Canon Films was a sensation in the movie industry during the 1980s. The ailing company was acquired by partners Menahem Golan and Yoram Globus, who quickly brought to the screen an eclectic array of low-to-middle range budgeted films. The company was not interested in producing high art and their range of product ran from exploiting the latest trends (i.e break dancing) to action movies aimed squarely at audiences that weren't too discriminating and who just wanted some fun flicks to indulge in. Sometimes their films sank at the boxoffice but more often than not they returned a good profit. Occasionally, they hit paydirt, as in their successful efforts to make Chuck Norris into a bankable leading man. The studio also became a one-stop employment agency for the aging Charles Bronson, whose glory days with the big studios were over. Cannon Films gave Bronson a new lease on life with a seemingly endless string of urban crime thrillers. Some were lousy (the "Death Wish" sequels) while others proved to be rather good and that Bronson still had the power to attract audiences. Golan and Globus weren't chasing Oscars, just good return on investment. By the late 1980s, however, the formula was showing signs of stress. The partners decided to go a bit upscale by securing the screen rights to famed adventure novelist Alistair MacLean's 1981 novel "River of Death". The film sank at the boxoffice but, like many Canon films, has enjoyed popularity through home video and streaming. MacLean, who passed away in 1987, was, for a while anyway, a surefire name to attract movie audiences via such high profile titles as "The Guns of Navarone", "Ice Station Zebra" and "Where Eagles Dare".
"River of Death" is set in the mid-1960s and presents Canon's in-house hunky action star Michael Dudikoff as John Hamilton, a freelance adventurer-for-hire who is engaged by a disparate group of suspicious people to help them find a legendary lost city deep in the inhospitable Amazon jungle. His primary client is Heinrich Spaatz (Donald Pleasence) who presents himself as a Holocaust survivor who lost his family in the Dachau concentration camp. However, due to a dramatic prologue, we know that "Spaatz" is actually a surviving member of the Nazi high command. Ostensibly, the group is supposed to be investigating the outbreak of a mysterious disease that is devastating a tribe in the jungle. In fact, Spaatz is trying to locate his old nemesis and fellow surviving Nazi big wig Dr. Wolfgang Manteuffel (Robert Vaughn) who had schemed with Spaatz to abscond with treasures of the Third Reich during the hectic final days of the war. However, Manteuffel double-crossed him and left him for dead. Spaatz suspects that the mad doctor is with the tribe, where he is unleashing his quack medical experiments with deadly results. We won't belabor the plot other than to say that the group Hamilton is leading includes two gorgeous blonds and a local American ex-pat Eddie Hiller (L.Q. Jones), who is an expert helicopter pilot who can deliver the group to where they will embark on the Amazon up river by boat. Needless to say, there are plenty of revelations along the way and the streetwise Hamilton is suspicious about the group's motives. They also meet the local corrupt police chief Col. Ricardo Diaz (Herbert Lom), who is determined to find out what the group is really up to.
I have not read MacLean's novel but it becomes clear that it was inspired in part by Joseph Conrad's "Heart of Darkness", as was "Apocalypse Now", which explains why there are similarities between this film and Francis Ford Coppola's classic. Under the competent direction of Steve Carver, the production is better than most Canon fare. The movie was supposed to be shot in Brazil, but the penny-pinching Golan and Globus decided they could shoot it in South Africa for lower costs. That's because South Africa was an international pariah at the time due to its unspeakably cruel apartheid practices. Major movie studios refused to shoot films there, but Carver, claiming his was "non-political" took the job and ended up getting sanctioned by the Director's Guild of America. Carver came to rue his decision before that happened simply because of the inhospitable locations he had to film in. He would later say they were so dangerous that it was amazing no one in the cast and crew was murdered. Nonetheless, this particular Canon film has some higher production values than most of the studio's fare. It also has some genuine suspense and impressive cast. Dudikoff makes for a suitable leading man and he can actually act. The film also benefits from the likes of Pleasence, Lom and Jones, all of whom have meaty roles. Although Robert Vaughn gets second billing, he only appears briefly in the prologue and again at the finale, filling the role of the Colonel Kurtz-like figure who has managed to preside over a tribe of savage warriors. In Manteuffel's case, however, he isn't regarded as the god-like figure Kurtz was. Rather, he enforces his control over the tribe with an army of heavily armed neo-Nazis.
I don't want to overstate the merits of "River of Death" because when one reviews a Canon production, your thumb has to firmly placed on a scale in terms of comparing it to most of their films. However, the movie moves at a brisk pace and contains some genuinely exciting action scenes. In the finale, you get to see an iconic T.V. hero, Napoleon Solo (Vaughn) squaring off against an iconic Bond villain, Ernest Stavro Blofeld (Pleasence). For that memorable moment in pop culture alone, the film is worth viewing.
("River of Death" is currently streaming on Amazon Prime and MGM+.)
The
celebrated filmmaker Elia Kazan’s last picture, The Last Tycoon, was
adapted from celebrated writer F. Scott Fitzgerald’s last novel (published
unfinished in 1941). Released in 1976, the film features a stellar cast,
Oscar-nominated Art Direction, and a respectful, intelligent screenplay by
playwright Harold Pinter.
And
yet, The Last Tycoon is a noble and interesting failure. That is not to
say it’s not worth seeing. There is a lot to admire in the movie, especially
for audiences interested in Hollywood history.
Robert
De Niro plays Monroe Stahr, the production chief and creative head of one of
the biggest studios in 1930s Hollywood. Anyone who knows anything about this
era of Tinsel Town will realize instantly that the character of Monroe is
inspired by Irving Thalberg, the genius producer who held the same jobs at MGM
during its golden age. He’s young, handsome, smart, and has some health
problems… but he has a way dealing with talent and executives.
Robert
Mitchum is the head of the studio, Pat Brady, perhaps something of the Louis B.
Mayer of the story. His daughter, Cecilia (the radiant Theresa Russell in her
first film) would like nothing more than to be with Monroe, but the
moody and melancholic Monroe, a widower, has his eyes and heart set on the
enigmatic Kathleen (Ingrid Boulting in her first film), a woman of beauty and
mystery who is not part of the Hollywood scene.
Throw
in a supporting cast—the likes of Tony Curtis, Jack Nicholson, Jeanne Moreau,
Ray Milland, Donald Pleasence, Dana Andrews, Peter Strauss, Jeff Corey, John
Carradine, and even a young Anjelica Huston in a small role—and you’ve got
classic Hollywood on the screen.
So
what’s the problem? Pinter’s script does a splendid job of emphasizing the
themes of the novel and Kazan manages to present a gorgeous-looking canvas of
star power and fine acting… but the movie ends up being, well, flat. There’s
something missing.
Guess
what… the missing element is the source material. Fitzgerald’s unfinished novel
is about dreams and ambitions left “unfinished.” Monroe’s “lonely at the top”
persona is because his life and work is unfulfilled, just like the house he’s
building on the beach—it’s unfinished. It’s not even clear that he wants to
finish it.
The
main love story thrust of the movie—that of Monroe pursuing Kathleen—is
ultimately unsatisfying, even if what does occur is what naturally
should. Once again, the issue is that we are left with threads that are vague,
uncertain, and unsettled.
In
a wonderful bit in which a famous novelist played by Donald Pleasence is having
difficulty adapting his style of excessive dialogue to the movies, Monroe
improvises a scene without characters speaking by describing what a character
“sees,” and in turn, what the audience sees. When Monroe stops without
completing the scene, Pleasence asks, “What happens next?” And Monroe has made
his point that the pictures are a visual medium.
What
happens next? Exactly.
Unfinished.
There
is an intriguing subplot tease involving the possible formation of a writers
union (in which one of those “commie” organizers from New York, played by
Nicholson, attempts to come to terms with Monroe), but this, too, is never
resolved. The sequence is doubly ironic in that Kazan himself was embroiled in
the HUAC Red Scare witch hunts in Hollywood in the 1950s, and there was a large
faction in that town who had knives out for the director in later years for his
cooperation with the government.
It
was an honorable attempt to bring Fitzgerald’s The Last Tycoon to the
screen, though. Revisiting the picture after nearly fifty years, seeing these
actors again when they were young and vibrant, and delving into the myths and ambiguities
of the Golden Age of Hollywood is still very much worth the time.
Kino
Classics’ Blu-ray release features a handsome 1920x1080 restoration that shows
off Victor J. Kemper’s cinematography and the lush production design by Gene
Callahan, Jack T. Collis, and Jerry Wunderlich. There is an audio commentary by
film historian Joseph McBride, who shines light on the darkness of this strange
piece of cinema. Trailers of other Kino Lorber titles round out the
supplements.
The
Last Tycoon is
for fans of classic Hollywood, Robert De Niro, Elia Kazan, Harold Pinter, and
any of the other actors featured in this unusual presentation.
“The
Hands of Orlac,” a 1960 U.K.-French co-production, was the third movie version
of “Les Mains d’Orlac,” a sensational 1920 novel by French writer Maurice
Renard.Like many of the other horror
pictures released in 1960, it was filmed in black-and-white.The director, Edmond T. Gréville, was a veteran French-born filmmaker who had worked in
both France and England.His previous
picture, “Beat Girl” (1960), had featured Christopher Lee as a strip club
impresario in an exploitative story about beatniks, aspiring rockers, and
strippers.Lee and other British actors
filled most of the major supporting roles in “The Hands of Orlac.”Exterior scenes were filmed on the French
Riviera, interiors at Britain’s Shepperton Studios.An American actor, Mel Ferrer, was cast in
the lead.Ferrer was a reliably familiar
leading man for the all-important U.S. market.His name lent box-office appeal in those days when foreign movies were
suspect in small-town America, as it did for another offbeat horror production
in which he also starred that same year, Roger Vadim’s “Blood and Roses,” a
French and Italian co-production.But
U.S. distributors apparently saw no pressing need to slip Gréville’s film into American theaters, since it didn’t open here
until 1964.By that time, a promotional
still from the movie had appeared in the October 1963 issue of “Famous Monsters
of Filmland” magazine, in a preview of upcoming horror and fantasy releases.
In
the story, a celebrated concert pianist and composer, Stephen Orlac (Ferrer),
flies from London to France to visit his fiancee, Louise (Lucile Saint
Simon).His small plane wrecks in a fog,
and Orlac’s hands are “burnt to the bone” in the crash.After his ambulance passes through a police
checkpoint where a condemned murderer, Vasseur, is being transported to the
guillotine, Louise prevails on a famous surgeon, Dr. Volchett (Donald Wolfit),
to operate in an effort to save her lover’s badly injured hands.Coming out of the anaesthetic, Orlac finds
his hands encased in huge, unsightly plaster casts.Worse, he sees the front page of a newspaper
that juxtaposes a report about Vasseur’s execution with one about his own
injuries.To his groggy eyes, the
stories gradually merge into one under the headline, “Stephen Orlac Receives
the Hands of Vasseur, the Murderer.”Lifting the grotesque casts, Orlac flies into hysterics.This was the publicity still that intrigued
us young readers of “Famous Monsters” in 1963.It was also the centerpiece of the movie’s lobby-poster art.
Did
the newspaper actually display the stories that Orlac read, more or less as he
interpreted them?Was he
hallucinating?Was there even a
newspaper at all?No matter, the
high-strung pianist becomes convinced that the surgeon found his hands
irreparably damaged, amputated them, and replaced them with Vasseur’s,
especially since, as he mourns, “They feel as if they no longer belong to
me!”After the casts come off, he can’t
get his fingers to strike the right notes on the keyboard.
The
obsession grows stronger when Orlac and Louise make love.His fingers unconsciously tighten around her
throat, and she begins to choke.That
incident and others convince the pianist that Vasseur’s hands have a violent
will of their own, and his fiancee’s life is in danger as long as they’re
together.He checks into a sketchy
Marseilles hotel under an assumed name, where he encounters a small-time stage
magician named Nero (Christopher Lee, returning from “Beat Girl” as an even
sleazier character).Nero senses an
opportunity for blackmail; obviously, “Mr. Stephen” is a well-off guy who
wouldn’t be holed up in a dump unless he had something to hide.Nero pimps out his pouty assistant and
mistress, Li-Lang (Dany Carrel), to cozy up to Orlac and get him to talk.
