscilla Presley and O.J. Simpson are all back and offer up nice support. The screenplay is full of silly situations and dumb dialogue, which makes you laugh and then you end up laughing at yourself for laughing in the first place. The movie might have dumb things in it but it's still very smart at what it's trying to do.

Naked Gun 33 1/3 (1994) Peter Segal

Frank Drebin (Leslie Nielsen) comes out of retirement to go undercover in prison so that he can find out where a mad bomber (Fred Ward) plans to hit next. This third and final film in the trilogy is no doubt the weakest in the series but I think there's enough charm to make it worth viewing even though the laughs are fewer are far between what we're use to. What really brings the film down some is the screenplay, which comes off rather tiresome and weak. Many of the gags just don't work as well as they should and that includes the opening sequence spoofing The Untouchables. The scene looks incredibly well but there just aren't any laughs. The ending, taking place at the Oscars where Drebin causes chaos with people thinking he's Phil Donahue, works pretty well but once again doesn't feature any hilarious gags. Nielsen is his usual funny self here and works well with new bad guy Ward. Ward really has some nice jokes that come off well as does Anna Nicole Smith. George Kennedy, O.J. Simpson and Priscilla Presley return but they're all reduced to rather thankless roles. If you weren't a fan of the first two movies then I'm fairly certain you'll hate this one but I think fans will find this here charming enough for a viewing every once in a while.

Re: Track the Films You Watch (2008)

Have you seen the handful of 'Police Squad!' episodes, Michael? They're just as hilarious, even though you'd recognize almost every joke, as they used practically all of them for the films (principal exception being one brilliant running gag with a shoeshine guy).

Re: Track the Films You Watch (2008)

Pete it's funny but I haven't tried the TV show yet. I watched all of these in the theater as a kid but never knew they were based on a show until many years later. Someone told me that the show was even better and would ruin my love for the movies so I decided to skip them. I might get around to them one day though.


Dark Knight, The (2008) Christopher Nolan

I'll be honest and admit that I'm not much of a fan of the so called "comic book" movies out there. I'll also be honest and admit that I didn't care for the previous series of Batman movies from Burton and Schumacher. Batman Begins on the other hand was a different story as it found it to be incredibly good but a rare occasion as occurred as this sequel is even better. I've always felt that comic book movies didn't contain enough elements of a dark nature nor did they contain very much adult-themed stuff but that's certainly not the case here as this movie contains enough character development and moral questions for three movies. The epic nature of this movie makes it a one of a kind even though I think the 151-minute running time is the only fault in the film. It's rather amazing at how dark this movie is yet movie crowds ate it up but perhaps they ate so much of it up simply because of how dark it is. This film works on so many levels but I think the biggest are its screenplay and actors. The darkness of the story is perfectly brought to the screen by Nolan with his masterful direction, which paints the perfect picture of corruption, greed and moral responsibility. All of the characters from The Joker to Harvey Dent to even Batman must face various moral issues and this type of stuff not only makes for great drama but it brings a lot of depth to this "comic book" movie. The performances are all quite remarkable and that includes the late Heath Ledger as The Joker. Before seeing the film I kept asking myself if his performance could top that of Jack Nicholson but I think that question shouldn't even be asked as both performances are so completely different that you can't compare them. Ledger certainly steals the show and leaves the viewer with goose bumps each time he's on the screen. It really seems as if he just floats through each scene as if he were a ghost roaming around. The walk that Ledger brings to the character is so refreshing and original that I couldn't take my eyes off of him. That wonderful talk and the brilliant line giving just adds to the fun and was it ever great to see such a dark villain. Christian Bale is also once again very good in the role of Bruce Wayne and Batman. Again, the screenplay benefits Bale greatly by having him just as dark as the villains. Aaron Eckhart is getting overshadowed by Ledger but he too really deserves a lot of credit as he probably gives the best performance of anyone dealing with the moral issues. His stint as Dent is perfect for a hero and his turn as Two-Face is perfect for a villain. Maggie Gyllenhaal also does a good job in the love interests role as does Michael Caine, Eric Roberts and Morgan Freeman. Gary Oldman also shines in his role of Gordon. What makes the special effects so great is that the movie isn't in their hand as far as entertainment goes. Yes, the effects and chase sequences look great but they work even better because the screenplay gives us characters to care about. I won't go as far as to call this one of the greatest films ever made but I do think it has to change the way comic book movies are made.

Re: Track the Films You Watch (2008)

I was hoping you and I might be of a like mind on THE DARK KNIGHT, Michael. But I see you're another supporter of "The Most Overrated Film Of All Time"!

Re: Track the Films You Watch (2008)

One question. Since BATMAN BEGINS and THE DARK KNIGHT didn't feature "POW" "BOOM" or "BANG", are you going to see the third one?

Re: Track the Films You Watch (2008)

It's not the dark subject matter of the film(s) that bugged me. In fact, I prefer Batman done that way.

Re: Track the Films You Watch (2008)

Your review made it seem as if you thought it was too dark but perhaps I just read it the wrong way.

Re: Track the Films You Watch (2008)

My review of THE DARK KNIGHT does not read as you're suggesting. BATMAN BEGINS - perhaps. But you're not focusing on the main troubles I have with the two Nolan movies --- not the darker subject matter itself , but more the confusing way the plot is handled, the poorly directed fight scenes, the overlength, the over-reliance on mindless action that tends to get dull after awhile, and technical things like that. Plus that really over-done and grating "tough whisper" that Bale/Batman speaks in. I thought the "darker, brooding Batman with psyche troubles" angle was much better realized in the Burton BATMAN.
But you're making an unfair assumption and a cheap shot when you automatically assume everyone wants the Adam West TV show, or something, if they don't like the Nolan film.

Re: Track the Films You Watch (2008)

That's interesting Joe. I thought people would be turned off by all the character development and the lack of action scenes. I just rented IRON MAN this evening and plan on watching it but it seems a lot of people said SPIDERMAN 2 was the first film to add all the character stuff yet I think it was more action than anything else. At least it certainly wasn't on the same level as the two Nolan films. I could have taken half a star away for the movie running too long but there was just so many great things in it. I was caught up in the story more than anything.

I just re-read your review and I was too strong on the "POW" comments so I'll apologize for that. I did find you talking about all the "greatest film ever made" comments interesting. I agree this isn't the greatest film ever made and I agree it shouldn't be mentioned along side of CITIZEN KANE. It won't even be #1 on my list for 2008 films. I still found it to be great though.

Perhaps I should watch Burton's film again but I found it to be 50/50 on darkness and camp. From my memory that's why I didn't like those films but did somewhat enjoy BATMAN & ROBIN, which was smart enough to be 100% camp. I'd rate all four of these with 2 1/2 star ratings, which certainly isn't bad but I think you'd need to edit all of them together with different bits and pieces to come up with an actual good film.

Did you see the second version of THE PUNISHER? I liked the darkness of that film and I'm even interested in going to see the new version even though it's getting horrible reviews.

Re: Track the Films You Watch (2008)

I didn't see any PUNISHER films, but I did enjoy the character a bit when I read him in some of the older comics.

Going back to the Burton BATMAN... I think that when it first came out in 1989 it was really a revelation, as it was the first time we really saw the character portrayed that grim and dark, with things like the Joker figuring into Bruce Wayne's personal demons, and so on. I would agree that TODAY the Burton film plays more campy than it did back then, especially when you consider Nicholson's Joker alongside Ledger's Joker. But such is what happens when multiple versions of a film get explored, and things are revisited.

Re: Track the Films You Watch (2008)

Classes tous risques - I've caught the videogaming bug lately and not at all in a movie mood. When that happens, there are films so captivating that they can put you back in the mood. And then there's films, like this one, which seem to drag on and on. There's nothing irritating or stupid or awful about it, it's just so unremarkable. A typical story about a tragic French gangster, does nothing to stand out from similar works by Melville, Dassin, Becker. Not a waste of time, but I wouldn't recommend it unless you just can't get enough French noir (or Jean-Paul Belmondo, whose sauve presence as a secondary character is far more compelling than Lino Ventura in the lead). Rating: 7

Re: Track the Films You Watch (2008)

Ed Wood (1994) Tim Burton

Burton's masterpiece is a loving tribute to "B" monster movie maker Edward D. Wood, Jr. played perfectly by Johnny Depp. The film covers Ed's life up to the release of Plan 9 From Outer Space but the true heart of the movie centers on Wood's relationship with a washed up Bela Lugosi (Martin Landau). To me this is perhaps the greatest film about the making of movies because of how it shows the ups and downs even though the majority of Wood's life were full of downs. The movie is about a lot of things and includes many great jabs at Hollywood but the true brilliance of the film is in its relationship between Wood and Lugosi. This here is where the movie really jumps off the screen because the love story between these two struggling men is where the heart is at and it's these scenes that are going to make the movie last for a very long time. The beautiful B&W cinematography also stands out and Burton has no trouble at building up a realistic setting. I know Burton will always be best known for his big budget action pictures but there's no question this here is his greatest work. The amount of time and detail in every shot jumps off the screen for various reasons but one is the performance from Depp. The way Depp brings Wood to life is something incredible to watch as his always joyful personality jumps out at the viewer and grabs ahold of them making him impossible not to love. As great as Depp is though the film still belongs to Landau who rightfully won an Oscar for his role as Bela Lugosi. Having seen nearly every Lugosi film available, I'm still shocked at how well Landau does him to this day. After numerous viewings of this film I still can't believe at how well Landau got his accent as well as certain gestures and moves. Depp and Landau together make for one of the most beloved duos in film history. Sarah Jessica Parker, Patricia Arquette, Jeffrey JOnes, Vincent D'Onofrio, Juliet Landau and Bill Murray all turns in strong supporting performances as well. Mike Starr, as producer Georgie Weiss, also sticks out in a great comedic performance. I can't think of too many film's that contain a bigger heart than this one. Not only showing the love between Wood and Lugosi but also being able to show respect and love for this type of movie. Burton was a big fan of these "B" and "C" movies so it was nice seeing him pay them respect and this really comes true when the premiere of Plan 9 From Outer Space where the cast and director get cheers for what joy they've brought many fans.

Man on Wire (2008) James Marsh

On August 7, 1974 Frenchman Philippe Petit crossed the north and south towers of the World Trade Center eight times. This fascinating documentary plays out like a thriller and a heist movie because Philippe and his gang had to pretty much break into both towers, sneak to the top, avoid security and then set the wire across both towers in order for Philippe to walk. This documentary works on two levels with one being given insight into a genius or at least a man without any fear in him. The second level this works on is a nice tribute to the towers, which are of course no longer with us. Early in the film we see some striking footage, which looks a lot like the clean up after the 9/11 attacks but it turns out to be the early stages of the towers going up. Throughout the film there are plenty of images from the towers, which are certainly great to see considering most of the views we get today. The rest of the documentary is certainly spellbounding as we go along with this man who is trying to fulfill a dream of walking between the two towers. I'm not too fond of heights even though at one point in my life I jumped off a cliff 96-feet in the air into a lake but while watching this movie I couldn't even imagine what must have been going on in Philippe's mind. We here from the man himself throughout the documentary so we know he makes it across without falling to his death but this doesn't take away from the suspense, which there is plenty of. Hearing how two teams had to break into both towers and sneak their way to the top is full of wonderful stories that certainly build up tension as there were plenty of times where they were almost busted. The way everything had to be rehearsed and then executed really makes this film seem like heist movie where we're involved with a group of criminals trying to do their job. The biggest difference, as pointed out by those who took part in this, is that they were doing a crime yet hurting no one.

What About Bob? (1991) Frank Oz

Bill Murray plays the obsessive-compulsive Bob, who finally cracks and ends up following his new psychiatrist (Richard Dreyfuss) on vacation. Once at the vacation resort Bob finds himself getting better by getting closer to Dreyfuss' family but soon the psychiatrist is the one losing his mind. This film often gets overlooked and while it's far from a classic I can't help but find it mildly amusing in its own way due in large part to the two leads. This is certainly Murray's show from start to finish but all of the supporting characters set up the jokes for him but Murray is the one hitting them out of the park. Just take a look at the scene with Murray and the family around the dinner table when Murray keeps making annoying sounds. The viewer might find Murray annoying while doing this but the way the family reacts to him is the reason we see him so loveable. I think just about any actor in Hollywood, past or present, would have turned Bob into an annoying character so the credit has to go to Murray for never crossing a certain line that would turn the viewer off. Instead Murray makes him very loveable and most importantly makes him funny. Dreyfuss never really gets enough credit for his comic timing but he works very well with Murray here and the two make for some great laughs. The movie starts to run out of steam during the final fifteen-minutes and I've never been a fan of the ending but this is a nice entertainment for the family.

How the Grinch Stole Christmas! (1966) Chuck Jones, Ben Washam

Everyone knows the story to this classic animated film so there's no point in retelling it but no be honest there's really not much praise I can add that hasn't already been said countless times. For my money this here is one of the greatest animated films ever made even if it only runs 26-minutes. Next to the monster in Frankenstein and Bride of Frankenstein, this film offers Boris Karloff his most memorable role and I think the majority of the film's charm is because of him. That wonderful voice of his was just made for narration and how he tells the story here is just downright fun, warm and most of all cute. There are countless classic lines here but it's Karloff's deliver that really pushes them. The animation is great as well and I just love the look of the Grinch even though some fans say it isn't close enough to the original book.