Orlac’s
self-imposed exile doesn’t last long.After Louise tracks him down, he decides to straighten up, return to
England, marry Louise, and resume his career.But he continues to brood over his persuasion that his hands are no
longer his own.Discovering “Mr.
Stephen’s” true identity, Nero and Li-Lang follow.Nero sets about to feed Orlac’s paranoia,
reasoning that the unhinged pianist will kill someone sooner or later, opening
himself to big-time extortion.
To
the extent that film enthusiasts take notice of “The Hands of Orlac” at all,
they mostly judge it seriously inferior to the previous movie versions of
Renard’s novel.Robert Wiene’s “Orlacs
Hände” (1924), also called “The Hands of Orlac” in English-language prints, was
a classic of German silent cinema, with Conrad Veidt as the title character
amid feverish Expressionist sets.Following in 1935 from MGM, Karl Freund’s “Mad Love” with Colin Clive as
Orlac draped the story in sadism and sexual perversion, to the extent Freund
could do so under the vigilant eyes of the Hays Code censors.
Gréville’s remake dialed back on Wiene’s and Freund’s
extravagance, accounting for some of its lacklustre press from critics who like
to see the gothic thriller envelope pushed further than Gréville pushed it, at least in their opinion.It’s very much a product of 1960, emphasising
the psychological aspect of Orlac’s dilemma and stepping into film noir
territory once the intimidating Nero and Li-Lang enter the plot.It even evokes the emerging New Wave of
French cinema with its documentarian exterior shots on the Riviera.Claude Bolling’s musical score includes light
jazz for a scene in which Orlac tools around in a vintage sports car, and
rinky-tink cabaret music for Li-Lang’s sultry song-and-slink routine following
Nero’s magic act, juxtaposed with Beethoven and Liszt in the concert scenes
that open and close the movie.Mel
Ferrer lacks Conrad Veidt’s eye-popping hysteria and Colin Clive’s furrowed
anxiety, his Orlac repurposed for 1960 as a sophisticate in shades, pullover
sweater, and tailored slacks for casual wear, and an expensive suit for
business occasions.If you’re a
retro-fan of JFK-era men’s fashions, you probably won’t mind.You may even prefer Ferrer’s interpretation
over his predecessors’.Like other
British horror films of the time, such as “Jack the Ripper” (1959) and “The Two
Faces of Dr. Jekyll” (1960), “The Hands of Orlac” promises plenty of sex appeal
courtesy of Lucile Saint Simon’s filmy negligees and Dany Carrel’s showgirl
outfits.In truth, this stuff is pretty
tame by 2023 standards, but it was a draw for male filmgoers at a time when
even the centrefolds in “Playboy” were often modestly posed.
For
most of the picture, we don’t know whether Orlac’s obsession has a basis in
reality, since we don’t actually see the operation itself.Were the killer’s hands really grafted onto
his wrists, or is the pianist suffering from a morbid neurosis?An explanation is made toward the end that
for may find satisfying or frustrating, depending on your tastes.It doesn’t help that Orlac is surrounded by
oddball characters who only compound his unease.Nero is the only one who is overtly menacing,
but others are unsettling in their own ways.In his few minutes on screen, Donald Wolfit’s Dr. Volchett is brusque
and possibly alcoholic; his decision to save (or replace) Stephen’s damaged
hands seems more a whim than a humanitarian impulse.His unnamed assistant (Anita Sharp Bolster)
is a starchy spinster who wears rimless glasses with impenetrably thick lenses,
like Albert Dekker’s in 1940’s “Dr. Cyclops.”When Orlac tries to call Dr. Volchett to either confirm or relieve his
suspicions, the assistant tells him the surgeon is on professional travel—to
Moscow!—and unreachable in that era before cellphones and Zoom.She brightens up as she enjoys a chance to
extol her boss, but her comments only deepen Orlac’s fears:“Dr. Volchett is a magician,” she
declares.“Your case was his greatest
triumph.”In a small but bravura
appearance, Donald Pleasence plays Coates, a sculptor who wants to use Orlac’s
hands as the model for those of Lazarus in a biblical tableau of Lazarus raised
from the dead.“All we see of Lazarus is
his hands—your hands, Orlac!”, he exclaims, seizing the pianist’s
wrists.Given Stephen’s state of mind,
the sculptor’s fervor is more invasive than flattering, like the irritating
stranger who latches on to you at a party and won’t let go.As he makes his pitch with growing
enthusiasm, Orlac stares at his hands (poised exactly as he had scrutinized his
grotesque casts earlier in the story), and runs off in panic.
“The
Hands of Orlac” isn’t the best horror thriller of 1960.That would be Alfred Hitchcock’s “Psycho,”
with “Blood and Roses” and Georges Franju’s “Eyes Without a Face” as close
seconds.But it’s better than its
obscurity would imply.In the U.S.,
“Eyes Without a Face” was dumped onto double bills as “The Horror Chamber of
Dr. Faustus” and generally ignored by critics, much as “The Hands of Orlac”
was.Now, it’s widely regarded as a
classic.It’s surprising that Gréville’s
picture hasn’t received similar reappraisal, given the renewed interest in
neglected horror films in the home video era, and the movie’s value as an early
showcase for Christopher Lee and Donald Pleasence.The problem may lie with the fact that an
official DVD or Blu-ray edition for fair evaluation doesn’t exist in the U.S.,
the U.K., or anywhere else as far as I can tell.DVD-R versions are sold on the collector’s
market, with caveats about their visual quality.
We
discovered this presentation of the film on YouTube, apparently sourced from
tape, perhaps one of two competing VHS releases in the 1990s, or a videotape
from a long-ago television broadcast.The image is better than you might expect, if inferior to the hi-def
transfers we’ve come to expect nowadays.It’s also the easiest way to find the movie, at least until we can hope
to see original elements unearthed, if they still exist, and a better print
prepared for Blu-ray or one of the major streaming platforms.
(To watch in full screen format, click on "Watch on YouTube".)
Friedkin with Gene Hackman on location in New York City for "The French Connection", 1971.
(Photo: Cinema Retro Archive.)
By Lee Pfeiffer
William Friedkin, who reinvented the crime and horror film genres with "The French Connection" and "The Exorcist", has died in Los Angeles at age 87. Friedkin's first film was based on a personal obsession- to get a man incarcerated on Death Row exonerated. The 1962 documentary "The People vs. Paul Crump" was deemed a deciding factor in getting the innocent man released. The Chicago native first worked in the television industry before landing his first Hollywood feature film, directing the comedy "Good Times" starring Sonny and Cher in 1967. The film wasn't a hit but Friedkin was learning his craft. His diverse output included a screen adaptation of Harold Pinter's acclaimed, offbeat play "The Birthday Party" starring Robert Shaw and Donald Pleasence, the exuberant Prohibition era comedy "The Night They Raided Minsky's" and "The Boys in the Band", a daring screen version of the controversial play about the lives and relationships of gay men.
Friedkin's biggest break came when he was hired to direct "The French Connection" in 1971, an adaptation of the bestselling book that documented the biggest drug bust in U.S. history. Friedkin's passion for eschewing the trappings of conventional crime films paid off when he won the Oscar for directing. The film also won Best Picture and Best Actor for Gene Hackman in a star-making role. Friedkin's next film was also an adaptation of a bestseller- in this case William Peter Blatty's horror novel "The Exorcist". Friedkin resisted hiring popular leading actors of the day in place of casting reliable character actors and leads with little name recognition. His transformation of 12 year-old Linda Blair into a terrifying demon immediately became the stuff of horror film legend. However, the film won over critics and was nominated for numerous Oscars because Friedkin made the production a thinking person's horror film with interesting characters and believable reactions to the surrealistic events. Following the worldwide success of this second Friedkin blockbuster, Friedkin did not bring another film to the screen for four years. When he did, it was "Sorcerer", a lavish and grueling reinterpretation of French director Henri-Georges Clouzot's acclaimed 1953 adventure film "The Wages of Fear". The film seemed to be cursed. On location in the Dominican Republic, Friedkin had to face soaring budget costs due to natural disasters and other seemingly insurmountable problems. When the film opened, it flopped. Friedkin, in an interview about the film with this writer in Cinema Retro issue #29, said that studio executives threw him under the bus by implying the film had gone over-budget because Friedkin lacked self-control in terms of spending. Friedkin tried to set the record straight but the damage was done. His reputation had taken a hit and his next film, the comedy "The Brink's Job" was also a critical and financial disappointment. his 1980 crime thriller "Cruising" cast Al Pacino as a New York detective who goes under cover in Gotham's gay leather bar scene to find a serial killer. The film caused great controversy, with gay activists denouncing it even before filming had been completed. Critics assailed the film as vulgar and unsatisfying, but like "Sorcerer" it has been favorably re-evaluated in the ensuing years. Friedkin continued to work steadily but only the 1985 crime thriller "To Live and Die in L.A." gained any kind of attention and that was largely due to an extravagant car chase.
Over the following years, Friedkin would divide his time directing films and TV productions as well as live operas. He would never score another boxoffice hit but he appreciated the attention and accolades he received later in life that commemorated his body of work. He took satisfaction from the fact that his 2011 film "Killer Joe" starring Matthew McConaughey became a cult favorite for younger audiences. Friedkin is survived by his wife, producer and former studio head Sherry Lansing. His final film, a remake of "The Caine Mutiny", will premiere at this year's Venice Film Festival.
Friedkin with Cinema Retro's Todd Garbarini.
(Photo: Todd Garbarini)
Cinema Retro mourns the passing of this great filmmaker and we appreciate his contributions to our magazine. His last interview (with Todd Garbarini) appeared in issue #50 in which he discussed the 50th anniversary of "The French Connection".
By Darren Allison, Cinema Retro Soundtracks Editor
It was back in 2005 that I last reviewed Guido
and Maurizio De Angelis’s Piedone a Hong Kong (1975). A multi layered and
hugely enjoyable score to the Bud Spencer poliziotteschi-comedy film directed
by Stefano Vanzina (aka Steno). Piedone a Hong Kong was the second of four
"Flatfoot" films, all of which featured Spencer as the Naples Police
Inspector "Flatfoot" Rizzo. In 2005 it was the new Digitmovies CD,
which in itself was a nicely produced album consisting of 70 minutes of music.
Some eighteen years on, Chris’ Soundtrack
Corner decided to dig a little deeper and as a result, produced a super two-CD
version of Piedone a Hong Kong (CSC 035), the label’s first two-disc release. Rizzo's signature theme composed for the first
film embodied the De Angelis' penchant for flavourful, catchy melodies. The
theme was carried over into all four movies and naturally became the primary
motif heard in Piedone a Hong Kong. This time, it was aided by an exotic
electric guitar that works well to identify the luxurious Hong Kong landscape
as well as accommodating Rizzo's cheerful, uninhibited nature, just as it would
later in the detective's adventures in Africa and Egypt. Reprising their
infectious main theme from the first Piedone movie, brothers Guido &
Maurizio De Angelis weave their way through Piedone a Hong Kong with a
delightful array of tuneful themes etched with a degree of ethnic Asian music
which energise Rizzo's journey, all of which treats the film's humour and dramatic
action with an equal degree of light-hearted fun and exciting suspense music.
It’s a blend that might seem a little awkward on paper, but it works tremendously
well as a listening experience.
Chris' Soundtrack Corner’s new extended two-CD
edition now consists of 101 minutes of music, incorporating the complete film
score. Disc one (the score) includes a great deal of previously unreleased cues,
while the second disc provides an impressive collection (19 tracks) of
alternative versions, different mixes and the A and B sides of the original
Italian 7” single release (CAM AMP 153) from 1975.
There has obviously been a great deal of
thought behind this release, and Chris' Soundtrack Corner have made sure this
is not just another standard re-issue. There’s an entirely new, fresh vibrancy
about this edition, not only in its content and audio quality (excellently produced
by Christian Riedrich and mastered by Manmade Mastering), but in its packaging
too. A 16-page, full colour illustrated booklet designed by Tobias Kohlhaas accompanies
the CD’s and features detailed, exclusive notes by Randall D. Larson, who
explores the making of the film as well as the score in fine detail. A super
release which deserved of much praise.
It's probably fair to say that Le ultime ore di una vergine (1972) (CSC 040) wasn’t
widely seen outside of it’s native Italy. The film was also known by various
other titles such as The last hours of a virgin, Un Doppio A Meta and Double by
half for its limited American release. However, you’d still be excused had it
passed you by. As so often is the case, it is the music to such obscure titles
that often lives on beyond that of the film itself - and Daniele Patucchi's Le ultime ore di una vergine is no exception to that
rule.
In the 1970s, the genre of Italian melodramas
found fresh and innovative ways to discuss heavy topics against the backdrop of
romantic stories. Until abortion was made legal in 1978, Italian filmmakers
shot dramas cantering around the issue with varying degrees of good taste. Le
ultime ore di una vergine is one of the more constructively made examples of
these ‘abortion’ dramas. The film was co-written and directed by Gianfranco
Piccioli and features a relatively small cast, including Massimo Farinelli (his
last movie) as Enrico, a photographer. Laura, his pregnant girlfriend, is
played by the American-born actress Sydne Rome, perhaps best known as the
fetish-geared archaeologist hypnotised by Donald Pleasence in the rather
dreadful The Pumaman (1980). Enrico's deceitful journalist friend Roberto is played
by Don Backy. But through all of the unfolding drama of Le ultime ore di una
vergine, there's only one winning aspect of the movie, and that's Daniele
Patucchi’s score.
Whilst the Turin born composer has scored
over 50 films, his work has never tended to fall into the realms of mainstream consciousness,
which is a genuine pity as he really deserves much more attention. The score's
central theme is introduced in "Titoli" and is written for the female
character which curiously enough Patucchi titled "Sydne's Theme," basing
it after the actress rather than her character's name. There are also brilliant
recurring motives for other aspects of the story. "I mendicanti"
collects several cues that use the same propulsive energy for a montage
highlighting the various swindles all captured with a POV style of camera. The
score also provides a few suspense cues. In what is arguably the film's strangest
moments, Enrico attends a magic show prompting the composer to provide a seemingly
self-contained cue for one of the story's visually most interesting sequences.
There are also some wonderful, almost improvised, electronic forms of scat
vocals peppered throughout the score where the singer improvises melodies and
rhythms rather than words. Delicate, haunting whispers also fluctuate through certain
cues - all of which work particularly well and really add to the score’s unique
footprint.
This is a world premiere release of the
film's soundtrack – although certain tracks have made their way on various
library compilations of Daniele Patucchi's music in
the past. As mentioned above, this has been fairly typical of Patucchi's recognition,
and the full score as a complete package, is far more beneficial in respects of
Patucchi’s talents as a composer. The CD has two bonus sections, opening with
the record versions of certain cues, which includes the unused version of
"Tema per Sydne," which was originally to appear on the soundtrack
but was actually removed from the film. The second half of the bonus section
includes all the source music heard in the movie including the vocal track "I
Love You More Than Life" with lyrics by Norman Newell.
The audio, again produced by Christian
Riedrich and mastered by Manmade Mastering, is clean and sharp throughout. The
CD is accompanied by a 12-page illustrated booklet featuring detailed notes by
Gergely Hubai. An excellent job for what could have easily become a forgotten
score. Kudos to Chris' Soundtrack Corner
for rescuing it from potential obscurity.
Piero Piccioni’s ...Dopo Di Che, Uccide Il Maschio E Lo Divora (1971) (CSC
041) has, in terms of its soundtrack history, had a somewhat varied life. As a
composer, Piccioni’s work is still highly regarded. Despite that, ...Dopo Di
Che, Uccide Il Maschio E Lo Divora remained a score that perhaps has not been
fully recognised in the past – despite a couple of incarnations. The standard
11 tracks did make their way onto a 2001 Piccioni CD (Screentrax CDST 335)
where it was paired up alongside music from Due Maschi Per Alexa (1971) and La Volpe
Dalla Coda Di Velluto (1971). In later years, it appeared in 2019 under its
American title Marta as a limited edition (300 copies) pressed on white vinyl
and released by Quartet Records (QRLP10) of Spain. Yet, despite of all its bells
and whistles, and in respects of its content, this only contained 12 tracks.
To set the scene, the film is a dramatic
thriller about a wealthy landowner (Miguel) haunted by the spectre of his dead
mother. When Miguel has an affair with a beautiful fugitive who bears a
striking resemblance to his missing wife (who has possibly run away or may have
been murdered) things turn decidedly awkward. Based on a play by Juan José
Alonso Millán, who also co-wrote the screenplay, the film was directed by
Spanish filmmaker José Antonio Nieves Conde. His influence
for the story was not so much the Giallo atmosphere of Dario Argento, as perhaps
some might suspect from its wordy Italian title, but more from the films of
Alfred Hitchcock. Featuring a psychopath linked to a mother and whose hobby is
collecting insects instead of taxidermy, plus a notorious weakness of spying on
beautiful women from hidden holes in the walls, the influences were pretty hard
to ignore.Miguel was played by Irish
actor Stephen Boyd (Ben-Hur, Fantastic Voyage) with Austrian actress Marisa Mell playing both Marta and the missing wife, Pilar. Mell
became very popular in Europe - especially in Italy, where she co-starred in Danger:
Diabolik and many other genre movies. At the time of filming, Boyd was in a
real relationship with Mell, so their charged, on-screen sexuality extended further
beyond their mere dedication to the acting profession.
Piero Piccioni's
score is an interesting and engaging mélange of original cues along with a
large variety of library music or cues tracked in from other films. The
repetition of motifs, textures, and full-on themes throughout the score assertively
integrates the music with the drama playing out on screen. Even with a variety
of individual tracks and musical sequences, Piccioni ties most of them together
by recognisable instrumental patterns and designs that characterise the
uncertain and potentially dangerous liaison between Marta, Pilar, and Miguel. Chris'
Soundtrack Corner have certainly taken up the challenge of ...Dopo Di Che,
Uccide Il Maschio E Lo Divora and its previous shortcomings. For their
presentation, they have opened this expanded release with Piccioni's original
11 album tracks followed by a further 19 tracks featuring the film versions, 17
of which are previously unreleased. There is also another alternate version of
the vocal track "Right or Wrong" sung by the golden voiced American songstress,
Shawn Robinson. As a result, the soundtrack now has a more rounded feel to it
and makes for a ‘fully grown’ listening experience and deserved of a ‘Mission Accomplished’
sticker.
As with their other releases, the score is
beautifully produced by Christian Riedrich and mastered by Manmade Mastering.
The CD is accompanied by a 12-page illustrated booklet featuring detailed notes
by Randall D. Larson. Overall, an excellent trilogy of releases that continue
to see the label grow in both style and stature.
To coincide with Paramount Home Video's new 4K release of the 1986 film Dragonslayer, Cinema Retro's Todd Garbarini caught up with the film's director, Matthew Robbins.
By Todd Garbarini
Matthew Robbins is a film director whose experience in the
industry goes back over fifty years. Born in New York City and a graduate of
Johns Hopkins University in 1965 with a BA in Romance Languages, he formed
friendships with Academy Award-winning film editor and sound mixer Walter Murch
(The Godfather, 1972) and Academy Award-nominated cinematographer Caleb
Deschanel (The Black Stallion, 1979). While a student pursuing his MFA
at the USC School of Cinematic Arts in Los Angeles, he met future film director
George Lucas who enlisted Mr. Robbins to work on his student film, Electronic
Labyrinth: THX 1138 4EB (1967), which was later made into the feature film THX
1138 starring Robert Duvall and Donald Pleasence.
Well into his mid-twenties when he came into The New
Hollywood (aka the American New Wave or Hollywood Renaissance), his
professional career began during one of the most original and fruitful decades
in American Cinema, the 1970s. Along with his USC writing partner Hal Barwood,
they scripted the real-life 1969 escapades of ex-convict Robert “Bobby” Dent,
22, and his wife, Ila Fae Dent, 21, into The Sugarland Express, hailed
by New Yorker film critic Pauline Kael as “one of the most phenomenal debut
films in the history of movies,” as directed by Steven Spielberg and released
in 1974. Both Mr. Robbins and Mr. Barwood made brief appearances as two of the
World War II pilots returning to Earth from the mothership in Mr. Spielberg’s Close
Encounters of the Third Kind (1977).
After writing The Bingo Long Travelling All-Stars and
Motor Kings (1976) and MacArthur (1977), Mr. Robbins made his
directorial debut while co-writing Corvette Summer (1978), a comedy that
pitted Mark Hamill and Annie Potts against a ring of car thieves. Next, he
embarked on his most audacious outing yet – the fantasy film Dragonslayer,
the second film made a co-production with Paramount Pictures and Walt Disney
after Robert Altman’s Popeye in 1980. Starring Peter MacNicol as Galen,
apprentice to the wizard Ulrich (Sir Ralph Richardson), who must battle the
dragon Vermithrax Pejorative following Ulrich’s death, Dragonslayer has
had a poor representation on home video over the decades. All that has changed
now, thankfully, as Paramount Home Video has restored and released the film in
native 4K Ultra High Definition on Blu-ray and Standard Blu-ray. The result is
glorious. I spoke with Mr. Robbins recently about this new restoration.
Todd Garbarini: Dragonslayer
is one of my favorite movies from childhood. I fell in love with Merian C.
Cooper and Ernest B. Schoedsack’s King Kong from 1933 and had seen a lot
of the Ray Harryhausen stop-motion films prior to that. When I saw your film, I
thought, “Wow, they really have come a long way.” I was so impressed with the almost
seamless juxtaposing of the special effects and the live action and full-size
dragon. In the years since, I’ve had the film on every conceivable home video
format, but the picture always seemed very dark and murky, even the letterboxed
laserdisc. The new 4K UHD Blu-ray is just so beautiful, you can now really
enjoy the amazing production design, cinematography, gadgetry, matte paintings
and the incredible Vermithrax Pejorative, a dragon so bad-ass that he has a
surname!
Matthew Robbins: Yes! I have been very carefully
avoiding seeing this movie for about forty years because it looked so wretched.
They worked so many miracles with the new technologies of today to fix one
egregious problem after another (on the new 4K release). So, the fact that you are
so conscious of the difference here before and after, it means a lot.
TG: I would say it almost looks even better
than it did in the theater. Any movie that requires this amount of visual
design to create a world that does not exist, the intricacies and nuances, the optical
effects, the matte paintings and the go-motion with blur, it is truly an art
and collaborative effort. I am a real proponent of the real-world special
effects. I have loved reading Cinefex, Cinefantastique, Starlog and Fangoria
for decades and it is amazing how much time and effort goes into a film such as
this. It is very gratifying to see these movies get their due as none of them
have ever been properly represented on home video due to the limitations
inherent in those technologies. It is wonderful that younger audiences can
really benefit from seeing Dragonslayer in this new 4K ultra high
definition. It is my understanding that this movie got the go-ahead because of the
popularity of the Dungeons & Dragons imagination game.
MR: That’s right. When Hal Barwood and I
drummed up this story, we had been very much present when George Lucas was
creating ILM (Industrial Light and Magic) for Star Wars in 1976 when it
was being set up at the warehouse in Van Nuys with John Dykstra. We were at
that facility, and then he brought it up to Kerner Boulevard, here in Marin (County) where I live, and we
specifically created Dragonslayer to get all that horsepower attached to
something other than star fields and spaceships. So, it was like turning loose
Phil Tippett! Dennis Muren was super charged up because he got a new sandbox to
play in. In terms of what you mentioned before, we were aware of Dungeons
& Dragons, but we weren’t playing the game.
TG: Neither was I! I have no idea why,
either. I loved fantasy, and close friends of mine were very much into it, but
I just was never asked by them. I did love the 1978 Ralph Bakshi cartoon of The
Lord of the Rings with that wonderful score by Leonard Rosenman.