Re: Track the Films You Watch (2008)

Twenty-Four Eyes - All I knew about Keisuke Kinoshita before this was that he was part of the ill-fated "Four Horsemen" group (with Kurosawa, Kobayashi and Ichikawa), but I'd never seen any of his work. This was a lovely introduction. A deeply moving nostalgic tear-jerker about a young teacher in an island community and her ongoing relationship with her first class of 12 students. It's quite sentimental, and more than a little bit manipulative ("Auld Lang Syne" can always be counted on to turn on the waterworks), but it's also incredibly effective. The final 10 minutes had so many touching moments that I was reduced to a blubbering wreck. I just eat up this kind of heartwarming, bittersweet stuff. And there's a graceful beauty to the whole thing. Several shots show the characters tiny in a frame dominated by their gorgeous surroundings, not only establishing a sense of community, but also making them part of a larger world. Nor is the film simply a melodrama, but also packs a strong anti-war message. Again, it's not terribly subtle, but Kinoshita makes it work, with the help of lead actress Hideko Takamine (star of some of Naruse's best films). Except for two early scenes that involve a pack of small children bawling their heads off simultaneously (not only annoying, but unconvincing), I really enjoyed this film. Rating: 9


Oasis - This is a misguided film. It's not awful, and it is to some degree thought-provoking, but I can't help questioning the message it's trying to get across. I can handle, with a small amount of effort, a romantic relationship between a woman with cerebral palsy and her would-be rapist (I'm oversimplifying things, but I'm not in the mood to explain). But the real problem here is that I didn't buy that these two people were in love. I feel like someone's trying to pull a fast one on me. We're supposed to be so touched by such an unlikely romance (and so smugly impressed with our own willingness to accept it) that we forget that we haven't had the proper foundation for it. In scenes that are mildly lovely, but also amusingly reminiscent of a "Mr. Show" sketch, we witness the "normal" inner life of Gong-ju. So we know she's not an idiot. This is the guy who not only tried to force himself on her, but also supposedly killed her dad and creepily barged into her apartment after getting out of prison. If we accept her as a normal person who doesn't fall for someone simply because he doesn't treat her like an animal, then she loves him, apparently, out of pure desperation for comfort and companionship. One gets the impression that any fella would do. And why does he fall for her? Because she's an "outsider" like him? Or is it more guilt and pity? Or is he just incapable of not acting on his bizarre impulses? I felt it was because she was less likely to call him out on his irresponsible behavior... he'd love her even more if she were deaf and blind. Whatever the reason, it didn't fly with me. I didn't feel a true connection between them, only one that was convenient for the quirkiness of the story. And another thing: I felt like I was being DARED to like Jong-du. "Look at this guy, he's such a prick... and if you don't love him, then you've fallen for all that HOLLYWOOD BULLSHIT, man! Why don't you go rent a Julia Roberts movie if you can't handle this?" Despite my qualms about all this (and I haven't even touched on the contrived ending, or So-ri Moon's dubious performance), I have to admit it's provocative in a way that's much less obnoxious than provocative films usually are. Rating: 6

Re: Track the Films You Watch (2008)

12/09/08: THE BEASTMASTER (Don Coscarelli, 1982)

I had rented this on VHS as a kid but did catch snippets of the film again on TV while in Hollywood in late 2005/early 2006. It’s one of a handful of sword-and-sorcery titles made around the early 1980s: incidentally, I watched a number of these last Christmas (Arnold Schwarzenegger’s three “Barbarian” efforts, ATOR – THE FIGHTING EAGLE [1982], THE SWORD AND THE SORCERER [1982], etc.) but this is probably the only one that will make it this year. Although I was aware of its availability as a Special Edition DVD from Anchor Bay, I eventually acquired it from ulterior sources but, ironically, my copy sported a compromised aspect ratio which squashed the characters somewhat and no manner of fiddling with the picture settings on both my DVD and TV remote had any effect on remedying the situation!

Anyway, it’s a typical if not exceptional entry in its sub-genre (of which I was clearly fonder upon first viewing) – though possessing stronger visuals (shot by Stanley Kubrick regular John Alcott, no less) than plot or characterization; we also get the obligatory rousing score (courtesy of Lee Holdridge) and which I actually still recalled from the time of my first viewing all those years ago! As always, here we have the heir to a throne (Marc Singer, best-known for the V sci-fi TV series of the mid-1980s and which I now own in its entirety i.e. 3 distinct variants) fighting the usurper (Rip Torn) and helping a besieged people (including love interest Tanya Roberts – from the “Charlie’s Angels” TV series but who’d later graduate to her own mythic character i.e. SHEENA [1984], which I also saw for the first time last January).

As the title suggests, Singer is able to communicate telepathically with animals – so that an eagle, a black tiger and a couple of amiable mongoose are constantly being called upon in his aid. However, weird creatures also abound: Torn’s ugly but oddly sensuous witches (clearly a nod to Shakespeare’s “Macbeth”) – though he’s himself fitted with a hooked nose and wicked eyebrows – as well as a group of imposing eagle worshippers bestowed with cape-like wings behind which they’re able to crush a person to death! Following Torn’s demise – when Singer disrupts a sacrificial rite –
our heroes have to contend with (and naturally triumph over) another invading group: these had earlier exterminated the inhabitants of Singer’s village, including his guardian, and are led by an imposing masked figure (a` la the James Earl Jones from the first Conan movie) but whose identity is, bafflingly, never divulged. In fact, for all the film’s adult-oriented elements (read sexiness – as in the afore-mentioned witches and a gratuitously naked Roberts having a riverside bath), the film mostly comes off as a child-like retread of CONAN THE BARBARIAN (1982)!


12/10/08: THE AMBUSHERS (Henry Levin, 1967)

The third of Dean Martin’s Matt Helm adventures is generally considered to be the worst of the quartet but, while undeniably the silliest (especially in the film’s relentless concession to go-go dancing), it’s still never less than enjoyable; I’d say these goofy spy sagas were basically the rough template for the jokey version of James Bond as depicted throughout Roger Moore’s tenure in that series!

While here we don’t get the hero thinking in song per his usual custom (though Hugo Montenegro’s lounge score is as infectious as ever), all of the character’s other traits are allowed full sway: the constant intake of alcohol, the lethal attraction to women, the dubious gadgets (guns shooting heat rays or causing people to levitate, an inflatable tent complete with comfort accessories, cigars emitting laughing gas, while even the women spies are given the benefit of narcoleptic lipstick and bullet-shooting bra – the latter device has actually reminded me that I’ve yet to check out the Vincent Price sci-fi comedy DR. GOLDFOOT AND THE BIKINI MACHINE [1965]) that I’ve recently acquired.

The two leading ladies themselves are well chosen: Senta Berger (somewhat ill-used, though, as the obligatory duplicitous female – especially since she’s eventually disposed off rather too quickly, and not even by Helm!) and Janice Rule (quite delightful as Martin’s companion but who also gets to play an important role in the mission); besides, as ever, there’s a plethora of other beauties on hand – including Helm’s ubiquitous secretary Lovey Kravezit (Beverly Adams yet again). The villains, too, are notable: Albert Salmi and Kurt Kasznar; as for the action scenes, perhaps the most elaborate is the one inside Kasznar’s brewery…and, of course, a jab at Martin’s fellow Rat Packer Frank Sinatra never goes amiss! For the record, the best line in the film has Berger toasting via the traditional Scandinavian epithet of “Skol”, with Martin’s instant retort being “Sure it's cold – it's got ice in it!”

The plot, for what it is, involves the theft of a flying saucer (though we’re never told just what Salmi intends to do with it and, in fact, is later visited by interested parties bidding for possession of it) which, it transpires, can only be flown by a woman – as the atmosphere inside is fatal to the male of the species (huh?). The comic-strip nature of the film extends to the climax – in which Helm chases the runaway saucer (speeding across a railway track with Rule still inside it) on a motorbike (he even goes underwater on top of it and comes up with an alligator seated in the sidecar!) – which, however, is rather marred by the rampant back-projection involved.


12/10/08: CACTUS JACK (Hal Needham, 1979)

This is just the kind of movie whose existence (both in terms of the premise and the people involved) make even knowledgeable film buffs do a double-take – I know I did when I chanced upon it first in a VHS catalogue in the mid-1980s! For this reason – a live-action version of a Road Runner/Looney Tunes cartoon with Kirk Douglas(!) evoking the hapless but dogged figure of Wile E. Coyote – I’d always been curious about it…even if I had the good sense to not to expect much of the eventual outcome.

That said, while certain gags don’t really translate or else fall miserably flat (not only because they’re already familiar from countless cartoons but the fact that animation has a much more ‘believable flexibility’ as it were), parts of it are definitely amusing (with Douglas, one of Hollywood’s most durable leading men, willing to spoof his own image by undergoing a series of pratfalls throughout). Having the typical desert setting, the makers opted to make this a Western; therefore, it can also be read as yet another (broad) genre lampoon. Of course, it’s not a patch on Mel Brooks’ classic BLAZING SADDLES (1974); incidentally, here we also get a handful of wisecracking Indians (led by Paul Lynde, from the “Beach Party” series, in his last film) a` la TEXAS ACROSS THE RIVER (1966) which, as it happens, I’ve also just watched.

The thin plot involves Douglas being paid by unscrupulous banker Jack Elam (after the former’s disastrous attempt to blow up the latter’s safe!) to thwart heroine Ann-Margret’s journey (who’s just withdrawn a large sum of money) back home. She’s something of a nymphomaniac herself and is being escorted by the foolishly-named Handsome Stranger (played with all the woodenness he can muster by, of all people, Arnold Schwarzenegger!) but who seems totally impervious to her charms; by the way, she is called Charmin’ and dad Strother Martin goes by the unlikely moniker of Parody! Douglas conceives many a cartoonish ruse in the accomplishment of his mission: every single one of these backfires, however (sometimes with the help of his “treacherous” steed itself) – with the intended victims being completely oblivious of the whole thing; the latter’s scenes together are fairly dull but, thankfully, the lion’s share of the running-time is devoted to Douglas’ ill-timed antics!

In fact, the two parties only come face to face twice during the course of the film: first, when Douglas disguises himself as a preacher (his hammy turn here seems to be tapping a typical larger-than-life performance by Jack Palance!) and, then, at the climax where, having finally had enough of Schwarzenegger’s cluelessness, Ann-Margret decides to side with the villain (actually the film’s original American title). This unforeseen turn-of-events sends Douglas leaping over rooftops in an impromptu fit of uncontainable ecstasy, as often seen in Tex Avery cartoons and which easily gets the film’s biggest laugh – though other undeniable chuckles have him slipping high in the air on an empty beer bottle, squashed at the front of a speeding train and knocked about when the platform he’s standing on falls apart in the aforementioned preacher sequence! I told you it plays like a cartoon…


P.S. Incidentally, as part of my Christmas schedule, I should also be re-acquainting myself with two of the same director’s other ‘chase’ comedies – the “Cannonball Run” films, both of which I haven’t watched since the mid-1980s…


12/14/08: THE STORY OF MANKIND (Irwin Allen, 1957)

The opening titles of this historical epic – one of the most notoriously misjudged films in Hollywood history – boast no fewer than 25 stars but, having personally gone through it, I have to say that its reputation is entirely justified! I’d always been interested in it, of course, yet I’d practically given up hope of ever catching the film…and, eventually, I only managed to come across a soft-looking, panned-and-scanned VHS copy with forced Spanish subtitles (which will more than suffice under the circumstances).

Actually, the central premise isn’t half-bad – a tribunal in outer space(!), presided over by Sir Cedric Hardwicke, convenes to determine whether mankind should be allowed to go on living or else let it obliterate itself via the misuse of nuclear weapons! In fact, the opening half-hour or so is fairly decent but, as soon as one realizes that the film will be a constant parade of Hollywood stars stolidly appearing (portraying is hardly the correct term to use here) as famous historical figures – who are subsequently given little of consequence to do – it becomes a depressing, repetitive and altogether rather dull charade!

At least, the main roles of The Spirit Of Man (a suave and gracefully aged Ronald Colman in his last film) and Mr. Scratch aka The Devil (a typically genial turn by Vincent Price) are ideally filled – something which, alas, can’t be said of most of their colleagues: Hardwicke himself merely gets in a few inane phrases between Colman and Price’s rebuttals, but, for good measure, we also have to contend with John Carradine (as a campily-dressed Pharaoh), Peter Lorre (as a thoroughly miserable Nero, which is ironic given that the role had often inspired actors towards hamminess!), Virginia Mayo (unrecognizable as Cleopatra), Hedy Lamarr (an embarrassingly miscast Joan of Arc), Dennis Hopper (as a wimpy Napoleon Bonaparte!) and, surely the weirdest casting choice of all, the Marx Brothers (appearing in their final team effort, albeit separately: Chico barely registers as a monk in the Christopher Columbus episode, Groucho incongruously appearing fully in character, with glasses and wisecracks intact[!], as obscure American Pilgrim Peter Minuit, and Harpo, ditto, as a mute and harp-playing Sir Isaac Newton)!!

The various re-enactments (amidst which Colman and Price are free to roam) display a rampant use of stock footage – thus making the film seem more expensive than it actually is – and naturally end with the present i.e. 1957 crisis; in hindsight, the script’s constant reference to the “Super H-bomb” is amusing and dates the show more than anything else! At a mere 100 minutes, such an ambitious enterprise was doomed from the start and, indeed, it feels too much like a crash-course in World History (intercut with elementary bits of Philosophy). Perhaps, the kindest thing that can be said about THE STORY OF MANKIND is that, for better or worse, it did pave the way for Irwin Allen’s heyday as a producer of star-studded Hollywood blockbusters.

Re: Track the Films You Watch (2008)

12/11/08: ROAD TO UTOPIA (Hal Walker, 1945)

This is possibly the best regarded of the highly popular seven-movie “Road” series of musical comedies teaming Bing Crosby, Bob Hope and Dorothy Lamour (all of which I’ve now watched and own).

It takes the boys to the Klondike (making the film a sort of Western spoof, a number of which I’ve scheduled for this Christmas marathon – and to which feast, by the way, there’s even a visual reference here); they unwittingly take the identities of a couple of murderers and robbers of a map to a gold-mine. The latter is owned by Lamour’s father, and she turns to his old pal Douglas Dumbrille for help in retrieving it – but he obviously has evil intentions (and is flanked by like-minded Hillary Brooke and Jack LaRue).

The series got progressively zanier, sometimes descending into surrealism (including a variety of talking animals!) – with in-jokes galore and even the proverbial breaking of the fourth wall (Hope referring to a mountain as his “bread and butter”, and immediately the trademark Paramount stars appear around it!). This, then, adds yet another layer of hilarity with the presence (albeit rather too brief) of celebrated humorist/actor/scriptwriter Robert Benchley, whose last film this proved to be. Incidentally, the picture was shot in 1943-44 but it release was subsequently delayed for two years – due to a surplus of war-themed efforts the studio still had in the pipeline, as well as Bing’s newly-acquired stature as an Oscar-caliber actor!

Though there are a few too many interruptions (for my taste) to accommodate the musical numbers, the songs in themselves are quite nice – and the film fast-paced fun all the way, with the star trio in excellent form. By the way, this is the one in which Hope shows his toughness by famously ordering the saloon’s bartender to give him “Lemonade…in a dirty glass”!


12/11/08: DR. GOLDFOOT AND THE BIKINI MACHINE (Norman Taurog, 1965)

I had watched this maligned film’s even more notorious sequel, DR. GOLDFOOT AND THE GIRL BOMBS (1966) – a most incongruous assignment for Italian genre stylist Mario Bava! – on late-night TV…so, whatever its quality, I was obviously interested in the original. Unfortunately, the edition I acquired is panned–and-scanned and, just now, I realized that both films, along with the TV special THE WILD WORLD OF DR. GOLDFOOT (1965), are available as a package on DivX! Oh, well…

Vincent Price was a fine actor but, whenever he turned to comedy, the horror icon was known to resort to ham – which he certainly does in this sci-fi comedy, mugging his way through the silly (if not entirely unamusing) proceedings. Of course, he’s the mad scientist of the title – complete with Arabian-style golden shoes – who dispatches a number of female robots to lure wealthy bachelors into marriage so that they can eventually turn their assets over to them/him. Dwayne Hickman is one such target though, when a robot (engagingly played by luscious Susan Hart, who was actually the wife of top AIP executive James H. Nicholson) is sent out to find him, she actually bumps into Frankie Avalon first who, smitten with the girl, is determined to get to know her.

Soon, he and Hickman join forces and land in Dr. Goldfoot’s mansion; the latter is hindered, more often than helped, by an inept assistant but nevertheless manages to imprison Hickman in his dungeon. Frankie’s partner and nemesis (respectively) from his “Beach Party” series of films, Annette Funicello and Harvey Lembeck, unexpectedly turn up here in cameos as an in-joke! – but we also get copious (albeit deliberate) use of footage from Roger Corman’s Edgar Allan Poe adaptation of PIT AND THE PENDULUM (1961), which had starred Price himself. Similarly, the portraits of Dr. Goldfoot’s ancestors bear the looks of the actor in a number of his earlier horror pictures for AIP!

Fred Clark as Avalon’s flustered uncle is typically good value: he’s involved in a running gag which has him being hit by the door of his office and thrown clear across the room every time it’s opened! For the record, the score (and title song) is very much of its time. The film, then, culminates in an elaborate car chase along the sloping streets of San Francisco (three years before the celebrated sequence in BULLITT [1968]) – before heralding an upcoming sequel which was to have been called THE GIRL IN THE GLASS BIKINI; actually, the craze for such cliff-hanging ‘appetizers’ begun by the James Bond films, was also adopted by the Matt Helm spy spoofs and even the “Beach Party” series itself!


12/12/08: COAL BLACK AND THE SEBBEN DWARFS (Robert Clampett, 1943)

This is a notorious Looney Tunes cartoon from celebrated exponent Robert Clampett, one of a handful of ‘outrageous’ efforts from The Golden Age Of Animation which were subsequently banned. Of course, as can be gleaned immediately from its altered title, it’s a modernized all-black retelling of the Snow White fairy-tale with rampant (but not really offensive) racist – and even sexual – attitudes that were prevalent during the wartime era. As ever with the classic Warners style of animation, the short moves at breakneck speed – throwing in a plethora of visual and verbal gags along the way, while being held firmly together by a constant and wholly agreeable jazz soundtrack (complete with half-sung and rhyming dialogue). All in all, however, given its reputation and prolonged suppression, I wouldn’t count it among the best or even funniest shorts that Warners produced under the “Looney Tunes/Merrie Melodies” banner.


12/12/08: CASANOVA’S BIG NIGHT (Norman Z. McLeod, 1954)

One of Bob Hope’s last big-budget studio productions is an elaborate yet rather patchy costumer in Technicolor, with the star only impersonating the famed Venetian lothario (he’s played, briefly, by an uncredited Vincent Price!). The film, in fact, has a truly imposing supporting cast (Joan Fontaine, Basil Rathbone, Hugh Marlowe, John Carradine, John Hoyt, Lon Chaney Jr., Raymond Burr and Paul Cavanaugh among others) which, however, doesn’t really allow any of them to shine – while embarrassing somewhat Fontaine (an unlikely comedienne) and Rathbone (in the equally undignified role of Casanova’s long-suffering valet); for the record, horror icon Chaney appears in a bit as a crazed prisoner.

The plot has tailor’s assistant Hope offering to replace the fleeing and debt-ridden Casanova; he’s subsequently involved in a scheme wherein a lady is to be compromised – and in which the warmongering Doge of Venice (with the aid of advisers Carradine and Burr, who are naturally just as unscrupulous) sees an opportunity to start a war with a neighboring state. The film offers typical routines and lines for the star (he even gets to appear in drag) – which, ultimately, may be its problem as this is clearly a case of ‘we’ve been here once too often’ (even if his most obvious earlier title in this vein, MONSIEUR BEAUCAIRE [1946], I’ve yet to catch in its entirety); having said that, Hope did previously star in a film called THE GREAT LOVER (1949) – which I’ve haven’t seen either – but in it he played a private eye.

Incidentally, the character of Casanova is certainly among the more popular in cinema – a subject attracting to it all kinds of stars (not to mention a bevy of beauties) and film-makers: from Riccardo Freda and Vittorio Gassman to Luigi Comencini and Leonard Whiting, from Federico Fellini and Donald Sutherland to Ettore Scola and Marcello Mastroianni…not to mention Michael Sarrazin (under the direction of “Euro-Cult” stalwart Enzo G. Castellari), Tony Curtis, Richard Chamberlain and all the way down to the recent Lasse Hallstrom-Heath Ledger outing.


12/13/18: THE SEVEN LITTLE FOYS (Melville Shavelson, 1955)

This is underrated as both a Bob Hope vehicle and a musical biopic: even if it follows the basic path of all such films (the struggle to achieve success followed by the pitfalls of celebrity, not forgetting the obligatory romance and the equally inevitable tragedy), it’s very capably mounted – with the script even garnering an Oscar nomination. The star is in very fine form here, balancing characterization with his traditional banter; Milly Vitale is radiant as his wife who bears him seven children and then dies. Since Foy’s only ever known showbiz, he opts to drag them all into his act! Incidentally, one of the kids (Bryan) grew up to be a film-maker himself but was mainly noted as a producer with a penchant for the noir genre!

Even so, THE SEVEN LITTLE FOYS is perhaps best-known for a guest appearance by James Cagney, reprising his Oscar-winning role of George M. Cohan from YANKEE DOODLE DANDY (1942) – where, incidentally, Foy was portrayed by his real life son, Eddie Jr; interestingly, George Tobias played Cohan’s manager in that earlier film and Foy’s here! Anyway, Hope and Cagney’s one scene together – which culminates in a dancing duel/duet – is not merely the picture’s undeniable highlight but pure cinema magic in and of itself where two top movie stars incarnate a couple of great vaudevillians strutting their stuff. As with a handful of other Hope titles I own, the film has unaccountably fallen into the Public Domain despite being a major studio production, but the copy I acquired thankfully maintains remarkably vibrant colors throughout.


12/14/08: THE OSCAR (Russell Rouse, 1966)

This is another all-star film I’d long wanted to watch – with the added attraction of a Hollywood/Oscar backdrop – but which ultimately proved a disappointment…so that it’s small wonder it seems to have fallen through the cracks over the years (in fact, I have had to make do with a panned-and-scanned copy culled from VHS)!

The film is glossy (itself earning Oscar nominations in two categories i.e. art direction/set decoration and costume design), undeniably interesting (though hardly reaping its full potential given the narrative’s regrettable emphasis on characters’ private lives rather than the business side of things) and with entertainingly high-pitched performances (especially star Stephen Boyd) and dialogue. As such, it’s extremely typical of the cynical era from which it emanates (another similar title is Robert Aldrich’s equally hard-to-find THE LEGEND OF LYLAH CLARE [1968]) – but the fact that it deals with matters that the people involved should be familiar with doesn’t prevent a veneer of artifice throughout, not to mention a tendency towards cliché…though, to be fair, the similar but vastly superior THE BAD AND THE BEAUTIFUL (1952) paints an equally melodramatic picture of Hollywood!

Boyd plays an aspiring actor who tramples over everybody, especially those closest to him (Tony Bennett, Jill St. John, Eleanor Parker, Elke Sommer and Milton Berle) in order to achieve his goal and stay at the top. Yet, we never ever see him at work – which is baffling when considering the film’s generous two-hour duration…so that we watch him (in flashback during a make-or-break Oscar ceremony) going from a nobody to a celebrity to a wash-out without really understanding his rags-to-riches-to-rags progression! The supporting cast also includes Ernest Borgnine as a private eye-cum-blackmailer and Joseph Cotten as the disgruntled studio head while a plethora of other stars – such as Ed Begley, Walter Brennan, Broderick Crawford and Peter Lawford – appear in cameos; on the other hand, Edith Head, Bob Hope (typically, he’s the emcee on Oscar night), Merle Oberon and Frank Sinatra (the eventual recipient of the coveted statuette!) make a guest appearance as themselves.

Re: Track the Films You Watch (2008)

I'll be starting next year's thread in the next couple of days for those interested. Perhaps later tonight.


Pony Express Days (1940) B. Reeves Eason

Impressive Technicolor short from Warner features an young George Reeves playing the legendary "Buffalo" Bill Cody. In the film, Cody is turned down as a rider for the Pony Express but soon gets his shot when Indians kill another rider. An important message must get to California about Lincoln being elected President and without this message it could cause the state to pull from the union. Historic accuracies aside, this is a very entertaining little film that makes one wish that shorts still played a part in Hollywood today. Even though Eason directed over one-fifty films, he's probably best known for the stunts in the silent Ben-Hur but he handles the story and action here very well. He does a great job at keeping the film moving fast and the riding scenes are very well done as are the fight sequences. Reeves does a pretty good job in is role delivering a fine performance that allows him to show off his action skills but he also manages a few nice laughs as well.

Policy Girl, The (1934) Roy Mack

Vitaphone short has an insurance salesman begging his sister to introduce him to a radio star so that he can sell her a policy. Roy Mack directed this film without much fire but I can't say this was his style since this was the first film I've seen from him and he did make over a hundred in his career. What we got is basically another attempted comedy that mixes several musical segments but the comedy isn't funny and the songs aren't memorable. The film takes a while to warm up but not once would I say it's entertaining. Mitzi Mayfair, apparently a major Broadway star who couldn't make it in Hollywood, gets top billing but doesn't add anything to the film.

So You Want to Be a Gambler (1948) Richard Bare

Joe McDoakes (George O'Hanlon) short has the dimwitted guy trying his hand at gambling, which leads him to profit $12,000 but of course he can't walk away a winner. This here is one of the better films in the series as we get a better than average story that has plenty of laughs along the way. The story of the down on his luck gambler on his roller coaster day is nicely directed by Bare and the screenplay has a couple nice twists that make for some good laughs. The highlight are the scenes where Joe gets a psychic parrot calling off numbers for him. The early scenes at the pinball table are nicely done and the final gag works well too.

So You Think You're Not Guilty (1950) Richard Bare

One of the better entries in the series has Joe McDoakes (George O'Hanlon) running a traffic light but instead of pleading guilty and paying two dollars, he decides to fight the charges, which just ends up costing him more fines and prison time. There were over sixty of these shorts made and they were certainly hit and miss but this here is one of the better ones. The entire situation is handled very well by director Bare who also wrote the screenplay, which has plenty of nice twists and turns throughout the nine minute running time. There are countless highlight but the best one is a scene where McDoakes is forced to break out of jail, which of course just gets him into more trouble. There's several scenes that perfectly spoof the gangster and courtroom drama films out at the time as well.

So You Want to Be a Detective (1948) Richard Bare

Spoof of countless detective films has Joe McDoakes (George O'Hanlon) working as a P.I. under the fake name of Phillip Snarlow. Soon he gets a case working for a beautiful woman whose father has been murdered. If you're a fan of film noir or just detective films in general then you should find plenty to enjoy here including the lead performance as well as others who just happen to pop up. The film does a very good job at laughing at the genre it's spoofing and that includes a very good shock ending where the killer is revealed in a way that comes off very clever and funny. Lila Leeds would have a very short career in Hollywood but her brief scene as the femme fatale Veronica Vacuum is priceless.