MR: Well, speaking of Lord of the Rings,
Hal was very influenced by Tolkien. He was a fan of Lord of the Rings and
got me acquainted, and I thought it was great.
TG: So many people have been influenced by
Tolkien. George R.R. Martin credits him for his Games of Thrones novels.
MR: Exactly! I was a big fan of Fantasia
with Mickey Mouse and the sorcerer. So, there’s that, and so we combined all
those elements, and then we went out with our agent to find a buyer for this
thing. While we were waiting, he came back with this news that both Paramount
and Walt Disney were both interested. Our first meeting about the film was with
Michael Eisner, who was the president of Paramount at the time. He pointed to
his desk, and he had a stack of scripts about dragons that they had tried to
develop based on their awareness of the Dungeons & Dragons game. So,
the fact that people were playing that game in droves really helped us get the
project off the ground. As far as I know, people still play it. That’s some of
the origins of Dragonslayer.
TG: Was that a long process in your
opinion, to your recollection, or did it all kind of come together fairly
quickly?
MR: It came together fairly quickly compared
to, say, (Guillermo Del Toro’s) Pinocchio.
TG: I had spoken to Robert Wise in February
1994 about my favorite film of his, 1963’s The Haunting, and he talked
about Elliot Scott, his production designer. He did such wonderful work on that
film, as well as Arabian Adventure (1979), The Watcher in the Woods
(1980), Labyrinth (1986) and two of the Indiana Jones films. His
work on Dragonslayer was no less stunning.
MR: Oh, I’m so pleased you’re asking about him.
He was the dean of production designers. When we went over there to England to
put together a crew, everybody was busy. I had actually met some of the people
that George (Lucas) had used on Star Wars and Sir Ridley Scott had used
on Alien. And so, we were very ambitious, and they were all busy, and
they kept saying, “Why aren’t you in touch with Scotty?” I didn’t know who they
meant! Everyone else had been kind of either directly his acolytes or had been
influenced by him. He was a remarkably talented and experienced individual, and
this was only my second picture. He was one of those people whom I relied upon
and he helped me tremendously. He would say things like, “I’m gonna put this
here for you, and you can do the thing,” or “It’s not attached to the rest of
the castle, but then you have this here, and your transition is easy.” He took
me in hand. He was a senior presence and a very lovely man. I was quickly sort
of in awe of him, really. I remember when we had met and we talked about it,
and then I’d had a meeting with him in the art department at Pinewood (Studios),
where he was working, and he had a staff. He was a beloved figure and he came
in with rolls of paper. He put them out on the desk, and he had drawn some
preliminary ideas about how he thought we might have the interior of Ulrich’s
Castle. But, I had something else in mind, something very different.So,
I said, “Well, I don’t know if this is exactly what I want, because I thought
maybe…” and before I could even finish, he took all the papers and he crumpled
them up, and he threw them away. And he said, “All right, we’ll start over.” I
was just appalled because these beautiful drawings, you know, had just gone to
waste! I thought that we were going to discuss it! (laughs) He just
scrapped them! I still have a vivid memory of that. I felt very much like what
they call the imposter syndrome. How could I have done such a thing? He was one
of my favorite people on that movie.
TG: How about cinematographer Derek
Vanlint? He was a veteran of television commercials, just like Sir Ridley Scott
and they had done Alien together. He brought a wonderful and original look
to that film as well. Was he your first choice?
MR: Yes, and he had a cadre around him as
well. He was hard charging, very demanding. His nickname for me was “Pet”. (laughs)
He was a really gifted cinematographer. I was not experienced enough to know
when I was asking for the impossible. He tried to tell me now and then, “We’ll
get you as close as we can get.” He was remarkable. I had not had much
experience with using more than one camera on set at once. So, I learned,
sometimes to my dismay, that I wasn’t free to put the camera just anywhere,
once the master was lit. I learned a lot. You can tell it was my second movie, as
it was on a vastly bigger scale than my first film. I was running to keep up
sometimes.
TG: Were you a fan of movies growing up,
and do you recall the first movie you ever saw?
MR: I was afraid of movies when I was
growing up! I was very easily frightened by not even scary movies, but films that
had a lot of drama or suspense in them.
TG: I was, too. I remember hiding behind my
grandmother’s chair while a documentary on Alfred Hitchcock was on and there
was a scene playing from Dial M for Murder. My father had told me that
the strangler gets killed by a pair of scissors and I was beside myself.
MR: It made me very anxious. I can remember
when I was very little, my father was very interested in classical music, and
he had a lot of classical LPs. He would put on classical music and I would get
scared. They would say, “Well, what’s scary?” And I would say, “Well, this…,”
and the fact that music could have things in a minor key, an orchestra music, it
meant that it was a score to what was happening in the house! It was background
music to what we were living. So, if we were in the kitchen and the music was
in the living room, but my mother was at the stove or something in the kitchen,
I just felt that something terrible was going to happen because Dimitri Tiomkin
was behind this and it was portentous. I was very interested in movies, even
though I was very scared of them. I can’t remember literally the first movie I
ever saw, though. My neighbors had a television set, and I saw some movies
there, such as the Bela Lugosi movies. They were scary. I would leave and then
listen at the door. That’s what my grandson does today. One of my grandchildren
is exactly like me with regard to being afraid of movies. He’ll flee from the
room, and then he’ll linger because he can’t stop, you know?
TG: Are you going to show them Dragonslayer?
Caitlin Clarke was my introduction to the female form. (laughs)
MR:(laughs) My grandchildren are
too young to see Dragonslayer. (pauses) But one day, soon,
they’ll see it!
Click here to order 4K UHD Limited Edition Steelbook edition from Amazon
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The
plot of Dario Argento’s much-maligned 1985 thriller Phenomena has long been the subject of ridicule and derision by
critics and fans alike since its initial release. The inevitable complaints
about the film range from the bad dubbing and stiff performances to the
ludicrous notion that insects can be employed as detectives in a homicide
investigation (this is true and has actually been done, providing the
inspiration for the film. A November 1996 episode of television’s Forensic Files even featured
an episode about this very method).
If the film does not sound familiar, that could be attributed to the fact that Phenomena was severely cut by some 33
minutes and retitled Creepers when it
opened in New York on Friday, August 30, 1985.
Jennifer
Corvino (Jennifer Connelly) is a fourteen year-old student attending an
all-girls school in Switzerland while her movie star father is away for the
better part of a year shooting a film. Her mother, who left the family when
Jennifer was a child, is merely mentioned but never seen. Unfortunately, her
roommate Sophie (Federica
Mastroianni) has just informed her that the school is
beset by a killer who stalks girls their age and kills them. Well, that is unfortunate! You would think that someone would order
the school closed and the girls sent away. As you can imagine, this does not
sit too well with Jennifer who suffers from a bad case of sleepwalking and
manages to find herself embroiled in the very murders she was hoping to avoid. She
meets entomologist John McGregor, a wheelchair-bound Scot who lacks a Scottish
accent but possesses an avuncular disposition that endears Jennifer to him and
his chimpanzee Inga who doubles as his nurse. Fortunately for Jennifer, he is
aiding the police in their investigation into the murder of a Danish tourist,
Vera Brandt (Fiore Argento, the director’s eldest daughter) and the
disappearance of McGregor’s former aid. Together with the help of McGregor,
Inga (yes, the chimp!) and a very large fly, Jennifer sets off to locate the
murderer. When she does, she has a very good reason to nearly regret it.
Phenomena is an unusual entry in
the Dario Argento universe as it is a mashup of fantasy and giallo-esque
murder mystery, effectively making some to refer to the film as a fairytale. Jennifer
Connelly was chosen by Mr. Argento to play the lead as he had seen her in
Sergio Leone’s Once Upon a Time in
America (1984) and he thought she would be perfect for the film. His
decision to set the film in the Swiss Alps is unorthodox but provides the
perfect backdrop to the story as the scenery is utterly breathtaking. He also
makes terrific use of the Steadi-cam and it never feels over-used. From a
thematic standpoint, the film also deals with a subject I never would have
thought of: female abandonment. Critic and devoted Argentophile Maitland
McDonagh brought up this point when Mr. Argento discussed the film at the
Walter Reade Theatre in June 2022 at a retrospective
of his work. She is right: Vera is
abandoned by the bus (accidentally), Sophie is abandoned by her boyfriend,
Jennifer is abandoned by her mother (in an explanation left out of Creepers),
and even Inga is abandoned by her keeper.
Phenomena has been released on home video more times than I can
count, and I have personally owned it in the past as Creepers from the
original Media Home Entertainment VHS release from 1986; as Phenomena in
the form of the gatefold Japanese laserdisc pressing in 1997; the 1999 American
laserdisc release from The Roan Group; the 2008 DVD pressing as part of a
package of four other titles; the 2011 single Blu-ray from Arrow Films; the
2017 Blu-ray steelbook from Synapse Films; the 2017 Limited Edition Blu-ray from
Arrow Films with newly commissioned artwork by Candice Tripp, and the 2023 4K
UHD Blu-ray set from Arrow Films. Whew…Now, Synapse Films follows suit with
their own release of the film in yet another 4K UHD Blu-ray edition, this time
in a limited edition pressing with less-than-spectacular cover artwork design.
However, there is a more cost-effective edition that has made me giddy with
excitement. I must say that as a Dario Argento fan, and Phenomena being
my favorite film of his, the new pressing of this standard edition from Synapse
Films is a must-buy if only for the absolutely beautiful, gorgeous, and atmospheric
cover artwork that has been newly commissioned by artist Nick Charge. As a
purist, I generally shy away from artwork that is anything other than the key
art used in the original exhibition of the film. I do not wish to sound stuffy
or, heaven forbid, pretentious regarding this point, but it has been my
experience that the key art used in promoting a film is generally the best and
most effective artwork that has been used, regardless of the title in question,
though there have been exceptions. The original style “B” poster for Dan
Curtis’s 1976 thriller Burnt Offerings I have found to be infinitely
more interesting and creepy than the lesser-used style “A” artwork; Conversely,
Saul Bass’s beautiful mockup of the contorted face in the black lettering set
against a yellow background in the style “A” for Stanley Kubrick’s The
Shining (1980) was, is, and always will be far more effective to me than
the requisite and now tongue-in-cheek “Here’s Johnny!” image of Jack
Nicholson’s crazed visage peering at his wife through the remnants of the
bathroom door.
In the
case of Phenomena, which was trimmed and altered significantly for its
American debut and retitled Creepers, the original Italian key artwork by
the late great artist Enzo Sciotti was discarded altogether in favor of a poster
that focused on Jennifer Connelly holding flies in her hand, and the America
video poster went even further to have the insects remove the flesh from half
of her face! Nick Charge’s artwork is one of the most spectacular alternative promotional
images of the film that I have ever seen.
Watching
Phenomena again makes me realize just
how much I miss Daria Nicolodi, Mr. Argento’s long-time girlfriend who appeared
in six films for him. She brought so much to his work, and her absence is
deeply felt more than ever now. In Deep
Red (1975), she played the
wonderfully sweet journalist, redubbed by Carolyn de Fonseca; in Inferno she’s the strange Elise Stallone
Van Adler who keeps finding paint on her foot; in Tenebre (1982) she’s Peter Neal’s secretary Anne, redubbed by
Theresa Russel of all people; here in Phenomena
she’s the sinister Frau Bruckner, again redubbed by Carolyn de Fonseca; in Opera (1987) she is Mira, and this was
the first time that her actual voice was used; and La Terza Madre (2007) she is Elisa Mandy (again with her own voice).
Donald
Pleasence is also quite good as the entomologist. Some have complained about
his performance, but I have never seen him give anything less than 100% in his
roles, however off-beat. His presence in a horror film is always welcome. Check
him out in Gary Sherman’s Death Line
(1972). He is unorthodox and brilliant.