Re: Track the Films You Watch (2008)

Mike,


I've just seen the 2009 thread and was struck by the following entry in your second (masterlist) post:


"Star/Director of the Month

01---Bogart/DeMille
02---Tracy/Kurosawa
03---DeNiro/Scorsese
04---Brando/Hitchcock
05---Nicholson/Hawks
06---Newman/Bergman
07---Wayne/Ford
08---Cagney/Altman
09---Keaton/Chaplin
10---Price/Corman
11---Murray/Kubrick
12---Stewart/Peckinpah"


Am I understanding correctly that you intend to dedicate every month to the above-mentioned director or star?

I didn't want to clutter the first page of the new thread with this interjection so I permitted myself to bring this over here in this year's thread that has been winding down somewhat recently.

Actually, I was thinking of doing something sequential myself for next year -but it was more like dedicating one day in the week to a specific genre on different formats. For example, Monday would be Comedy night and I would watch one on DVD, one on DVD-R and one on DivX or VHS. In that way, I would be going through all formats equally rather than concentrate on one to the detriment of the others like I have been doing for far too long.

Your idea is also a good one and our paths are bound to cross but, unfortunately, some of your choices have been long-time favorites of mine and therefore I am already familiar with most of their filmographies but, at any rate, I should have unwatched stuff by each one of them in my collection somewhere.

Re: Track the Films You Watch (2008)

Mario, I'm going to give it a shot but I'm not sure if I'll pull it off or be very faithful to it. I've seen the majority of the actor's work so that will basically be me going back over films I haven't seen in a while. The director's a a bit different as each have plenty of first time views for me. I'm not sure how close I'll stick to the order but I tried to plan them out with various things in mind.

With Jan. TCM is showing at least 7 Bogart's that I haven't seen. Not to mention some of his bigger stuff like THE BIG SLEEP that I haven't seen in years. I've got a couple DeMille's on my DVR as well as that silent box set, the Universal box and T10C box. For the next month since TCM will be doing their Oscar stuff, I can go back through several Tracy films as well as catch up on my Kurosawa, which I've got a 20+ disc box set from China as well as five movies on my DVR.

Again, I'm not sure how well I'll stick to the list because if Stewart has a TCM Star of the Month in August then I'll bump him up to there. I was going to expand the list to include shorts since I've got dozens of box sets from Arbuckle to Chaplin to Looney to Popeye and so on to go through. Not to mention the Stooges, Our Gang and everything else under the sun. I thought about mixing these with a "Series of the Month" so that I could do a Bond, Chan, Moto, Thin Man and a few others. Play a "shorts of the month" and then follow that up with a series.

We'll see how it goes and I'm sure I'll mess with that list more before then. Things are a tad bit slow now because the majority of the movies I want to see right now are new releases that aren't showing here yet.

P.S., I'm glad to see you finally got and started watching the Universal set. I was curious as to when you were going to crack it open and I look forward to your reviews.

Re: Track the Films You Watch (2008)

12/13/08: THE CANNONBALL RUN (Hal Needham, 1981)

This is one of those films watched during my childhood days which, unfortunately, didn’t now live up to my recollection of it; even if I knew it doesn’t have a good reputation (despite the box-office success which spawned a sequel three years later), I still expected the film to be more entertaining than it proved to be!

The film is said to rip-off THE GUMBALL RALLY (1976), which I haven’t watched; ironically, I had intended to check it out for this Christmas season as well but its DVD is currently unavailable at my local rental outlet. Being only a little over one and a half hours in length, the narrative doesn’t have enough time to adequately accommodate its roster of stars, all of whom seem to be there for the fun of it anyway: a pity, therefore, that this sentiment isn’t always transmitted to the audience! The cast is led by Burt Reynolds (a regular in ex-stuntman/director Needham’s films – having been also the star of the “Smokey And The Bandit” franchise), Dom De Luise (whose character has a superhero alter-ego named Captain Chaos – one of the film’s few inspired touches), Roger Moore (playing a man posing as Roger Moore and with the expected rampant nods to his James Bond image!) and Rat Packers Dean Martin and Sammy Davis Jr. (who spend most of the time disguised as priests)!

Also on hand is Jack Elam (as an eccentric doctor who likes to inject himself with whatever he’s administering to his patients!), Jackie Chan (who manages to demonstrate a bit of his martial arts prowess but his scenes are otherwise among the dullest in the film), Jamie Farr (as an Arab sheik, whose role will eventually be expanded in the sequel), Peter Fonda (as the leader of a biker gang, what else?) and, of course, a number of women including Farrah Fawcett (who naturally hitches up with Reynolds) and Adrienne Barbeau (as one of two female competitors who don’t think twice about using their generous cleavage to get ahead in the race). To be honest, having been a few days since I watched both films anew, their proceedings (and jokes) now seem not only interchangeable but have begun to fade in the memory; I do recall, however, that the race is finally won by the two sexy girls (after Captain Chaos is called upon for help just as he’s about to tread the finishing line)!


12/14/08: CANNONBALL RUN II (Hal Needham, 1984)

As I said in my review of the original 1981 film, this is much of the same – only slightly worse. What we get here is another impressive-looking but grossly underachieving cast list, which now also incorporates Shirley MacLaine (who, taking a cue from Dean Martin and Sammy Davis Jr.’s ruse in the first film, dresses up with her younger companion as a nun but soon ditches the habit and gets it on with star Burt Reynolds: having retained her figure at 50, she’s not afraid to display it and is made to don ultra-short skirts throughout the film’s second half!), Telly Savalas (embarrassing as a flustered gangster), Frank Sinatra (in a cameo as himself that amounted to his farewell to the silver screen: the competitors turn to him when organizer Jamie Farr is kidnapped along with the prize money…after which Ol’ Blue Eyes decides to try his luck at the title as well!), Ricardo Montalban (as Farr’s dad), Doug McClure (as Farr’s long-suffering manservant!), Richard Kiel (“Jaws” from a couple of James Bond titles, appearing incongruously as Jackie Chan’s co-driver – although one does wonder whether they turned to him after Roger Moore declined an encore) and the dubious novelty of having a bad-mannered orang-utan driver (which not only lock lips with Montalban[!] at one point but actually wins the race).

Of course, Dom DeLuise, Dean Martin, Sammy Davis Jr. and Jack Elam (now detailed with Farr rather than Reynolds and DeLuise) also return to the fold – to say nothing of a new couple of sexy women drivers (including “The Dukes Of Hazzard”’s Catherine Bach). Incidentally, DeLuise has a second (or third, if you count Captain Chaos) role as a Mafia don – obviously aping Marlon Brando from THE GODFATHER (1972) – but which supplied the film’s single funniest gag (i.e. the dead cat) and which I still vividly recalled from all those years ago. On the other hand, the low point would definitely have to be seeing Reynolds, DeLuise and Davis dressed up as dancing harem girls (even if Dino’s reaction to that eyesore is admittedly amusing).


12/15/08: WHAT A WAY TO GO! (J. Lee Thompson, 1964)

This is another all-star film I came across in my childhood, albeit of a more vintage and satisfying nature than the two CANNONBALL RUN outings that I’ve watched on the preceding days. It’s a witty black comedy by Betty Comden and Adolph Green – of SINGIN’ IN THE RAIN (1952) fame – which has a woman (Shirley MacLaine) who marries a succession of men, except that these always seem to die soon after achieving the height of success and happiness thus leaving her increasingly wealthy but obviously guilt-ridden!

Wanting to give away the fortune she’s accumulated ($211 million!) over the years, the heroine’s referred to a psychoanalyst (Robert Cummings) who’s willing to hear her life-story. She began in modest surroundings, a poor girl whose parents (including regular Marx Bros. foil Margaret Dumont), proud of her beauty, want her to marry eminent bachelor Dean Martin; however, he’s a heel and she prefers the mild-mannered Dick Van Dyke. Still, the latter soon demonstrates to harbor ideas above his station – thinking himself able to wipe out rival Martin’s business – but, in so doing, he works himself to death! Off to Paris for a breather, she bumps into bohemian artist-cum-taxi driver Paul Newman (in what is arguably his most satisfying comical performance): they’re idyllically happy at first, until he hits upon the idea of creating machines to accelerate the pace of his work but, driving even these to a frenzy, they rebel and crush him to death!

Next comes wealthy but bored industrialist Robert Mitchum: for love of MacLaine, he gives it all up – fatally – for the simple life; this is perhaps the least interesting segment in the film. Widowed and distressed once again, the heroine finds herself at a bar where minor cabaret artist (Gene Kelly, who, naturally, gets to sing and dance) cheers her up: yet, as ever, when the opportunity for celebrity as a movie star comes along – ironically, when he decides to be himself – Kelly grabs it with both hands…with MacLaine already waiting for the inevitable come-uppance (he ends up mobbed by fans at a premiere!). Just as it seems there’s no hope for the heroine (especially since Cummings himself offers to marry her, which shows how much he understood her problems!), Martin suddenly re-appears as a lowly janitor. Having been humbled, he now proves the ideal partner for MacLaine (incidentally, this was the fourth of five films in which the two stars appeared together): they raise a family together and live happily ever after but, even here, the writers taunt us with a prospective new jinx (they strike oil on their Texas farm), but it ultimately proves a false alarm.

WHAT A WAY TO GO! is a lavish Twentieth-Century Fox production – including a plethora of costumes for the female lead (allegedly worth half-a-million dollars alone!) and outlandish sets (especially a bed in the form of a champagne glass during the Mitchum episode!) – which is surprisingly but competently directed by action film expert Thompson (in itself, a testament to his versatility); depicting the progress of the heroine’s accident-prone marriages as a series of amusing movie pastiches was a particularly inspired touch. For the record, MacLaine would soon make a similar episodic comedy (teaming her with another roster of male stars) in WOMAN TIMES SEVEN (1967) for Italian director Vittorio De Sica.


12/16/08: THE WRONG BOX (Bryan Forbes, 1966)

A typical all-star extravaganza of the 1960s (which I had also first caught on Italian TV) based on a novel by Robert Louis Stevenson, this black comedy perhaps aspires to be a zany updating of KIND HEARTS AND CORONETS (1949) as it revolves around the assorted mishaps of various people on the way to gaining the proceeds of a lottery. However, being patchy overall – insufficiently witty and often resorting to heavy-handed comedy which outstays its welcome – it fails to achieve that film’s level of artistic merit (culminating in a fracas at a graveyard, then, it also brings to mind the contemporaneous THE LOVED ONE [1965]); however, we do begin promisingly enough with a number of nice skits wherein the long line of candidates to the fortune is severely diminished (there’s even a gag involving an accident-prone Queen Victoria!).

As for the remarkable cast, it’s led by Ralph Richardson (amusingly bugging everybody with his pomposity – a coachman whispers to himself “God save us!” at Richardson’s hope that they meet again) and John Mills (atypically involved in pratfalls, especially when attempting to do in brother Richardson: the two live next door to each other and, yet, haven’t spoken in 40 years!) as the last survivors of the deadly tontine. Also on hand are Michael Caine (as Mills’ grandson) who shares a rather boring, and unnecessarily flashily-presented, romance with Nanette Newman (Richardson’s ward and director Forbes’ real-life wife), Peter Cook and Dudley Moore (making for a characteristically unscrupulous albeit bumbling duo – incidentally, I should get to their maligned spoof rendition of THE HOUND OF THE BASKERVILLES [1978] presently), Wilfrid Lawson (who’s fun as Mills’ doddering butler) and Thorley Walters (the lawyer charged with handing over the money to the eventual winner). Besides, we also get guest spots by Peter Sellers and Tony Hancock in decidedly ill-advised character turns as eccentric doctor and befuddled Police Inspector respectively. The evocative period detail (courtesy of cinematographer Gerry Turpin and production designer Ray Simm) and John Barry’s lovely score are flawless, however.

For the record, the Spanish(!) DVD edition I acquired is hardly optimal – being not only regrettably panned-and-scanned but even going out-of-synch during the climax…yet it will have to suffice for the moment.


12/16/08: COBRA WOMAN (Robert Siodmak, 1944)

Spurred on by the success of ARABIAN NIGHTS (1942; see my comments below), Universal reteamed its star trio of Jon Hall, Maria Montez and Sabu (but also villainous Edgar Barrier) in a handful of other exotic adventure pictures with this one, directed by German stylist Robert Siodmak, being the best-known. The latter had just scored a success at the same studio with the atmospheric SON OF DRACULA (1943) – where Lon Chaney Jr. had donned the proverbial vampire cape – and he engaged the horror star yet again for COBRA WOMAN as the benign giant protector of the good Montez. The latter adjective is appropriate since the actress has a dual role of twin sisters – the rulers (one rightful, one usurper) of an island where the Cobra is worshipped as a deity!

Jon Hall and Sabu are adventurers who reside in the mainland and, respectively, love and have befriended the good Montez (unaware of her royal lineage). The evil sibling had been tyrannically ruling over her people with a decidedly unwelcome penchant for sacrificing a great number of her subjects to the Cobra god; this springs Chaney into action who (dressed as a blind, pipe-playing beggar) kidnaps the good Montez in order to replace the deadly queen. Hall and Sabu do not waste time in following them to the island where they witness the latest fashion in ‘snake–dancing’! These sequences which are aplently, despite the film’s lean 71-minute duration, are both corny and embarrassing – never more so than when the King Cobra (real for the close-ups and a fake and hilariously overgrown one for the long-shots) is carried in a golden platter to do the honors personally!; the rubber snake shots here are about as bad (perhaps even more so) than the similar ones in Fritz Lang’s latter-day entry into the exotic sub-genre, THE INDIAN TOMB (1959).

The film is extremely handsome to look at and reasonably entertaining while it’s on but, in hindsight, could have been a lot better and thus rather unworthy of both its director and considerable reputation as a camp classic; the late British critic Leslie Halliwell hit the nail squarely on the head, then, with his memorable assessment of it – “A monument of undiluted hokum”!