The new
4K UHD Blu-ray standard edition from Synapse Films is gorgeous and only
contains 4K UHD Blu-rays. There are no standard Blu-rays or DVDs in this
package. Phenomena has more
detractors than admirers if you believe what you read, and even staunch
proponents of Mr. Argento’s vision (Maitland McDonagh and Alan Jones) have
written off the film as silly. However, the amount of love and dedication that
has been lavished upon this film restoring it to its former glory on Blu-ray
says volumes about those who cherish it. This set is absolutely beautiful and
definitely worth the price of an upgrade as it sports the following:
Two
4K UHD Blu-rays which consist of three (3) different cuts of the film, all
available in high-definition for the first time ever in one collector’s edition
package:
the
83-minute United States Creepers cut
in HD
the
110-minute International Phenomena
cut in HD
the 116-minute English/Italian hybrid
audio Phenomena cut in HD
Extras:
Disc One includes the Italian language cut of Phenomena.
There is a disclaimer: “No English audio exists for scenes unique to the
Italian version of Phenomena. This full-length version can be viewed
either entirely in Italian, or in a hybrid version which uses Italian audio in
instances where English audio is unavailable.” You can choose from English /
Italian Hybrid in 5.1 Surround, or Italian 5.1 Surround, or Italian 2.0
Surround.
There
is an audio commentary by Troy Howarth, author of Murder by Design: The
Unsane Cinema of Dario Argento (on Italian Version). Mr. Howarth proves
himself to be a fountain of knowledge about Italian horror and this film in
particular.
There
is a 2017 documentary produced by Arrow Films called Of Flies and Maggots,
which runs two hours(!), including interviews with co-writer/producer/director
Dario Argento, actors Fiore Argento, Davide Marotta, Daria Nicolodi and others.
Much of the information presented here is already familiar to die-hard fans,
but it is a welcome look at the film.
“Jennifer”
is a music video of the Phenomena theme by former Goblin member Claudio
Simonetti, directed by Dario Argento, and featuring Jennifer Connelly.
The
promotional materials consist of: the Italian theatrical trailer, the
International theatrical trailer, and a page-by-page replica of the Japanese
pressbook.
Disc Two consists of both the international cut of Phenomena
and the U.S. Creepers cut.
There
is an audio commentary track on Phenomena
(the 110-minute cut) moderated by film
historian, journalist and radio/television commentator David Del Valle, who
speaks exclusively with Argento scholar and Derek Botelho, author of the
excellent book The Argento Syndrome. The discussion is both spirited and
informative as Mr. Botelho clearly knows his stuff. I love listening to
commentaries that tell me anecdotes that I either forgot about or never knew
before, and there is plenty of interesting info here.
The
Three Sarcophagi is a
visual essay by Arrow Films producer Michael Mackenzie comparing the different
cuts of Phenomena, and it is enough to make your head spin trying to
keep track of the different versions. This piece runs 31 minutes.
Rounding out the extras are the U.S. theatrical trailer and
two U.S. radio spots for Creepers.
Phenomena is not Mr. Argento’s best. IMHO, Deep Red (1975) holds that title, and it also could be argued that Tenebrae
(1982) is a contender for that mantle as well. It is, however, a terrifically
entertaining murder mystery with some great set pieces and a driving score by
some members of Goblin among others, and the sort of gonzo film that the
Italian Maestro has not made since Opera in 1987.
Imprint, the Australia-based video label, has released a limited edition (1500) Blu-ray boxed set of "The Eagle Has Landed". It includes the original theatrical release cut and an extended version as well. As is often the case with Imprint titles, they sell out almost immediately. However, there are a few copies listed on Amazon USA for hardcore fans of the film. Here are the details from Imprint's site. To order the set from Amazon,click here. We can say that the set is amazing and includes bonus extras from previous releases as well as new content for this limited edition set. Note: although the Amazon description lists this title as a Region B/2 Blu-ray, in fact it is region-free.
The daring World War II plot that changed the course of history.
During World War II, Nazi officer Max Radl (Robert Duvall)
devises a plan to kidnap or kill the British prime minister. Approved by
German Cmdr. Heinrich Himmler (Donald Pleasence), the scheme moves
forward with Col. Kurt Steiner (Michael Caine) leading the mission,
aided by Liam Devlin (Donald Sutherland), an Irishman with a deep hatred
of England. As the plan unfolds, it seems to be going well — until
certain events threaten the group’s shot at success.
Michael Caine, Donald Sutherland and Robert Duvall lead a
star-studded cast in this World War II classic based on Jack Higgins’
best-selling novel. Directed by John Sturges (The Magnificent Seven, The Great Escape).
Starring Michael Caine, Donald Sutherland, Robert Duvall, Donald Pleasence, Jenny Agutter, and Treat Williams.
Anne
Francis was director John Sturges’ only female actor in 1955’s “Bad Day at
Black Rock”, and she repeated her solo act ten years later on “The Satan Bug”.
But on that production, she and many cast members felt a preoccupation, a
distance, from the man who held together “The Magnificent Seven” and “The Great
Escape”. Francis was certain “He was thinking about “The Hallelujah Trail”.
This was Sturges’ next production, his entry into the world of roadshow
presentations; a mammoth production with a huge cast and even huger backdrop:
Gallup, New Mexico.
Bill Gulick’s 1963 novel, originally titled “The Hallelujah Train”, seemed a
perfect story to upend all western movie conventions, with the cavalry, the
Indians, the unions, and the Temperance Movement fighting over the
transportation of forty wagons of whiskey. Sturges was comfortable making westerns,
but this was a comedy western. He appreciated the Mirisch Corporation’s vision
of straight actors trying to make sense of the silliness, but still wanted to
persuade James Garner, Lee Marvin and Art Carney for major roles. Sturges knew
these actors could handle comedy.
Garner
passed. “The premise was too outrageous, not enough truth to be funny”, he
said. The rest of Sturges’ dream cast was not available, but what he got seemed
attractive: a pair of solid supporting actors, Jim Hutton and Pamela Tiffin,
and Lee Remick and Burt Lancaster for the leads. Lancaster had previously
worked with Sturges on “Gunfight at the O.K. Corral” and was impressed how the
film turned out. The rest of the supporting cast included Donald Pleasence,
Brian Keith, and Martin Landau. They were in for a tough shoot.
The
weather was unpredictable (you can spot thunderstorms heading their way in the
finished film) and the location had three hundred crew members miles away from
the hotels. Scenes contained countless stunts, and fifty tons of Fuller’s earth
was blown by several giant fans to create The Battle at Whiskey Hills. Bruce
Surtees, son of Sturges’ cinematographer Robert Surtees and focus-puller on the
set, recalled “All this and we’re shooting in Ultra-Panavision 70mm, which made
life even more difficult!” Despite the difficulties, the director was loving
what he saw on set; the film looked as breathtaking as any wide screen western
ever could, the stunts were amazing, and thank God he was also laughing all
through it.
The
hilarity was cut short near the end of the shooting. For the sprawling wagon
chase finale, stunt persons Buff Brady and Bill Williams convinced associate
producer Robert Relyea to let them delay their jump from inside a catapulted
coach. Permission was given, and in the attempt, Williams got tangled somehow
during his planned escape. He was killed instantly. Relyea nixed including the footage in the finished film, but was overruled by
Mirisch. It’s an incredible shot and it plays in every promotional trailer, probably the
most famous footage from the production. Was including it a bad decision or a
tribute? There is still a debate over this among retro movie fans.
“We
all thought it was going to be a hit picture”, said Sturges, “until we hit an
audience.” “The Hallelujah Trail” opened with a 165-minute cut that audiences and critics
found “belabored and overlong”. Sturges overheard some patrons wondering if
this was a straight western or a deliberate comedy. Screenwriter John Gay
blamed much of the response on the performances of Brian Keith and Donald Pleasence.
Gay wanted his lines played straight but the actors played it for laughs. The
film was soon cut to 156-minutes (the version on this Blu-ray) and the
reactions were much more positive; critics noted several inspired sight gags,
audiences enjoyed the cartoonish atmosphere of the DePatie-Freleng maps,
Variety found the film “beautifully packaged”, and the LA Times proclaimed “The
Hallelujah Trail” as “one of the very few funny westerns ever made, and
possibly the funniest.”
When the film finished its roadshow run, United Artists cut the film once more,
to 145-minutes. It didn’t help. Compared to “Cat Ballou” and even “F Troop”,
“The Hallelujah Trail” was unhip.Sturges
was done with comedy, but not with roadshow Cinerama, though his future films would have checkered histories. He was set to direct
“Grand Prix” but clashed with the original star, Steve McQueen. A year later
Gregory Peck turned down Sturges’ “Ice Station Zebra’, wary of its weak third
act. Rock Hudson, now middle-aged and wanting a strong lead role, came aboard
for this Sturges voyage instead. The MGM release still had a confusing third
act, but the film sails nicely mostly due to Patrick McGoohan and some clever
dialogue.
Decades
later, “The Hallelujah Trail” remains a nice memory to those who attended the
Cinerama presentation; not much greatness to retain but a great experience at
the movies. But that experience was tough to relive because the film remained
in legacy format limbo for years: a letterboxed standard definition transfer.
So when Olive Films announced a Blu-ray release in 2019, fans of comedy epics
sung Hallelujah! Now this film can be viewed in 1080P! Retreat! Unfortunately, the quality of the Olive release resembled an upscaled version of the original standard
definition transfer. But two years later “The Hallelujah Trail” was casually
spotted on Amazon Prime, and it was a new HD transfer. And a year after that,
it’s a new Kino Lorber Blu-ray release.
(Above: Dell U.S. comic book tie-in.)
Any
Cinema-Retro reader worth their Cinerama Chops should have this Blu-ray in
their collection. “The Hallelujah Trail” is an hour too long, but you get miles
of lovely landscape. My favorite portrayal? Donald Pleasence as Oracle, who predicts the future in
return for free drinks. And watch for his amazing jump off a roof! Certainly,
the most impressive part of the film is the finale: the runaway wagon chase.
There are sections where you swear it’s Remick, Keith and Landau handling those
coaches but you know it has to be well made-up stunt people, at least for most
of it. You’re also realizing that this sequence, and perhaps the entire film,
is performed without any process work or rear projection.
There’s a legitimate debate on how the film may have been more successful if
James Garner played the role of Colonel Gearhart, though only Lancaster could
have pulled off that bathtub smile scene. There’s no disagreement on the music;
Elmer Bernstein’s sprawling score contains so many themes that Sturges’
biographer Glenn Lovell qualifies the film as “almost a pre-“Paint Your Wagon”
musical." And here’s your tiniest “Trail”
trivia: decades ago, during the production
of the laserdisc version, MGM/UA discovered that a few reels were mono sound
instead of multi-channel, including the main title featuring the chorus. Yours
truly was working on a project for the company at the time, and I happily lent
them my stereo score LP. so the main title would be in stereo. That audio track
mix remains on this new Blu-ray as well. (You’re welcome, America!)
Kino
Lorber is kind enough to provide some expert guides to help you along the “Trail”:
the perfect pairing of screenwriter C. Courtney Joyner and filmmaker/historian
Michael Schlesinger. Joyner had already provided his Sturges bonafides with his
documentary on the director for the recent Imprint Blu-ray of “Marooned”, and I
can verify Schlesinger’s knowledge of film comedy, having been fortunate to
join him, along with Mark Evanier, for the commentary track on Criterion’s
“It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World”. Joyner and Schlesinger tackle and
acknowledge “The Hallelujah Trail”s social and political incorrectness, but
also deflate any virtue signaling by examining how the film is smartly an equal
opportunity offender: the Cavalry, the Indians, the Temperance Movement, all up
for farce. Thanks to this team, and the picture quality of this Blu-ray, I
finally spotted the gag of the Indians circling the wagons as the cavalry is
whooping and hollering. Both gents are in a fine fun mood to tackle this type
of film, and It’s one of my favorite film commentaries of 2022.
“The
Hallelujah Trail” now looks clearer and sharper than any previous home video
release, and somehow it makes the comedy and the performances sharper as well.
I think you’ll be entertained by this roadshow epic, and with Joyner and
Schlesinger as your commentary companions you may indeed learn, as the posters
proclaimed, “How the West Was Fun!”