12/17/08: ARABIAN NIGHTS (John Rawlins, 1942)

I had long wanted to revisit this one since my one and only viewing of it had occurred long ago (back in the mid-1980s) and given that I am partial to Arabian Nights extravaganzas. Frankly, I was very disappointed that Universal decided to issue this one on DVD by itself a couple of years ago instead of releasing a Franchise Collection comprising several of its equally colorful follow-ups from the same studio; in the end, I didn’t pick the disc up but, in view of the problematic copy I eventually ended up with, it would perhaps had been wiser if I did! In fact, when I first acquired it on DivX, there were severe lip-synch problems; this was remedied when I eventually converted it onto DVD-R but then there was intermittent jerkiness to the picture. Furthermore, when I played it on my Pioneer model, the picture froze with a loud buzz…thankfully, this was not repeated when I placed it into my cheaper DVD player and even the jitters were less conspicuous!

Anyway, this movie has a lot to answer for: it was the ideal form of cinematic escapism for WWII picturegoers and reaped big box office returns for Universal which ensured that they went back to the desert of Arabia for many more times thereafter in the next decade or so. Despite the generic title, the film isn’t actually a filmic depiction of one of the classic stories but rather Universal’s own concoction with every known ingredient thrown into the mix for added value: so it is that historical figures (Haroun-Al-Raschid) rub shoulders with mythical ones (Sinbad, Aladdin, Scheherazade) and are subverted or sanitized into the process. Dashing hero Jon Hall plays Haroun-Al-Raschid as a deposed Caliph seeking to regain his throne usurped by his villainous and seemingly love-crazed brother (Leif Ericson); the object of his unrequited affections is Scheherazade – which is actually misspelled in the credits! – played by the iconic “Queen of Technicolor” Maria Montez. Sinbad and Aladdin, then, are incongruously but humorously portrayed as amiable buffoons by familiar character actors John Qualen and Shemp Howard respectively; the latter is always on the point of spinning one of his seafaring yarns yet again before being shut up by his ill-tempered circus employer Billy Gilbert! The third lead role is taken by exotic Indian star Sabu who had already visited this territory in the quintessential Arabian Nights tale (and definitive film), the magnificent Alexander Korda production of THE THIEF OF BAGDAD (1940); what the film under review lacks in comparison to the latter is the omission of wizardry and special effects.

As I said, this formula proved so successful that Universal reunited variations of the star combo several times afterwards – WHITE SAVAGE (1943), ALI BABA AND THE FORTY THIEVES (1944), COBRA WOMAN (1944; see above), GYPSY WILDCAT (1944), SUDAN (1945; also helmed by Rawlins) and TANGIER (1946). Another measure of its being welcome at the time of release is the fact that ARABIAN NIGHTS was nominated for 4 Academy Awards in these categories: art direction-set decoration, cinematography (this was Universal’s first three-strip Technicolor production and, over 60 years later, the colors still leap off the screen), music (Frank Skinner’s score is appropriately rousing) and sound recording. In this context, the choice of John Rawlins as director – best known for the rather weak SHERLOCK HOLMES AND THE VOICE OF TERROR (1942) – was a curious one but, in hindsight, he conducted the proceedings very capably.


12/18/08: A THOUSAND AND ONE NIGHTS (Alfred E. Green, 1945)

Although the Arabian Nights Technicolor fantasies of the 1940s and 1950s were mainly the domain of Universal Studios, the other Hollywood majors understandably jumped on the Oriental band wagon while it was big box-office, and this endearingly modernistic revamp of the mythical tale of Aladdin was Columbia’s contribution to that WWII craze. Having first (and only) read about this one on Leonard Maltin’s Film Guide and never encountering it on Italian TV in my childhood, I leapt at the chance of acquiring it on DivX but, as is becoming increasingly (and frustratingly) regular with this format, there were lip-synch problems which, thankfully, were corrected via conversion to DVD. But, enough of this techno-babble…

Aladdin is played by Columbia’s star Cornel Wilde – he had just been Oscar-nominated for A SONG TO REMEMBER (1945) – who is curiously fourth-billed here; he even gets to sing several times (a talent of his that I had previously been unaware of…if that was indeed his voice on the soundtrack); incidentally, I should be acquiring another somewhat obscure Wilde costumer very soon called STAR OF INDIA (1954) which I intend to watch over the Christmas week. As I said in my introduction (and perhaps to differentiate itself from the rival Universal product), the film-makers also engaged the services of another currently hot commodity in bespectacled comedian Phil Silvers as Aladdin’s pickpocketing sidekick. At first, I balked at his modern-day savvy personality (with in-jokes towards The Lone Ranger, liberal use of hip words like “groovy”, etc.) but was eventually won over by his gauche schtick culminating in his hilarious Frank Sinatra transformation at the film’s very end. Another asset to the film is the delightful (if belated) presence – as a mischievous female genie of the proverbial lamp – of the late (she died earlier this year aged 91!) Evelyn Keyes; naturally, she falls in love with her master Aladdin but, losing him to Princess Adele Jergens, she creates her own clone!

Speaking of the Universal rivality, I was surprised to see Dennis Hoey (best-known as the bumbling Inspector Lestrade of Universal’s ongoing Sherlock Holmes series with Basil Rathbone and Nigel Bruce) in a dual rule as the villain, not to mention Rex Ingram reprising (albeit too briefly) his celebrated giant characterization from THE THIEF OF BAGDAD (1940)! Like its prototype ARABIAN NIGHTS (1942), this film was also looked on favorably by Academy Award voters in the technical categories: art direction-set decoration and special effects (mostly having to do with Silvers being unable to see Keyes and Wilde’s transformation into a dog – another nod, I suppose, to that afore-mentioned Alexander Korda production).


12/19/08: RUGGLES OF RED GAP (Leo McCarey 1935)

British-born but American-naturalized comedian Bob Hope had first followed his classic Western comedy THE PALEFACE (1948) with FANCY PANTS (1950) where he played a stuffy English butler out West; it was pure coincidence, therefore, that I happened to come across the remake of the former – the Don Knotts vehicle THE SHAKIEST GUN IN THE WEST (1968) – and the original of the latter (which is the film under review) for this year’s Christmas season.

RUGGLES OF RED GAP was an oft-filmed novel and this version (perhaps the best-known and undoubtedly the best) was already the third screen treatment. Charles Laughton was clearly on a roll in the early 1930s, with three superlative performances in 1935 alone – the others being his celebrated (and Oscar-nominated) Captain Bligh in MUTINY ON THE BOUNTY and Javert in LES MISERABLES – but I’d venture to say that his Marmaduke Ruggles is the one that ought to have been singled out for the highest praise. His social standing as a butler doesn’t allow him to appear flustered by all the lunacy going on around him and, as a result, his subtle reactions are a sheer joy to behold and a clear testament to the actor’s capabilities and emotional range. In fact, the film’s first 20 minutes or so (set in Paris, France) are a hilarious succession of events that seriously test the age-old values of the unflappable Ruggles (culminating in a memorable drinking sequence that brought tears to my eyes from laughter).

It is ironic that a film which headlines a character named Ruggles should have an actor named Ruggles in a main role but Charlie Ruggles manages to defeat that challenge and emerge almost as shiny as Laughton himself; he plays a hen-pecked American tourist (as usual, he’s married to bossy Mary Boland who wins Ruggles in a bet with his reckless master Roland Young) and proceeds to take him to his hometown of Red Gap, Washington, U.S.A. Charlie’s persistence in treating Ruggles as his equal and call him “Colonel” gives his compatriots the mistaken notion that Laughton was a high-ranking British officer and, consequently, they start regarding him as a local celebrity. However, his ruse slowly starts to unravel when he meets up with klutzy cook Zasu Pitts and starts giving her pointers on spicing up her meat sauce…

Although the film eventually loses some of that initial frenzied momentum, it is never less than enjoyable and, occasionally, even moving: at one point, Laughton lets his real cultured self show through in front of his feather-brained American bar-room cronies when murmuring Abraham Lincoln’s famous address at Gettysburg – according to Edward Dmytryk (who worked as an editor on the picture), ultra-sensitive Laughton got so emotional in speaking those lines (and which subsequently became favorites of his) that it took director Leo McCarey one-and-a-half days to shoot the scene! Also, according to Laughton’s wife Elsa Lanchester, the subject was clearly close to his heart as it was he who brought to Paramount’s attention and picked McCarey to direct the film, whose sole Oscar nod would be for the Best Picture of the Year (although Laughton did eventually win the New York Film Critics Circle award for Best Actor).


P.S. This was yet another case of DivX foul-up for me as the copy I initially got kept pixelating and freezing before the DVD conversion conveniently resolved the issues satisfactorily.


12/19/08: KISMET (William Dieterle, 1944)

More Arabian Nights stuff, this time emanating from the studio where the lion roared: according to the Internet Movie Database, there are twenty (count ’em) films that go by the name of KISMET and, although the Vincente Minnelli-Howard Keel musical version is the best-known of the lot, this earlier straight adaptation starring Ronald Colman and Marlene Dietrich is perhaps the best-regarded. For the record, I do have the former on VHS but won’t have time to catch it just now and, of all the rest, I’m mostly interested in the 1930 German version (there was another one made in Hollywood the same year) which, like the film under review, was directed by William Dieterle! Speaking of which, I don’t quite understand the reasoning of Warner Brothers (who have inherited DVD distribution rights to the MGM film library) behind recently releasing the 1955 version on this format on its own (so to speak, since it actually forms part of a Musical Collection) rather than coupled with the earlier version.

Aged 53, Ronald Colman still cuts a strikingly handsome figure (even when dressed as a beggar) and his silvery hairline is amusingly obscured by the most unseemly of turbans for all but one scene in the film’s latter stages. Equally splendid-looking is his 43-year old German co-star who, in the film’s most celebrated sequence that was, ironically, later cut for TV screenings because of its ‘erotic’ content(!), has her legs painted in gold for a veiled dance number before the court of evil Grand Vizier Edward Arnold and Colman (who dubs himself the King of Beggars by day but moonlights as a sovereign of a far-away land). Given the maturing age of the two leads, it’s no wonder that two younger actors were recruited in the persons of James Craig (as the Caliph of Bagdad who likes to go incognito through the streets of his kingdom as a gardener’s son) and the late Joy Page (Colman’s secreted daughter); she had made a memorable screen debut in CASABLANCA (1942) and died earlier this year aged 83.

The cast is rounded up by Florence Bates (as Colman’s nagging in-law), Harry Davenport (as Craig’s wily advisor) and Hugh Herbert (as one of Colman’s would-be comic-relief sidekicks). As was to be expected from Hollywood’s premier studio, no expense was spared in bringing this opulent costumer to the screen – including shooting in eye-filling Technicolor amidst impressively-constructed sets – and this effort was rewarded by garnering the film four Academy Award nominations in that year’s ceremony…although, as had been the case (and would be again) with similar Oriental ventures, the nominees all went home empty-handed!


12/19/08: THE BLACK TULIP (Christian-Jaque, 1964)

A lesser-known literary creation of Alexandre Dumas Snr. was this Zorro-type masked avenger at the time of the French Revolution who, unlike the contemporaneous The Scarlet Pimpernel, was on the side of the Revolutionaries despite being truly an aristocrat himself! I’ve never read the source novel myself but, in any case, I’m familiar with the character via a fondly-remembered Japanese animated series that I used to watch on Italian TV as a kid (where the titular hero was actually a girl!). Having said that, it seems that much of the narrative has also been changed for this handsomely-mounted, energetic but disappointingly bland cinematic adaptation.

Alain Delon – who, ironically, would go on to portray Zorro himself in an equally medium-grade Italian production in 1975 – plays a dual role here as the jaded aristocrat who dons the black costume and as his naïve, younger brother who is forced to keep up the ruse when the latter is facially scarred during a swordfight with his nemesis (Adolfo Marsillach). No self-respecting swashbuckling hero goes by without a gushing female pining for him and, appropriately enough, we get two here in Virna Lisi and Dawn Addams – one for each Delon persona! The fomer ditches her own imminent marriage when she meets cute with the shier Delon and the latter gets it on with the older Delon practically in front of her ageing aristocrat husband, Akim Tamiroff.

Re: Track the Films You Watch (2008)

This caught my eye, Mario... because you know I'm basically a "horror guy", yet when I was a kid I caught WHAT A WAY TO GO! and WOMAN TIMES SEVEN on TV late at night. Back then at that age I recall a scene with MacLaine jumping up and down on a bed, and I thought that was sexy. Just something that crossed my mind when I read your comments.

Re: Track the Films You Watch (2008)

The Third Man (rewatch, Blu-Ray) - Just revisiting this classic in hi-def. I'm really sick right now, so I've got nothing else to say. Rating: 9


American Gangster - Somewhat muddled pacing (I watched the theatrical version, not the director's cut) and not terribly original, but an entertaining watch. It feels a bit like Ridley Scott is doing his best Scorsese impersonation. Denzel Washington's presence is compelling and charismatic as always, while Russell Crowe is as bland and boring as ever. Rating: 7


Bottle Rocket (rewatch, Blu-Ray) - You can see the Wes Anderson tics emerging... the slo-mo, the Futura font, the British Invasion soundtrack, the lovable man-children characters, the Salingerisms. But it's much less mannered than his later films. This works both for and against it. It's kind of nice to be able to watch without being so aware that it's a "Wes Anderson film". But you also realize that it's those mannerisms that often make his work so endearing, especially the elaborate attention to set dressing and the wistful melancholy that isn't felt as strongly here. Still, it contains some of Anderson's funniest moments and Owen Wilson's portrayal of Dignan makes for an incredibly memorable character. Rating: 8

Also on the disc is Bottle Rocket, the original short film. Not much to say about it, it's mostly scenes that ended up in the first act of the film. Rating: 7

Re: Track the Films You Watch (2008)

Bargain Madness (1951) Dave O'Brien

Pete Smith Specialty has a woman leaving home early to get in on some bargains but her trouble starts as soon as she walks out the door and doesn't get any better when she gets to the store. This is a mildly entertaining Smith short that probably works just as good today as it did in 1951 since you can't help but think of Black Friday sales while watching this. With that in mind, some of the comedy bits with people getting trampled don't really make you laugh but there are still a few good moments. A lot of the humor comes from an overweight woman who is constantly trying to fit into clothes that are way too small for her.