If you asked anyone who is a fan of Sixties spy movies "In what film did Donald Pleasence play a rich, brilliant international criminal mastermind?", the answer would be obvious: "You Only Live Twice", in which Pleasence portrayed the evil Spectre mastermind Ernst Stavro Blofeld. However, there is another answer that would be equally correct: "Matchless", an unheralded long-forgotten spy spoof made by Italians and shot in such diverse locations as Germany, America and England. Pleasence plays Gregori Andreanu, the main villain of the piece, but he doesn't appear until well into the running time. The film opens with American journalist Perry Liston being creatively tortured by Communist Chinese soldiers who suspect he is a spy. In reality, Liston writes a popular newspaper column under the nom de plume "Matchless", the significance of which is never explained- along with other key plot points. For example, I don't recall if Liston ever does explain to anyone why he is China, but in this fast-moving comedy-adventure, plot points come and go with such rapidity that they may well be regarded as dispensable. While in jail, Liston shows pity on a fellow prisoner, an elderly Chinese man who, before dying, bequeaths to him a magic ring that will allow the wearer to become invisible. There are only two catches: the invisibility only lasts for 20 minutes and can only be utilized once every ten hours. (The team of five screenwriters must have been under the influence of something drinkable to come up with this zany concept.) Much to Liston's surprise, the device works and he escapes from prison, conveniently hiding in a nearby house that happens to belong to a single, gorgeous, horny young woman who even more conveniently happens to be taking a shower. She is startled by Liston's ability to be invisible but not for long. Once he appears in the flesh, it's under the covers for both of them.
The scene then switches to the United States where high level military personnel are subjecting Liston to the same torture applied by the Chinese, which involves tying the victim to a large canister that revolves at lightning speed in much the same way you get a paint can mixed at Home Depot. Again, I can't recall if it's explained how Liston ended up in the U.S. and why he is being tortured, but he is quickly enlisted by two members of the top Army brass, General Shapiro (Howard St. John) and his fawning sidekick Colonel Coolpepper (Sorel Brooke) to undertake a dangerous mission to Europe where he is to ingratiate himself with Andreanu, secure his confidence and somehow steal of case of chemical vials in his possession (though it's never explained what they are or why they are dangerous to the world.) Liston agrees and sets off to London, where somehow he is stalked for assassination by Hank Norris (Henry Silva), an American who was in the Chinese prison. How did he get out and become an assassin? Who knows. Just go with the flow. From there, the unflappable and capable Liston encounters deceitful, beautiful women and numerous villains in between making a series of narrow escapes thanks to his ability to temporarily become invisible. (One downside to the ability is that his clothes remain visible, so each time he wants to disappear, he has to ditch his clothing and often reemerge naked, a running gag used throughout the film.) When Liston finally meets Andreanu, they both pretend they like each other while following the old spy movie tradition of having each man obviously know that the other is his mortal enemy.
"Matchless" is an off-the-charts weird movie in every sense but it's also a lot of fun. Patrick O'Neal, who rarely scored a leading role in his career as a popular supporting actor, is well cast here. He seems to be having a ball playing a hero who is more Derek Flint than Bond. He's handsome, debonair and has the ability to toss out bon mots even when staring at deadly threats. Donald Pleasence gets an equally rare chance to show his comedic abilities and he's delightful playing an eccentric and ruthless megalomaniac. As with most of these lower-grade Bond-inspired spy flicks of the era, this one makes up for its shortcomings by supplying an endless bevy scantily clad women including Ira von Furstenberg (a real life princess), Nicoletta Machiavelli and Elisabeth Wu, who between them expose heaving bosoms and plenty of flesh, all the while dolled up in those marvelous mod fashions of the era. There are cheesy attempts to emulate Maurice Binder's trademark James Bond opening credits and an equally cheesy Bond-style title song ( future legend Ennio Morricone was one of the three credited composers). But the production values are better than you might imagine and the stunts and action scenes work quite well. (Liston utilizes an amphibious car a full decade before Bond did in "The Spy Who Loved Me"). Director Alberto Lattuada keeps the action going non-stop and makes the most of the Continental appeal of the European locations. One of the funniest aspects of the film is unintentional: the dubbing is terrible to the point of being of laugh-out-loud caliber. It appears that everyone other than O'Neal and Pleasence has been dubbed, including (inexplicably) Henry Silva, who was an American actor of repute. Silva gives a maniacal and very funny performance and, as with Pleasence, he seems to be relishing the opportunity to play a comedic role.
It should be noted that the deceitful American marketing campaign disguised the fact that "Matchless" is a comedy and presented it as straight spy thriller. One can only imagine the reaction of the gobsmacked viewers who were expecting a tense Cold War thriller and instead were treated to a film that was more akin to a Jerry Lewis production. I don't want to overstate the attributes of "Matchless" but it is an
unexpectedly enjoyable romp. If you're idea of good viewing is
"Operation Kid Brother", then this one is for you.
(The film is currently streaming on Screenpix, a subscription service available through Amazon Prime, Roku, YouTube and Apple TV for $2.99 a month.)
Author
and film historian Dana Polan has
recently written a book titled Dreams of
Flight: ‘The Great Escape’ in American Film and Culture that analyzes
director John Sturges’ WWII classic. Cinema Retro Editor-in-Chief Lee Pfeiffer conducted this interview with
Polan regarding his book.
Q:Tell us about your book overall:
Dana Polan: Combining unique
archival research, close analysis, and first-person accounts by viewers, Dreams
of Flight traces multiple histories around the 1963 POW classic The
Great Escape: production history of the film itself but also the history of
the original event (an actual breakout in 1944 that led to the successful
escape of three men, recapture of seventy-three with fifty of those summarily
executed on Hitler’s orders), as well as the trajectory of POW Paul Brickhill’s
written account as it evolved into the bestselling page-turner book The
Great Escape. I also chronicle my own viewing history of the film, starting
as a Sixties adolescent, along with accounts by other viewers who also saw the
film around then and found that its blend of the buoyant and the downbeat
stayed with them over the years. I had long wanted to revisit the film, ever
since first seeing and being so strongly impacted by it. I feel so lucky to
have been given the chance to engage with the film in a book-length study that
could go into much detail about the film and its reception history.
Q:When and where did you first see the film?
DP: I wish I could be
more precise about the exact date but I started researching and writing the
book during Covid quarantine and that limited a wee bit of my research. I know
I saw it at my town’s one drive-in and it was likely about 1965 since that is
when we moved to the area. If so, I would have been 13 years old or so, and it
would have been a re-release. I’d have loved to track down microfilm copies of
the local newspaper to see the dates the film was playing and also to determine
if it was on a double-bill or not. The Great Escape is a long film but
our drive-in generally showed two films and I imagine would only have had one
presentation per night of the double-bill. Although The Great Escape was
not road-showed in its original release in 1963 — no symphonic overture over a
static opening title, no intermission, and so on — I persist in thinking there
was a break half-way through so viewers could be encouraged to go to the
concession stand. In fact, the film has a logical place for a pause just at the
halfway mark — when the first character we care about gets killed and the hitherto
individualist Hilts (Steve McQueen) declares his commitment to the collective
cause of escape. There’s a consequential fade-out and then fade-in as the POWs
resolutely return to their cause. If indeed the drive-in showed The Great
Escape on a double-bill, that would have made for a long evening, and the
intermission might have been essential for concession-stand sales.
An
amusing anecdotal detail: I was away for the weekend when the film opened at
the drive-in and my mom and stepdad went without me on Saturday evening
to see it. I had desperately been wanting to see it as, as I’ll explain in a
moment, it seemed to promise exactly that sort of action entertainment I loved
as a kid. When I got home by Sunday, I was so distraught that they hadn’t
waited that my stepdad ended up having to take me that evening and sat through
this long epic a second time in two days. He dozed off here or there while I
was enthralled by every moment of the film even as I ultimately found it very
disturbing.
Q:What impressed you most about it?
DP: Like, I imagine,
many young American boys of the time, I went to the film for the gungho promise
of its canonic poster, “The great adventure, the great entertainment, the great
escape.” Instead, I was blown away by a narrative that seemed to me to be a
deflation of adventure — a transformation of rousing entertainment into
something questioning and quite bleak.
The
Great Escape’s
downbeat turn from a fun romp into fatalism left a lasting impression on me. As
I write in Dreams of Flight, this unexpected narrative turn was a theme
I began to notice in other films of that historical moment — one that is
telling of American culture in the 1960s.
I
have always imagined that my experience of movies is not mine alone but is
likely representative of my demographic currents (gungho adolescent boy, in
this case) and may be shared strongly by others in the same demographic. At the
time, as I say, I was a pre-teen American boy who especially liked “manly”
action cinema and expected from the trailers and that iconic poster that The
Great Escape fit that mold. I know from other fan accounts that I tracked down
for the book that I was not alone in feeling something disturbing and
consequential was going on instead — in the film and in the times themselves.
In my research for Dreams of Flight, I reached out to other viewers who
first saw The Great Escape in the 1960s and found many had comparable
reactions.
(Photo: Courtesy of the author.)
Q:Where does it stand in relation to Sturges' other films?
DP: John Sturges made
over 40 films in a career that started with B-movies with a graduation to A-films
in the 1950s, some of which combined strong narrative drive with a degree of
artistic ambition — on the one hand, an entrapment drama like Bad Day at
Black Rock (Sturges’s one nomination for Best Director) where thematic
resonance (the topic of racial prejudice) is overlaid with taut suspense and
moments of explosive action; on the other hand, the pretention of literary adaptation
with, for example, the barebones Hemingwayesque allegory of The Old Man and
the Sea. Even though he was thought of most as a manly man’s director,
Sturges even did so-called women’s films, melodramas of love and emotional
turmoil, such as A Girl Named Tamiko or By Love Possessed. But
his forte was films of masculine fortitude and he found apt embodiment,
literally so, for the trials and travails of men under pressure in a visual
fascination with strong, sometimes stocky guys filmed as upright or coiled up bundles
of vitality just itching to burst out. For example, the first time we see James
Garner in The Great Escape (as Hendley, the forger), he’s filmed,
perhaps curiously, from a distance that not only cuts off his feet but hisneck and head as well so that the emphasis is on his torso, taut and
tough as he confronts the fact of incarceration. Throughout the film, there are
long pauses to paint a pent-up male energy that then passes over into scenes of
vibrant action. I suggest in my book that The Great Escape not merely
divides into three parts — planning of the escape, enactment of the escape, the
outcome (as noted, a generally bleak one with most of the men rounded up and
summarily executed) — but finds an overall distinct visual style for each of
these: from coiled up men constrained by the fences that surround the camp and
by the very confinement of the barracks they are walled up in, to the open
expanses of seeming freedom beyond the camp, and back again to the camp for
those POWs who are rounded up but escape execution (with the last shots showing
even greater confinement for Hilts, who once again merits his moniker, “The
Cooler King”).
For
me, The Great Escape shows Sturges at the pinnacle of his dramatic form,
although some fans prefer the tighter professionalism of The Magnificent
Seven. Later Sturges films have their moments but the pauses get longer
(and more talky as in the very sodden The Satan Bug) and the
professionalism turns into long scenes of planning for action that actually
defer that action (for example, the slowly unfolding Marooned and the
overblown Ice Station Zebra which keeps delaying a violent confrontation
that actually never comes for symphonically scored scenes of the submarine
crashing through the ice and men pushing buttons and yelling orders). I find
perfection to the pacing of The Great Escape: men talk out their plans
at length but the suspense never lets up and, as I argue in the book, Sturges
films dialogue scenes in a variety of forms (classic shot/reverse shot,
wide-screen confrontation between men, long takes with a moving camera, and so
on) that keep everything moving forward in thrilling fashion.
The
year 1976 was a phenomenal time for films that went into production. George
Lucas’s space opera, Star Wars, began
principal photography in March; Steven Spielberg, fresh off the success of Jaws, was given carte blanche to bring Close
Encounters of the Third Kind to the screen and began shooting in May; and
Dario Argento, who became emboldened by the financial success of his latest and
arguably best film to date, Profundo
Rosso (known in the U.S. as Deep Red),
embarked upon Suspiria, a murder
mystery involving a dance academy hiding in plain sight while doubling as a
home to a coven of witches, which began filming in July. Suspiria is
just one of a handful of films directed by Signor Argento over a fifty-plus
year career, and it’s also being showcased in full-blown 4K Digital Cinema
Projection as part of the sinisterly titled Beware of Dario Argento: A
20-Film Retrospective at the Walter Reade Theater in New York City now through
June 29th. You can see the full calendar at this link here. The one omission from the roster of
titles is his 2009 thriller Giallo, starring Adrien Brody, which was
stopped from being released due to the actor’s failure to be paid for his role
until he successfully sued the producers.
Beginning
on Friday, June 17th, the first film shown in the retrospective was
his debut outing, the phenomenal The Bird With the Crystal Plumage from
1970, lensed by straordinario cineasta Vittorio Storaro, on a double
bill with his equally fine thriller Tenebre/Tenebrae from 1982. Bird
is amazing in that it was the first film that he ever directed…ever.
There were no interminable student films made prior to it. Somehow, following
his years as a newspaper film critic and having contributed to the 1968 western
Once Upon a Time in the West, he made a visually dazzling cinematic yarn
loosely inspired by Fredric Brown’s 1949 novel The Screaming Mimi (itself
made into the 1958 film of the same title by Gerd Oswald starring Anita Ekberg),
though there are also some similarities to the creepy 1949 “Birdsong for a
Murderer” episode of the Inner Sanctum radio drama that starred the late
great Boris Karloff.
The
standout in this series is clearly Suspiria, with its amazingly bright
color palette and virtuoso camerawork. Also of note, at least for die-hard
Argento completists, is his sole non-thriller/horror outing, the 1973 Italian
comedy set during the Italian Revolution of 1848 called The Five Days (Le
Cinque Giornate) shot by cinematographer Luigi Kuveiller who would go on to lens Deep
Red (Profondo Rosso) (1975). While available on Youtube in Italian,
this is an extremely rare presentation of the film with English subtitles –
restored in 4K to boot. It’s also quite funny; not on the level of the Pink
Panther films, but enough to elicit audible chuckles. The seldom-seen Inferno
(1980), his beautiful follow-up to Suspiria, will also be shown, the sole
title to be showcased in 35mm.
The
Italian Maestro appeared in-person at several of the screenings over the
weekend, most notably on Sunday in a Q & A session emceed by Argento expert
Maitland McDonagh, the author of the excellent book Broken Mirrors/Broken
Minds: The Dark Dreams of Dario Argento, originally published in 1991. Following
the sold-out screening of his 1985 film Phenomena, a phantasmagorical fairytale/murder
mystery that was presented to an audience of mostly younger fans who, judging
by their applause and reactions to the film, were new to it. The plot of Phenomena
has long been the subject of ridicule and derision by critics and fans alike
since its initial release. The inevitable complaints about the film range from
the bad dubbing and stiff performances. If the film’s title does not sound
familiar, that could be attributed to the fact that Phenomena was severely cut by 34 minutes and retitled Creepers when it opened in the States on
Friday, August 30, 1985. Fortunately, the 116-minute cut of the film was shown.
Signor Argento responded through an
interpreter to Ms. Donagh’s questions about the film.
Photo: Todd Garbarini. All rights reserved.
Maitland McDonagh:I've always thought that Phenomena was extraordinary
because it's a story that is sort of both a cross between the operatic and the
fairy tale. Dario, what were the origins of Phenomena?
Dario Argento: I was on vacation with my mother on a small
island, and we were listening to Radio Monte Carlo. There was a person telling
a story about how in Germany they had discovered that by examining insects,
they could discover when a person had died. I was very struck by
this and when I returned to Rome, I went to see an entomologist and asked
him how this was possible. He told me, for example, that if somebody fired a
gun off in a room full of insects, that the insects would die. He also
explained that for a whole series of reasons, that it would be possible to
identify a person’s exact date of death using insects, which is described in-depth
in the film.
MM: The insects are one of the most remarkable parts of this film.
Working with them must have been a great challenge. How did you work with your
crew and your on-set insect experts to get the insects to almost be their own
characters in their own right?
DA: For this movie, I needed thousands of flies. I rented a small
theater and completely sealed it off. I put some fly larvae in there and every
week I would throw some raw meat in the room. Eventually, after several
weeks, they turned into a mass of flies that just went after the actor the way
that we had intended and that’s how we shot the end of the film. The insects in
the scenes with Donald Pleasence, who plays the entomologist, were all
manipulated by insect handlers on the set and through editing.
MM: One of the things that really struck me after having viewed this
film after many years, was that it tells the story of two abandoned females.
First, there is Jennifer Corvino played by Jennifer Connelly, whose mother
leaves the family on a Christmas morning, and her father is currently away
shooting a movie in the Philippines, unable to be reached by telephone. The
other female is Inga, the chimpanzee, who loses her friend, played wonderfully
by Donald Pleasence.
DA:Tanga, the chimpanzee who plays Inga in the film, suffered greatly from the loss of
her friend (the Donald
Pleasence character) halfway through shooting. She escaped from the
set. We were working and shooting right near a large forest, and she went into
that forest for almost three days. As
you can well imagine, she became very hungry and so the forest rangers put out
some food and they were able to lure her back out. Tanga was a
remarkable creature; I would tell her what to do and she would simply do it. I
recall that in the film there is a scene where she must break up the wooden
slats on the shutters in order to get into her friend’s house. I showed her how
to do it, and she did it exactly how I showed her. Jennifer Corvino is also a very sad character.
Even though a lot of her classmates must think that she’s so lucky to have this
famous father for an actor, she’s very much alone and off by herself. Because
of this, she becomes prey to a very evil person. This is the story that I
wanted to tell, the loneliness of a young girl. This was a girl that was my
daughter’s age at the time. Jennifer Connelly was thirteen when she played this
role, and she did it with a tremendous amount of elegance.
MM: I also
love the way that you use the Swiss locations in the film, especially the trees
and the wind. They really work well in conveying the mindset of the characters
and the larger forces of nature that are at work.
DA: I have
the character of the professor talk about the foehn, the wind in the Swiss Alps,
with the link into the insects. At the very start of the film, where we see the
trees and the wind, there is this little house set against this vast landscape.
It looks like something right out of a fairy tale, sort of like a gingerbread
house. This young Danish tourist who is accidentally abandoned by her tourist
bus, is all alone in the midst of this panorama of forests, mountains and trees.
There’s this awful thing that is about to happen. The girl who plays her is my
first daughter, Fiore Argento. I really studied for this film very thoroughly.
I put a lot of time and effort into it. I did my best to create this, as you so
put it, operatic fairytale. I did it with great love, and I especially
appreciate the wonderful performance by Jennifer Connelly and what she had to
offer. She was thirteen years-old when we shot the film. This was her first big
movie, and I was just dazzled by her beauty, her intelligence, and her grace.
Photo: Todd Garbarini. All rights reserved.
Dark
Glasses
The
evening was rounded out with the premiere of his new film Dark Glasses (Occhiali
Neri), his first film in ten years, and while it fails to crack the Top Ten
Best Argento Flicks list, it’s still worth seeing in a theater. It was shot in mid-2021
in Italian and has English subtitles. Written over twenty years ago and
consigned to a drawer in 2002 after the financier went bankrupt and ended up in
prison, Dark Glasses was resurrected by his daughter, actress Asia
Argento, who stumbled across the script, read it, and urged him to make it. Described
as a “tender thriller”, this is highly misleading as there is a fair amount of
brutal violence and explicit gore, far more than anything seen in Profondo
Rosso, Suspiria, Tenebrae, Phenomena, or even Opera
– arguably the last truly great film he has made – the films often cited as his
most violent and most censored. If I had to compare Dark Glasses to
anything in his filmography of the past 35 years following Opera, it
would be Sleepless (Non Ho Sonno) (2001).
Diana
(Ilenia Pastorelli) is a matter-of-fact prostitute who finds herself blinded in
an accident caused by a maniac out to kill women in her line of work. Her
misfortune puts her in contact with a young orphaned Asian boy named Chin
(Andrea Zhang) as well as a woman named Rita from the Association for the Blind
and Visually Impaired (Asia Argento, in a refreshingly realistic and subdued
performance, with her own voice to boot!) who works with people to help them
get on with their lives. There is also a seeing-eye dog who comes to the rescue
to help our protagonists out of danger. While some of the plot points feel a
little silly and predictable, the film possesses an extremely atmospheric score
by Arnaud Rebotini. Missing from the film are the very directorial flourishes
that fans have come to love and expect from the Maestro’s golden era, his
genius method of cinematically propelling a story forward with astonishing set
pieces: there are no cameras booring into brains or over buildings, or
excessive jump-cuts, etc. The film boasts a decent performance from Ilenia
Pastorelli and young Andrea Zhang whose characterization of Chin is ultimately
sympathetic as the Mandarin youth the audience roots for. One of the director’s
shortest films at just 90 minutes give or take, the lack of visual splendor may
be a result of the director’s getting on in years – he is currently 81 – and
unwillingness to perform time-consuming set-ups. Or it may be having to make a
film on a smaller budget.
Once
wonders what fate has befallen the director’s as-yet-unfilmed project, The
Sandman, first announce in the fall of 2014. As of this writing, there is
still no word on it, however in the meantime, Dark Glasses fits the bill
as a bright spot in the director’s later filmography.
Warner Archive has released a Blu-ray edition of the 1966 thriller Eye of the Devil. The MGM movie, directed by J. Lee Thompson, is one of the last major B&W studio releases. The film had a troubled production history. The female lead had been Kim Novak, but when she was injured during filming, Deborah Kerr took over and had to reshoot all of her scenes - a costly and troublesome process. However, this meant that Kerr was reunited with her Separate Tables co-star David Niven (the pair would be seen on screen again the following year in Casino Royale). Eye of the Devil is an atmospheric thriller with supernatural overtones. Niven plays the heir to a massive French vineyard, though he keeps his distance from the massive rural chateau, preferring to be with wife Kerr and their two young children in an urban setting. An emissary from the vineyard summons him back to the chateau, presumably because the harvest is failing, but Niven's emotional turmoil indicates that there are other factors dictating why he is reluctant to return. When Kerr and the children show up, things deteriorate quickly. Kerr finds the locals to be frightened and unfriendly. Inside the chateau, the staff and Niven appear to be collaborating on hiding information from her. Additionally, a strange brother and sister team (Sharon Tate in her first major role and David Hemmings) are an omnipresent and threatening presence. Kerr ultimate suspects that the presence of a local priest (Donald Pleasence) is inciting people to dabble in witchcraft and the black mass. All of this leads to the prequisite sequences in which a helpless woman is tempted to poke about dark castle corridors and crypts to find the facts.
The film is disturbing from minute one, largely because it is devoid of any humor whatsoever. Every minute exudes a sense of menace. The cinematography adds greatly to the tension and the cast is highly watchable, even if no one attempts to hide their full-throated British accents while playing French characters. (The exteriors were shot in France, the interiors were filmed at MGM's Borehamwood Studios). The movie is consistently engrossing, even if it never reaches the level one might expect, given the sterling cast. Tate makes a significant visual impression, but it should be noted that her immaculate British accent was dubbed. The new region-free Blu-ray release does justice to the crisp B&W photography with a fine transfer. One quibble: Turner Classic Movies often shows an original production featurette from the film. One wishes it was included with this release, which features only the trailer as a supplement. However, spending any time with Niven and Kerr is time well-spent.
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Peter Cushing, André
Morell, Yvonne Mitchell, Donald Pleasence in a new restoration of
Nigel Kneale’s 1954
adaptation of the George Orwell classic
Cinema Retro has received the following press release from the BFI:
BFI
Blu-ray/DVD, iTunes and Amazon Prime release on 11 April 2022
George Orwell’s enduring dystopian
masterpiece is brought vividly to life in this celebrated BBC production.