Slumdog Millionaire (2008) Danny Boyle, Loveleen Tandan

The incredible story of Jamal Malik (Dev Patel) who grows up in the slums but gets a chance on India's version of 'Who Wants to Be a Millionaire'. The only catch is that he isn't doing it for the money and his answers come from his own life experiences while searching for his one true love (Freida Pinto). I really wasn't sure what to expect walking into this film but it grabs you from the very first shot and not once lets go and in the end this turned out to be one of the most impressive films I've seen in many, many years. Perhaps if I thought a tad bit longer a title would come to my mind but as I'm sitting here writing this I really can't think of another film quite like this one. The movie works brilliantly as a love story. It works brilliantly as pure drama. It works brilliantly as a heart-pounding thriller. This film is so many things that it's really incredible that director Danny Boyle was able to handle all of it and deliver one of the most heartbreaking yet rewarding film in many years. The movie is told in an extremely fast paced and it's visually very stunning. The brilliant editing mixed with the cinematography and visionary music score makes for an amazing assault on our senses but it mixes so well with the love story that you can't help but feel everything that the hero is going through. What I loved most is that Boyle and screenwriter Simon Beaufoy could have played it safe and delivered a PG-13 love story but instead they wanted to show the viewer what the slums of India are like. We get a couple extremely violent scenes that are rather shocking and we get to see what poverty is like in this country. The way the children are abused might make some think twice when seeing them on the streets over there. The screenplay captures every note correctly in telling this story and Boyle's wonderful direction really brings it home nicely. Patel and Pinto do a masterful job in their performances as does Madhur Mittal who plays Jamal's older brother. The three of them work so incredibly well together that their performances help sell the story. The three of them are played by two sets of younger actors earlier in the film and these kids also deliver very strong performances. What's really amazing is that it seems the filmmaker's goals were met early on in the film yet they just kept climbing and climbing until they've reached something bigger. I'm still early on in my quest to watch the best reviewed movies of 2008 but I will be shocked if I come across a better film than this one.

Re: Track the Films You Watch (2008)

Tough Winter, A (1930) Robert F. McGowan

Our Gang short has Stepin Fetchit playing a handyman who hangs out with the gang while they try to make taffy on a wintery day. This is a pretty poor short without much of anything going for it. There are pretty much two stories going on with the first half dealing with Fetchit while the second deals with the gang making a mess with the taffy. Neither one works and I can only recall one time laughing and that's a scene where Mary Ann gets taffy on her after it blows up. I was somewhat surprised to see how much screentime Fetchit got and his brand a humor is certainly not going to work on everyone in this day and age. I don't mind his performance but it just didn't make me laugh here. The kids too are also quite tame but you can't blame them as there really isn't any evidence that the screenplay was trying to be funny.

Pups is Pups (1930) Robert F. McGowan

Our Gang short has Farina telling the others about a pet show taking place in town so the kid's get all their animals together so that they can win some money. What they don't realize is that this is a pet show for fancy ones and not their pets, which includes mice, frogs and wild puppies. I'd be lying if I said this short had me laughing from start to finish because it didn't. What the short did do is work well with its nice screenplay, which makes for some cute moments. The highlight of the film would have to be Wheezer and his puppies, which he is constantly playing with at the start of the film. Just seeing Wheezer smile as big as the moon will put a smile on your face because it's obvious the young actor is having a great time with the dogs. Chubby also gets a few nice moments as do the rest of the animals who eventually terrorize the clean cut women at the show.

Teacher's Pet (1930) Robert F. McGowan

Miss Crabtree (June Marlowe) is the new teacher at the school where the gang goes and they plan on making her first day miserable but she has her own plan to get the group's affection. This here is certainly one of the better shorts in the Our Gang series up to this point. The majority of the charm has to go to Marlowe in her first appearance as Miss Crabtree. She has a few spots where her line reading isn't very good but she's attractive enough and charming enough to keep a smile on your face. Jackie Cooper is also very good in his role as the one who has a crush on her but is too embarrassed to say anything. Chubby and Dorothy get a very good sequence where she's constantly dubbing what he says and Wheezer is on hand for one of the highlights in the film. There's plenty of nice laughs throughout this short as well as some nice usage of the sound effects.

School's Out (1930) Robert F. McGowan

Our Gang short plays out like a sequel to Teacher's Pet. When a man comes to the school asking about Miss Crabtree, the gang fears it's a man wanting to marry her and take her away. To try and make him change his mind they start telling lies about her but what they don't know is that this man is actually her brother. This is a pretty good short but it's certainly not as good as the previous film as there aren't as many laughs here. The highlight is a wonderful sequence where Miss Crabtree gives the class a history quiz but they keep giving dumb answers after buying them from a classmate. All of the group get some nice stuff with Jackie Cooper once again taking most of the good stuff. There is a rather off color remake made towards Farina that doesn't play too well today but overall this is a pleasant film. The joke about Lon Chaney and one of his famous movies is well done as well.

Helping Grandma (1931) Robert F. McGowan

Our Gang short has the group helping out their adopted grandma who runs a small store. A group of chain stores might be willing to give her a good price for the property but a bad man is also there trying to rip her off. This isn't the best short from the gang but it's not the worst either. The movie doesn't contain too many laughs until the very end of the film but the final five minutes make it worth watching. I was surprised to see how well director McGowan handled the suspense as grandma comes closer and closer to signing a bad deal. McGowan edits back and forth to grandma and the good guys racing to get there and does a very good job with it. The highlight sees grandma punching a guy's lights out, which is always fun to see.

Love Business (1931) Robert F. McGowan

Our Gang short has Jackie's crush on Miss Crabtree (June Marlowe) growing and growing but things take a turn for the good when she rents a room in his parent's house. The good vibes quickly go away when he learns that Chubby plans on asking her to marry him. This is another winner in the early part of the series and once again a lot of its charm comes from Marlowe. While I wouldn't say she gives a good performance I do this she's awfully cute in her role and manages to be quite charming as the teacher all the kids have a crush on. There are many funny moments in the film including one around the dunner table where moth balls have fallen into the soup. Another funny scene, and the highlight, happens when Chubby comes calling with flowers and candy. Matthew 'Stymie' Beard steals the film in his few scenes.

Little Daddy (1931) Robert F. McGowan

Farina is taking care of his younger brother Stymie when it's learned that he must go to an orphanage. This doesn't sit well with the gang who plan on fighting off the man when he comes to take their friend. Reading up on this short I learned that it was originally banned from television due to some people, including the NAACP, protesting how blacks were shown and I must admit that I'm downright shocked that they'd take that stance as I've never seen a film from this era that showed as much respect to blacks. I know this series was rather mean to Farina in earlier films but this one here is so sweet and caring that it's just shocking anyone would take offense to it but then again I doubt those protesters even bothered watching it. The first fifteen-minutes actually play out as a drama even though there's a hilarious scene about Noah, which Stymie can't understand. Chubby and Jackie get some funny lines but the entire film belongs to Farina and Stymie, which is pretty rare for two black actors to get all the screen time in a white comedy. June Marlowe appears at the very end.

Bargain Day (1931) Robert F. McGowan

Our Gang short has Stymie and Wheezer playing door-to-door salesmen who aren't very good at selling anything. They eventually end up at the house of a rich but lonely girl and sure enough trouble follows when the rest of the gang shows up. This here is a pretty weak short in the series as the screenplay doesn't contain any funny moments and for the most part you can't help but feel this thing is rather desperate. For starters, the desperation really comes through because there are countless scenes that feature nothing but Stymie or Wheezer smiling at the camera. This is certainly cute the first time but I lost count of how many times they tried this and it eventually got old since they didn't add any laughs with it. The stuff with Stymie and the monkey is rather unfunny as is Wheezer's attempts to sell stuff. The only funny bit happens at the very start of the film when Chubby keeps trying on different hats.

Fly My Kite (1931) Robert F. McGowan

This Our Gang short doesn't have too many laughs but there's still a fairly nice story. The gang's favorite grandmother is getting taken advantage of by her evil stepson. He kicks her out of the house she's staying but soon tries to steal some bonds from her, which are worth a lot of money. Again, I really didn't laugh a single time during this short but I enjoyed the story enough to make it worth sitting through and the cast were all pretty good. Margaret Mann is pretty good as the grandmother and Mae Busch, of Laurel and Hardy fame, is nice in her one scene. Chubby, Stymie and Wheezer are all cute enough in the film even though they don't get too many comic moments. The film ends with the gang tracking down the stepson and throwing rocks at him, which was mildly entertaining.

Big Ears (1931) Robert F. McGowan

Incredibly distasteful Our Gang short has Wheezer overhearing his parents fighting and saying they're getting a divorce so he decides to make himself sick so that they'll stay together. This is a rather ugly film for several reasons including the subject matter of divorce but the film gets even uglier as we get a few racial slurs to the black kid Stymie and an even uglier scene where Wheezer is in bed with a tummy ache only to have the thread of various medicines being fed to him. Even with all the ugliness surrounding the film there are still a few funny moments but most of these are during the first half of the film. These scenes have Wheezer trying to get his parents to stop fighting by talking to each one separately and then bringing them together. Bobby Hutchins, the kid who plays Wheezer, does a great job in the adult subject matter.

Re: Track the Films You Watch (2008)

12/17/08: THE TWELVE CHAIRS (Mel Brooks, 1970)

I had first watched this as a kid on Italian TV and it must have seemed very different to me than the typical Mel Brooks film (after all, THE TWELVE CHAIRS was only his second outing) but, back then, I wasn’t familiar with THE PRODUCERS (1968) either; it was with his next effort, BLAZING SADDLES (1974), that Brooks really found a congenial formula, i.e. parody, which would occupy most of his subsequent career.

This was adapted from a popular Russian source much filmed over the years all over the world: in Britain as KEEP YOUR SEATS, PLEASE (1937), with George Formby (which I have just acquired but, alas, don’t have time to watch at present), in the Hollywood as IT’S IN THE BAG (1945), co-starring Jack Benny, the international production 12+1 (1969) featuring the last appearance of the ill-fated Sharon Tate and a starry cast (Vittorio Gassman, Orson Welles, Terry-Thomas, etc.) and there’s even a Cuban version from 1962 by Tomas Gutierrez Alea (which has recently been released on R2 DVD but which I have yet to acquire).

Brooks’ version, then, is the only one I know of to utilize the original Russian setting which, in spite of generally amusing (if overly familiar) situations, rather makes for a dreary-looking film. For the most part, too, the show’s more glum than fun – with pratfalls uncomfortably rubbing shoulders with (misplaced) social conscience! In any case, Ron Moody (fresh from the success of OLIVER! [1968]) is ideally cast as an impoverished aristocrat in search of the family fortune sown into one of twelve chairs which have been sold to various parties following the 1917 uprisings. His co-stars are a dashing Frank Langella (who, incidentally, I watched performing on a London stage in January 2007 and might well be up for an Academy Award next February in Ron Howard’s film adaptation of that very play I saw him in, i.e. FROST/NIXON) as a wily schemer, who plays it straight but is equally effective, and Dom DeLuise as the greedy priest to whom Moody’s relative has confessed before expiring; I suppose that his hysterical shtick and zany antics seemed funny at the time but it’s rather overbearing to watch nowadays. Last but not least, Brooks himself cameos (he’d appear in all of his own films from then on) as Moody’s loyal but befuddled servant.


12/17/08: HIS MAJESTY O’KEEFE (Byron Haskin, 1954)

The last of Burt Lancaster’s adventurous star vehicles is easily the weakest: bland, dreary and unmemorable yet contriving to be a colorful and pleasant diversion nevertheless; apparently, he plays an actual larger-than-life adventurer who became the ruler of a Fijian island. Andre` Morell and Abraham Sofaer round up a rather unremarkable cast as a German trading agent and the native (and benign for once) witch doctor.

The film has an excessive quota of local color via a succession of tedious native ceremonies but only a handful of the expected action sequences – although, what little there is, is adequately enough staged (including a hand-to-hand combat between Lancaster and a rebellious native chieftain who eventually comes to accept O’Keefe as his sovereign). An unusual element to the narrative which is, however, never brought to fruition is the native’s reverence for a local stone they call “Fei”. Needless to say, the strapping (and frequently bare-chested) Lancaster turns the girls’ heads wherever he goes – in particular that of an Afro-sporting native girl and his future wife, Asian Joan Rice.

The film was released on DVD by Warners as part of a rather undistinguished “Burt Lancaster Signature Collection” but I still intend to get my hands on the rest of them in the future; for the record, I already have the best of this bunch i.e. Jacques Tourneur’s THE FLAME AND THE ARROW (1950).


12/17/08: BELLE OF THE NINETIES (Leo McCarey 1934)

Mae West’s first vehicle following the enforcement of the Production Code emerges as a lesser comedy, despite the involvement of the renowned McCarey (who directed many a star comedian around this time, including various Laurel & Hardy shorts, Eddie Cantor, The Marx Bros., W.C. Fields and Harold Lloyd).

As ever, West wrote the script herself: having gone through the titles included in the R1 DVD collection not too long ago, this film can be seen to have adhered strictly to formula – so that, in spite of offering nothing new (all the men, be they naïve or unscrupulous, invariably throw themselves at the star’s feet who, of course, plays a notorious chanteuse), the undercasting of the chief supporting players and the severely reduced trademark double entendres, it still gets by on the consummate professionalism on display (conveyed in Paramount’s recognizable in-house style). Among the highlights here are a marathon boxing match, a typically soulful number by the underprivileged black community and the fiery climax.

The film’s brief 70-minute running-time (in PAL mode) and unassuming plotline makes this ideal for late-night viewing; however, such rampant streamlining also leads to an overly abrupt denouement in which events are neatly tied up via a montage of newspaper clippings!


12/20/08: LADY OSCAR (Jacques Demy, 1979)

As had been the case with Christian-Jaque’s THE BLACK TULIP (1964), this is another French swashbuckler whom I first became aware of via the Japanese animated series I used to catch on Italian TV as a kid (although I wasn’t as avid a follower of this one as I had been of the former). Conversely, the film version of LADY OSCAR proved to be more satisfying than that of THE BLACK TULIP, which is surprising given that the former is a maligned film within its distinguished director’s canon. Having said that, along with his modernistic remake of Jean Cocteau’s OPRHEE` (1950) entitled PARKING (1985), LADY OSCAR had always been the one title I was most eager to catch from Demy’s lean and near-invisible post-1973 period. It is ironic therefore that I have managed that feat before having acquainted myself with Demy’s best-known and finest achievements of the early 1960s – which is all the more remarkable when one considers that LADY OSCAR was a bastard international production: a Franco-Japanese joint venture shot in English with a cast of equally mixed nationalities and whose tangled worldwide distribution rights have made it impossible for even the British Film Institute to secure a screening in their renowned National Film Theatre in London for a ‘complete’ Jacques Demy retrospective in November 2007! Therefore, all the more power to Yamato Video, the Italian DVD production company who specializes in releasing vintage Japanese anime series (that were all the rage on Italian TV as I was growing up in the 1980s and early 1990s) for succeeding where others have failed; a gallery of trailers from their catalogue is available as a supplement on the LADY OSCAR disc and watching it was “a blast from the past” for me as the saying goes!

Anyhow, back to the film at hand: the fairy-tale qualities of the historical narrative are ideal hunting grounds for Demy, who had already brought DONKEY SKIN (1970) and THE PIED PIPER (1972) to the screen – although, in this case, he drew inspiration from a Japanese comic strip rather than a local legend (albeit set in his native land). Needless to say, the film is a feast for the eyes when it comes to sets (some of the exteriors were actually shot on the Versailles Palace grounds) and costumes but, even if the work of Demy here seems not be counted among his finest achievements, a couple of elegantly sweeping camera movements (the clandestine meeting in the abandoned chateau between Queen Marie Antoinette and her Swedish lover) and well-mounted sequences (the vigorous fist-fight in the tavern) are certainly noteworthy; the same applies to the musical contribution of Demy’s regular composer Michel Legrand. If there are distinct flaws, it’s that the film moves at rather too deliberate a pace (with a running time of just over two hours) and has a needlessly unhappy ending.

In spite of the title, the narrative incorporates three parallel storylines that give a more sweeping picture of the tumultuous times it depicts (starting out in 1755 with the birth of Oscar and culminating in the storming of the Bastille that led directly to the French Revolution of 1789): Oscar’s father had long wanted a male heir to follow him into his military career and when his wife dies in giving birth to yet another female, he determines to make a man of his newborn child regardless; while Oscar is eventually recruited as personal guard to Marie Antoinette, we follow the amorous exploits of the latter as well as the rise of one female peasant into aristocracy through devious schemes and callous behavior to her true peers (perhaps in emulation of the notorious Madame Dubarry whose name is mentioned at one point). In view of its origins as light-hearted kiddie fare, there is a surprisingly subversive undercurrent of sexual ambiguity in Oscar’s imposed masculinity (and the fact that this starts a cross-dressing fad among the upper classes), the repressed feelings for her shown by the stable boy she grew up with, the full-blown kiss on the lips Oscar gives during her own supposed engagement party to a giggling young lady she’s dancing with, etc.

Catriona MacColl looks just ravishing in the title role, both when dressed in her military outfit and also when she occasionally gives in to her womanhood (including a brief topless bit); this was her first film and arguably her best role since only another appearance for Demy and three in Lucio Fulci horror films – including CITY OF THE LIVING DEAD (1980) for which she even recorded an exclusive audio commentary for its R2 DVD! – really stick out from the rest of her filmography. Another beguiling presence in the film is undoubtedly that of Christine Bohm who plays Marie Antoinette; unlike MacColl (despite their being the same age), LADY OSCAR proved to be her last film as she tragically died at 25 in an accident that same year. As for the male cast, the most prominent are Barry Stokes (as Oscar’s stable boy companion and true love) and Martin Potter (as her jaded, titled but short-lived fiancé); incidentally, while they both had their artistic triumphs for major directors – in Juan Antonio Bardem’s THE CORRUPTION OF CHRIS MILLER (1973) and Federico Fellini’s FELLINI - SATYRICON (1969) – they each also worked for cultish British exploitation film-maker Norman J. Warren in, respectively, PREY (1978) and SATAN’S SLAVE (1976)!!


P.S. My amiably lazy feline pet goes by the name of “Lady Oscar”: I had originally dubbed it Oskar – in tribute to one of my favorite foreign films THE TIN DRUM (1979) because, like its protagonist, my cat seems to have stopped growing of its own accord (while that of my aunt, which is of a similar breed and only a year or so older, has become quite huge!); my mother, unaware of this connection, insists on calling her “Lady” because, first of all, it’s a female and, frankly, really does act royally and has the genuine impression that we’re there to wait on it!!

Re: Track the Films You Watch (2008)

Daughters of Darkness - Like the other Kumel films I've seen, this is another horror/mystery, although closer to straight horror. It's less surreal than the others, and although I wouldn't say it's a "typical" sexy vampire flick, it didn't really impress me with its originality either. I enjoyed the complex gender politics (and jeez, the most phallic window handle I've ever seen), Delphine Seyrig's performance and the general aesthetics (cinematography, music, atmosphere). But overall it kinda lacked that eccentric Kumel charm and was a little too schlocky for my tastes. Rating: 7

Re: Track the Films You Watch (2008)

Good Morning, Eve! (1934) Roy Mack

This Warner short is best known for being the second three-strip Technicolor film in history. It has Adam (Leon Errol) and Eve (June MacCloy) eating the forbidden apple and then taking a walk through history where they do a dance and music number with Nero in Rome and King Arthur in England. The main reason to watch this movie is for its beautiful Technicolor, which looks downright amazing. Just take a look at all the leaves covering Adam and Eve's bodies as the green nature of them just leaps off the screen and punches the viewer in the eyes. The colors are so extremely well here that I'd say this might be the best looking color film of the decade. The music numbers are fairly good and overall the film is charming but another big key is the pre-code elements. Seeing Eve in her fig leaves hardly covering any of her body certainly stands out. The mechanical snake in the garden was pretty funny as well.

Vicky Cristina Barcelona (2008) Woody Allen

Girlfriends Vicky (Rebecca Hall) and Cristina (Scarlett Johansson) are on vacation in Barcelona when a painter named Juan (Javier Bardem) invites them to travel with him. Both women end up going and falling for Juan but their paths towards him are a lot different. Things take yet another turn when Vicky gets married and Juan's ex-wife (Penelope Cruz) enters his life again. I guess it's not really fair to say I'm a tad bit disappointed considering I liked the film yet I was really hoping for more even though what's here is pretty entertaining. I get the negative stuff out of the way first and for me it was the final thirty-minutes of the movie. The way Allen kept going back and forth between the two storylines wasn't all that interesting to me and I even think Vicky's character wasn't all that well written in the second half of the film. That's really a shame because Hall is very good in her role as are the rest of the cast but it's Bardem who really steals the movie. I really loved his performance here with that Romeo like charm that he pushes on all three of the women in his life. I think he perfectly captures that sexuality he is constantly giving off but it works because of his charm as well. Johansson is making a name for herself in Allen's movies and he's once again written a very good role for her and the actress delivers. Cruz is only in the film for a handful of scenes but she's really, really good here and works excellently with Bardem. As with the recent trend in Allen's films, this one here benefits from the beautiful Spanish landscape, which certainly sets the mood for the film. Allen's choice for a music is a good one and the cinematography is nice as well. While this is an entertaining film I wouldn't call it one of the director's best.

Iron Man (2008) Jon Favreau

Industrialist Tony Stark (Robert Downey, Jr.) is forced to build an armored suit in order to escape from a group of terrorists but after reaching safety he decides to use technology to help people. I never was a comic book movie guy but my opinion on them has changed over the past couple years since directors and screenwriters decided to throw some brains into the film. Here's another fine example of a film that has something to say and doesn't just resort to non-stop action and slapstick violence. The movie is extremely well made, wonderfully acted and contains some great special effects and that makes it one of the better films of its type. I think the key to this film working is the performance by Downey, Jr. who makes you feel as if everything you're watching could really happen. I think a lot of times you really have to suspend your disbelief but that's not the case here because Downey is so great that you feel he really knows how to create this suit and make it work. I loved the early scenes before the terrorist attack when Downey uses his comic skills because this shows what a changed man he is after he is able to escape. The supporting cast is also very good with Terrence Howard and Jeff Bridges doing fine work, although I felt both of their characters could have been written better. Gwyneth Paltrow is the one who really shocked me because I had seen many of her artsy films and was shocked at how well she could handle this material. The chemistry between her and Downey is great and adds a lot of suspense to the film especially in the final minutes. Favreau does a wonderful job with his directing duties and manages to keep the story movie and to keep the viewer entertained even though the final Iron Man doesn't show up until a hour into the film. I'm not a fan of CGI because I feel most directors don't know how to use it but that's not the case here because the effects fit in well with the story and they never try to be the main focus of the film.

Step Brothers (2008) Adam McKay

Will Ferrell and John C. Reilly play spoiled brats who are still living at home with their parents. Ferrell lives with his mother (Mary Steenburgen) and Reilly his father (Richard Jenkins) but when the four move in together after the parent's marriage all hell breaks loose as the new step brothers can't seem to get along. Sometimes I can't understand mainstream critics who seem to walk into R-rated comedies and get upset that they're not watching some screwball comedy from the 1930s. Is this film stupid? Yes. Is the film raunchy? Yes. Is the film at times mean spirited? Yes. None of those yes marks matter because in the end the film is funny and that's the main thing. If you want a thinking man's movie then you might want to go elsewhere but if you want to laugh then this film offers up plenty to enjoy. I've never been a big fan of Ferrell but I thought he was terrific here as the lazy bum who can't stand to be out on his own. Reilly is equally great and putting the two together makes for some great chemistry as the two really know how to play off one another. I think a big key for the film are the supporting performances by Steenburgen and Jenkins as their straight forward approach to their "kids" makes for plenty of laughs and their constant struggle to stay sane is something I'm sure many parents could relate to. The film is full of dirty dick jokes, masturbation jokes and various other sexual jokes but I found myself laughing extremely hard. The first thirty minutes had tears running down my face but after that the thin plot shines through with most of the jokes being hit and miss but at the end I certainly laughed more times than I didn't so that makes this a winner in my book.

Re: Track the Films You Watch (2008)

12/20/08: TOPPER (Norman Z. McLeod, 1937)

I had first caught this on late-night Italian TV in its original language (and with forced subtitles) but, having missed the first 15 minutes back then, I’m now counting this as a first viewing. Produced by famed Laurel & Hardy ‘discoverer’ Hal Roach, it’s small wonder that the score by their regular composer Marvin Hatley here recalls those for the comic duo’s films but, in spite of the occasional lull, TOPPER otherwise displays much of the wit and sophistication prevalent during the heyday of Screwball Comedy.

The film, based on a Thorne Smith novel (he’d also provide the source for Rene` Clair’s marvelous I MARRIED A WITCH [1942]), has a lot to answer for: not merely the fact that it spawned two official sequels, a TV series in the 1950s, was itself remade as a TV-movie in the 1970s and is apparently being reworked for Steve Martin(!) as we speak – but it also launched Cary Grant’s career as an exponent of zany comedy. Besides, it even took the supernatural into mainstream cinema (having previously been the prerogative of the horror genre) and, with this in mind, the special effects – similar to those in Universal’s Invisible Man series of films – still hold up very well more than 70 years later.

Roland Young (in an Oscar-nominated performance) is the titular henpecked banker whose wild friends (Grant and Constance Bennett) are killed in a road accident; their mischievous antics while alive recall those of the drunken revelers of James Whale’s splendid REMEMBER LAST NIGHT? (1935) and, unable to enter the gates of Heaven without at least having done one good deed, they take it upon themselves to give Topper a good time…leading, of course, to no end of complications and misunderstandings for the meek middle-aged man. The supporting cast is equally well-chosen and delightful: Billie Burke as Topper’s snobbish wife, Alan Mowbray as his equally stiff but helpful butler and Eugene Pallette as the flustered hotel detective to which the narrative reverts for the last third of the film. In fact, this section is probably the film’s comic highlight where Grant, Bennett and Young meet again as porter the elevator boy from the couple’s hotel (an encounter which had already cost him the previous job!)


P.S. The copy I acquired played fine on my cheaper DVD player model until the 95th minute where it froze and wouldn’t proceed further! However, when I inserted the disc into my PC’s DVD-ROM, it played without a glitch!! Supernatural happenstance or what?


12/21/08: TOPPER RETURNS (Roy Del Ruth, 1941)

The second TOPPER film – TOPPER TAKES A TRIP (1938) – is curiously unavailable for appraisal (unless you happen to be one of those born-lucky U.S. residents who have the privilege of a TCM connection) but it seems to have followed the same route as its predecessor…except for the non-reappearance of Cary Grant which, following the release of one of the peaks of the Screwball genre THE AWFUL TRUTH (1937), he had become a bona-fide film star in his own right and his services had evidently become too expensive for Hal Roach’s limited pockets!

The third entry in the series, then, gave the formula an ingenious twist by marrying it with the popular old dark house-type of film. While I wouldn’t go so far as to say that Topper’s presence within this context is redundant, it does feel a bit contrived and, at times, he seems reduced to a supporting player in his own star vehicle. Still, the film (scripted by future noir expert Jonathan Latimer and Gordon Douglas, who would become a director of some distinction and had actually just helmed the minor Laurel & Hardy comedy SAPS AT SEA [1940]) is a deft combination of various familiar yet irresistible elements which render the mix all the more pleasing.

And so it is that, for the next 90 minutes or so, we are in the company of a ditzy blonde (Joan Blondell who’s killed off early and becomes the ghost in this case), a put-upon heiress (ill-fated Carole Landis), a mysterious masked assailant (whose identity when revealed proves quite clever), an ailing father (H.B. Warner), an enigmatic maid (Raffaela Ottiano from THE DEVIL-DOLL [1936]) a sinister doctor (horror regular George Zucco), a frightened manservant (hilarious Eddie “Rochester” Anderson who actually steals the film – with even an in-joke about his long-running collaboration with comedian Jack Benny on radio), a dumb cop (a typically flustered Donald MacBride), etc. For the record, the best gag has Rochester falling repeatedly through a hole in the ground to the riverbed beneath the old house, and then being persistently kept from re-emerging by a playful seal!


12/21/08: CARTOUCHE (Philippe De Broca, 1962)

I had previously watched this eons ago one Sunday night on Italian TV – a film that has easily come to be universally considered as France’s finest offering to the swashbuckling genre and, with this in mind, it more than holds its own alongside Hollywood’s best similar offerings. What gives this added texture, then, is the authentic feel for 18th century France (stunningly rendered in widescreen color cinematography by the distinguished Christian Matras, who was particularly adept at this sort of thing), a quality that is undoubtedly further enhanced by a typically wonderful Georges Delerue score; incidentally, listening to it once more, I realized that the lovely romantic theme here was very much a dry run for his celebrated, haunting work on Jean-Luc Godard’s CONTEMPT (1963) – which has for some time firmly insinuated itself among my all-time favorite movie scores!

Of course, the film finds star Jean-Paul Belmondo at the peak of his powers as the amiable titular rogue; however, his supporting cast – headed by luscious Claudia Cardinale, an atypically villainous Marcel Dalio, as well as Jess Hahn and Jean Rochefort as the hero’s rowdy copains – is no less impressive. With respect to the action sequences, the swordfights aren’t as plentiful as I had expected, though certainly vigorously handled all the same. As a matter of fact, another element that distinguishes it from contemporary outings in the prolific genre (even where French cinema is concerned), is that there is a good deal more emphasis here on brawling and (especially) romance – with Cartouche (actually a nickname) largely neglecting devoted commoner Cardinale for the amorous attentions of an unattainable aristocratic lady until it’s too late. Unusually, therefore, this comes with a downbeat ending in which the heroine sacrifices herself to save her lover from an assailant’s arrow – which is then followed by a beautiful and moving funeral rite.

For the record, this was the first (and best) of director De Broca and star Belmondo’s many collaborations which, box-office-wise, peaked with their next one, THAT MAN FROM RIO (1964), which I also own; incidentally, I have its follow-up UP TO HIS EARS (1965) as well albeit in French without the benefit of English subtitles! I would also love to catch up with the others – LE MAGNIFIQUE (1973) and L’INCORRIGIBLE (1975) – which look to be quite fun from the theatrical trailers I caught some time ago in a French Belmondo Box Set. Furthermore, De Broca would try (and relatively succeed) in recapturing the spirit of CARTOUCHE many years later with a much-filmed swashbuckling property LE BOSSU (1997). By the way, the low-budget Italian production of 1954 which also goes by the name of CARTOUCHE and stars Richard Basehart apparently has nothing else in common with this one (being, for one thing, a much-inferior product). One final thing: although the film under review is also available as a Special Edition DVD in France, I opted for the cheaper, barebones R1 disc from Anchor Bay given the prohibitively expensive shipping charges and the typical unavailability of English subtitles on the included audio commentary!


12/21/08: BOTANY BAY (John Farrow, 1953)

I recall catching this as a kid on local TV, a screening which, most probably, came about via the personal print of the film-buff sexton who calls over a number of friends, me included, from time to time to his private home theater in order to share in his vast movie collection on 16 and 35mm. Based on a book by the authors behind “Mutiny On The Bounty”, this follows a very similar path – with a ship’s crew at the mercy of a martinet captain (James Mason basically returning to the kind of role which had made him a star in his homeland); his opposition is led by medical student(!) Alan Ladd (typically dour) who's actually one of the many prisoners bound for exile in far-away Australia, among whom is also leading lady Patricia Medina (predictably, over the course of the film, she also becomes a personal object of contention between the two male stars).

Despite such imposing credentials as scriptwriter Jonathan Latimer and director Farrow, the film perhaps fails to rise consistently above the routine – not even with such unusual plot points as Mason’s adoption of a banned form of punishment (keel-hauling); during the latter stages, then – as the company sets ashore, and we also get to meet Governor Sir Cedric Hardwicke – the film tends to lose the initial momentum of the ship-board brutality. Suffice it to say that the film I watched just prior to it, CARTOUCHE (1962; with Jean-Paul Belmondo and Claudia Cardinale) was over 20 minutes longer but seemed to me to have moved at a much quicker pace! Even so, BOTANY BAY remains a good example of the colorful entertainment they used to churn out in the old days, given an extra edge by Mason’s compelling portrayal (which, if anything, suggests that he’d have made a marvelous Captain Bligh).

For the record, John Farrow directed Alan Ladd for the fifth and last time here after what looks like a run of mostly unassuming action potboilers: CHINA (1943), the equally seafaring TWO YEARS BEFORE THE MAST (1946), CALCUTTA (1947) and BEYOND GLORY (1948). It must be said here that, locally, Alan Ladd was a very popular film star with my father’s generation and, apart from the immortal Western SHANE (1953), it’s a pity that he seems to have been undeservedly forgotten with the passage of time.


P.S. Useless bit of trivia: I have just come across an allegedly uncut copy of the controversial WAKE IN FRIGHT aka OUTBACK (1971; with Donald Pleasence) taken from an Australian TV screening and, as the credits rolled, an announcer informs the audience to tune in at the same time tomorrow for a screening of…BOTANY BAY!!


12/22/08: FANFAN LA TULIPE (Christian-Jaque, 1952)

This is the last of four swashbucklers from France I’ve scheduled for viewing during this Christmas season: the others (in order of viewing) were the uninspired THE BLACK TULIP (1964; from the same director as this one but not nearly as good), the surprisingly effective LADY OSCAR (1979; which had originated as a Japanese manga!) and the splendid CARTOUCHE (1962). Actually, I had watched this one not too long ago on late-night Italian TV and recall not being especially bowled over by it, so that I was genuinely surprised by how much I enjoyed it this time around (also bearing in mind the baffling lack of enthusiasm shown towards the film here and elsewhere when it was first announced as an upcoming DVD release from Criterion).

Incidentally, FANFAN LA TULIPE has quite a bit in common with the afore-mentioned CARTOUCHE: not just cast and crew members (producers Georges Dancigers and Alexandre Mnouchkine, cinematographer Christian Matras, actor Noel Roquevert) but plot-wise as well – in fact, the hero is a womanizing soldier (Jean-Paul Belmondo’s Cartouche had also had a brief military spell) who’s loved by a fiery girl (in this case, gypsy Gina Lollobrigida) while he’s himself obsessed by an impossible love (here, it’s none other than the king’s daughter)! As in the later film, too, Fanfan (an ideally cast Gerard Philipe who, ironically, is so full of life here that one finds it hard to believe that he would be stricken down by cancer within 7 years’ time) is flanked by two fun-loving yet cowardly men (one of them is actually his superior officer and the heroine’s own father) and opposed by an unscrupulous figure within his own ranks (the ageing Roquevert, with whom the hero eventually engages in a rooftop duel since he too has amorous designs on the gypsy girl)!; for the record, Lollobrigida will rejoin Philippe in her next film, Rene Clair’s delightful romantic fantasy LES BELLES DE NUIT (1952).

FANFAN proved to be a big box-office hit on its home-ground and even copped a surprising (but well-deserved) Best Direction award at Cannes over more renowned films like AN AMERICAN IN PARIS (1951), DETECTIVE STORY (1951), OTHELLO, UMBERTO D. and VIVA ZAPATA! In fact, its popularity ensured its re-release in a computer-colored version (presumably for the benefit of viewers who wouldn’t touch a black-and-white product with a ten-foot pole) and the Criterion DVD itself contains a sample from this variant; being obviously a foreign-language title, there’s also the dubious choice of an English-dubbed soundtrack but, even if these proved not especially painful to sit through considering, when all is said and done, there’s simply no substitute for the original!

FANFAN LA TULIPE (a nickname given the hero by a young Genevieve Page as the celebrated Madame De Pompadour) contains about as much comedy as (the expected) action and romance; while some may find this overwhelming, I don’t agree myself as I enjoyed the sharply satirical narration and, on the whole, this combination is comparable with Jerzy Skolimowski’s equally droll THE ADVENTURES OF GERARD (1970). That said, the swordfights here are remarkably forceful for an essentially lighthearted enterprise (particularly a scuffle in the woods and the ambush at a convent) and the film itself rather adult at times (with numerous allusions to sexuality as well as coarse language adopted throughout) when viewed back-to-back with vintage Hollywood fare as I did now; the climax, then is quite ingenious: the enemy forces (who, amusingly, are made to speak in speeded-up gibberish!) are depleted by our heroic trio alone, much to the king’s amazement who, as portrayed by Marcel Herrand – best-known for his role of leader of the Parisian underworld in Marcel Carne`’s CHILDREN OF PARADISE (1945) – is himself something of a lecher.


P.S. An Italian TV channel has been threatening to screen Christian-Jaque’s promising CHAMPAGNE FOR SAVAGES (1964) for months now but, despite programming it three times already (with a tentative fourth one slated for next week), they have yet to show it; even so, I do have three more films of his in my unwatched VHS pile (equally culled from late-night Italian TV screenings): the three-hour epic LA CHARTREUSE DE PARME (1948; also starring Gerard Philippe), THE SECOND TWIN (1967) and THE LEGEND OF FRENCHIE KING (1971; with Brigitte Bardot and Claudia Cardinale).


12/23/08: THE PURPLE MASK (H. Bruce Humberstone, 1955)

This is yet another vintage Hollywood costumed adventure romp, a “Scarlet Pimpernel” clone that proves to be a modest but lively swashbuckler with Tony Curtis cutting a dashing figure as the titular masked avenger (who, predictably, utilizes a foppish countenance as cover). Though awarding the film per se no stars at all, the late eminent British critic Leslie Halliwell nevertheless recommended Curtis’ contribution here when denoting the more noteworthy genre exponents in his “Filmgoer’s Companion” (an informative and vastly entertaining tome which I used to consume in my younger days but, having now been overtaken somewhat by up-to-date information which can be gathered more readily via the Internet, I do miss leafing through)!

Anyway, though the narrative pretty much follows the traditional pattern – with The Purple Mask even taking time out for romance (with unknown but adequate Colleen Miller) amid his action-packed and danger-fraught exploits – it’s given a considerable boost by once again providing (as did BOTANY BAY [1953]: see my review elsewhere) a formidable antagonist for the hero in Dan O’Herlihy who, like him, is not above using deceptive cunning in carrying out his task and eventually engages Curtis in a fencing duel by the shadow of the guillotine! Also on hand in the villainous stakes are John Hoyt as the incompetent Chief Of Police, Gene Barry as a Captain Of The Guards (who is also conveniently enamored of the leading lady) and, perhaps most surprisingly of all, Robert Cornthwaite (best-known for playing the misguided scientist in Howard Hawks’ THE THING FROM ANOTHER WORLD [1951]) as Napoleon Bonaparte! Therefore, this was O’Herlihy’s first onscreen encounter with Napoleon since he would later also appear in the Russian epic WATERLOO (1971; with Rod Steiger); on the other hand, O’Herlihy had also just come from playing a monarch himself and an ally of Tony Curtis in their previous (and superior) collaboration, THE BLACK SHIELD OF FALWORTH (1954).

Incidentally, the script makes a passing but interesting reference to France’s then-First Consul’s own bid for power: while he seemed to side with the Revolutionaries, Napoleon secretly harbored a wish for Royalist restoration (which would eventually occur, albeit briefly, in 1804 – a year after the events depicted in the film – with himself as Emperor). Finally, THE PURPLE MASK – along with another popular Universal swashbuckler, the Rock Hudson vehicle CAPTAIN LIGHTFOOT (1955), which I had tried to acquire recently but ended up with only 20 minutes of playable film! – is conspicuous by its absence on DVD; consequently, I had to make do in this case with an edition culled from a panned-and-scanned TV screening which, bafflingly, ran for a mere 75 minutes: the movie’s full-length is given in various sources as 82 (which, even making allowances for PAL speed-up, would still leave some 4 minutes unaccounted for!).