Adapted by Nigel Kneale (The Quatermass Experiment), NINETEEN
EIGHTY-FOUR (directed byRudolf Cartier) broke new ground for
television drama when first broadcast in 1954. On 11 April, tying in with a
Nigel Kneale season at BFI Southbank, the BFI brings this classic production to
Blu-ray and DVD in a Dual Format Edition, and to DTO via iTunes and Amazon
Prime. Experience Orwell’s haunting vision of a society dominated by relentless
tyranny and the subversion of truth – a world in which Big Brother is always
watching you.
Featuring
a stunning central performance from Peter Cushing (The Curse of
Frankenstein, Star Wars) as the doomed Winston Smith, this small-screen
landmark has been newly restored by the BFI using original film materials from
the BBC Archive and the BFI National Archive. Numerous extras include a newly
recorded audio commentary by television historian Jon Dear, host of Nigel
Kneale podcast Bergcast, with Toby Hadoke and Andy Murray, and a newly
filmed conversation between the BFI’s Dick Fiddy and historian Oliver Wake, on
the myths that have grown up around the production in the last 60-odd years.
NINETEEN EIGHTY-FOUR is released
alongside the BFI Southbank centenary celebration of screenwriter Nigel
Kneale. A season, NIGHTMARES AND DAYDREAMS, runs throughout April in
partnership with Picturehouse to commemorate Kneale’s contribution to British
television. His adult drama and tense thrillers with a sci-fi or horror slant
went on to influence the likes of John Carpenter, Stephen King and Ben
Wheatley. Often enthralling and terrifying, Kneale’s visionary work showing on
the big screen includes the restored version of NINETEEN EIGHTY-FOUR. The
screening, on Monday 4 April at 6.30pm in NFT1 will be followed by a
panel discussion. Other titles screening in the season include FIRST MEN IN THE
MOON, QUARTERMASS AND THE PIT, THE YEAR OF THE SEX OLYMPICS and THE WOMAN IN
BLACK and there will be a special table reading of OUT OF THE UNKNOWN: THE
CHOPPER, as part of the BFI’s Missing Believed Wiped programme.
Picturehouse Crouch End will be hosting a day-long
event on Saturday 23 April featuring expert panellists and members of cast and
crew looking at Kneale’s film and TV work and his influence and legacy. Events
include a live reading of ‘lost’ 1942 radio play YOU MUST LISTEN, and
screenings of several of Kneale classics, including THE QUATERMASS EXPERIMENT:
CONTACT HAS BEEN ESTABLISHED, THE STONE TAPE, AGAINST THE CROWD: MURRAIN and
LATE NIGHT STORY: THE PHOTOGRAPH.
Special features
Presented in High Definition and Standard Definition
Newly recorded audio commentary on Nineteen
Eighty-Four by television historian Jon Dear, host of Nigel Kneale
podcast Bergcast, with Toby Hadoke and Andy Murray
Late Night Line-Up (BBC, 1965, 23 mins): members of the cast and crew look
back on the controversies surrounding this adaptation of Orwell’s classic
The Ministry of Truth (2022, 24 mins): in conversation
with the BFI’s Dick Fiddy, television historian Oliver Wake dispels some
of the myths that have grown up around the groundbreaking drama over the
course of the past half century
Nigel Kneale: Into the Unknown (2022, 72 mins): writer, actor and
stand-up comedian Toby Hadoke and Nigel Kneale biographer and programmer
Andy Murray try to unpick who Kneale was, what he did and why his work
still matters today
Gallery of rare images from the BBC Archives
Original script (downloadable PDF)
Newly commissioned sleeve artwork
by Matt Needle
·
** First pressing only** Illustrated booklet with essays by Oliver Wake and
David Ryan; credits and notes on the special features.
Product details
RRP: £19.99 / Cat. no. BFIB1445 / 12
UK / 1954 / black and white / 113 mins
/ English language, with optional subtitles for the Deaf and partial hearing /
original aspect ratio 1.33:1 // BD50: 1080p/50i, 25fps, mono audio
(48kHz/24-bit) / DVD9: PAL, 25fps, Dolby Digital 1.0 mono audio (24kHz/16-bit)
The inmates are running the asylum in
Jack Sholder’s directorial debut Alone in the Dark (1982) which opened in
New York on Friday, November 19, 1982 among a smorgasbord of horror outings
that included midnight showings of George A. Romero’s then-notorious Dawn of
the Dead, Trick or Treats (which, contrary to my original
recollection, did play in my area, a fact that could have been easily
confirmed with a quick consultation of an archival copy of my local newspaper –
my bad!), the Canadian horror outing Funeral Home, the comic book pairing
of George A. Romero and Stephen King in the fun-thrilled Creepshow, the
mis-marketed Halloween III: Season of the Witch, and John Carpenter’s
then-maligned but now rightly revered The Thing. While the marketing for
Alone may hint at buckets of gore, it’s actually a fairly mild affair by
today’s (arguably low) standards. It primarily focuses on the scenario at hand
which features a group of then-unknowns pitted against an all-star cast in what
can be described as a mixture of social commentary and a send-up of killer-on-the-loose
movies. The lead characters play their roles straight despite having to utter
some truly silly dialogue worthy of anything penned by Franco Ferrini and Dario
Argento.
Dr. Dan Potter (Dwight Schultz) moves
his family into a large new house after he goes to work for Dr. Leo Bain
(Donald Pleasence) at the Haven Asylum, taking over the position from the previous
Dr. Merton. Dr. Bain, whose last name cannot help but draw smirks from those
who notice the absence of the letter “r†from his name, could easily be mistaken
for one of the patients that Haven houses, as he seems more off-the-wall than
they are. He smokes from a marijuana pipe and refers to the inmates as
“voyagersâ€. One of the “voyagers†makes the comical statement that “There are
no crazy people, doctor. We’re all just on vacation!†Yikes! It’s tough
not to get a kick out of a film that boasts a nightclub scene featuring a band
called the Sick F*cks who sing a song that has lyrics consisting solely of “Chop
chop, chop up your mother!†recited over and over again. Dr. Potter hilariously
remarks over the loud music, “I have enough insanity in my life. I don’t wanna
pay for it!â€
While a far cry from the “Do not touch
the glass, do not approach the glass†severity of Hannibal Lecter, several
of the inmates – sorry, voyagers – specifically Hawkes (Jack Palance),
Preacher (Martin Landau), and Fatty (the late Erland van Lidth, unrecognizable from
The Wanderers (1979) and from 1980’s Stir Crazy as the huge bald
inmate), had been close to Dr. Merton and erroneously believe that his absence
is a result of having been murdered by Dr. Potter. The poor doctor is now the
target of termination by the triumvirate of terrors. They manage to have their
day of reckoning when a power outage befalls the hospital and the loss of electricity
causes their normally locked cells to now be conveniently opened, thus beginning
their reign of terror. Fault tolerance was obviously not part of the institution’s
budget. Oops!
Martin Landau is very amusing as Preacher.
He looks like Fred Flintstone at the end of the “A Haunted House is Not a Homeâ€
1964 episode when Fred flips his lid and sports a meat cleaver, laughing
maniacally and chasing his relatives. I never would have expected Landau to
deliver the impressive performance he gave Woody Allen in Crimes and
Misdemeanors (1989) years later. When Potter realizes the reality of the
situation, he holes up his family in his house to save their lives, but not
before his precocious young daughter’s (Elizabeth Ward) sexy, Playboy-like
babysitter Bunky (Carol Levy) is attacked after her boyfriend is killed. The
scene of a huge knife menacing her on the bed is creepy and decidedly phallic. They
all do their best to outwit the escapees.
The film’s ending is a bit bloody,
however there is more to it than meets the eye, which is to say that it’s more
than just a slasher film in that it posits questions about “who is crazy?†along
the same lines as Milos Forman’s One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (1975).
Originally released on DVD in 2005, the
new Blu-ray from Scream Factory has a beautiful HD transfer and ports over the
extras from that release, minus the liner notes by horror film authority Michael
Gingold (a shame), while adding new ones. Up first is a feature-length audio
commentary with the film’s director who discusses Ronald David Lang, who ran a
famous psychiatric hospital and said that crazy people were saner than the “normalâ€
people- they had just adjusted to it. This reminds me of Claire Bloom’s line to
Julie Harris in Robert Wise’s The Haunting (1963): “You really expect me
to believe you’re sane and the rest of the world is mad?†He also talks
in-depth about the choices made by some of the actors; the challenges he
encountered working with Jack Palance; Lyn Shaye’s cameo at the film’s start;
how New Line Cinema was originally a distribution company and moved into the
production end of the business, and an interesting tidbit about Matthew
Broderick auditioning and the director, who rejected him because he thought he
was too good!
Out of the Dark – Interview with Jack
Shoulder
– A very interesting 40 minutes with the film’s director talking about his
humble beginnings and the difficulties he ran into making films in his early
days.
Mother Choppers – The Sick F*cks
Remember Alone in the Dark – For over nine minutes, Snooky, Tish
and Russell discuss their experience working on the film.
Sites in the Dark – The Locations of
Alone in the Dark – Alone was filmed in sections of northern New
Jersey in November 1981. As you can imagine, much of the locations have changed
in 40 years. At just under 12 minutes, this is a brand-new, HD-lensed tour
hosted by Michael Gingold, who did a great job with his tours of Alice,
Sweet Alice (1977) and The Changeling (1980), to name a few. For the benefit of New Jersey readers, this
time he takes us to the Skyland Manor, the Rockland Psychiatric Center, Route
46 and Bergan Turnpike, Hillsdale Plaza, Closter Plaza where the Bleeder wears
a hockey mask before Jason Voorhees did in 1983’s Friday the 13th
Part 3 In 3-D, the Englewood Police Department, Oradell, NJ (specifically
the intersection of Midland Road and Commander Black Drive where Preacher obtains
his mailman’s hat), and the Potter Family house, which is a private residence
that forbade them from filming on the property. I always love horror film
locations and this is a great piece.
Bunky Lives! – Interview with Carol
Levy – Now
a successful real estate agent in New York, Carol did a lot of toothpaste
commercials in her early career. She also talks about the few other films that
she appeared in. I appreciated her taking the time to do this, which is
something she clearly didn’t have to considering her current profession. This
runs over 16 minutes.
Still F*cking Sick – Catching
Up with the Sick F*cks – At 16 minutes, this is a piece that is ported over
from that 2005 DVD. Great for fans of this group.
Rounding out the extras are a theatrical
trailer, a TV Spot, two creepy radio spots (I miss those!) and an extensive stills
gallery.
Here's a real rarity from some years ago: an officially licensed Steve McQueen Virgil Hilts action figure sold only in Japan back in the 90s. The Great Escape packaging is enough to make a collecting nerd out of any retro movie fan, especially when you throw in the optional U.S Army jacket patterned after the one McQueen wore in the film. The bad news: these figures sell for hundreds of dollars whenever they periodically show up on the collector's circuit. Now if they'd only make that Donald Pleasence companion figure! (Image from UK-based Metropolis Toys, which has a cool catalog of toys based on classic TV shows and movies)
‘Directors
have needed a book like this since D.W. Griffith invented the close-up’, wrote
legendary director John Frankenheimer about John Badham’s first book, ‘I’ll Be
in My Trailer’. ‘We directors have to pass along to other directors our
hard-learned lessons about actors. Maybe then they won’t have to start from
total ignorance like I did, like you did, like we all did.’
Along
with Frankenheimer, there were names like Oliver Stone, Michael Mann, Richard
Donner and Steven Soderbergh weighing in from the directors’s corner. Giving
the actors’s side of events, such luminaries as Mel Gibson, Frank Langella,
Richard Dreyfuss, Jenna Elfman, Dennis Haysbert and Martin Sheen.
Badham
had gathered some of the most celebrated creatives in Hollywood to give us the
benefit of their on-set experiences, and to offer advice about how these two
very different artistic types can work together successfully on a picture. Of
course, there was also plenty of anecdotal evidence that a film-set can be
highly combustable work environment if director and actor are not particularly
simpatico.
He
told me, ‘The first book came about after a talk at the AFI when one student
asked “What do you do when an actor won’t do what you want him or her to do?â€
And the entire room of fifty, sixty people suddenly sat up straight, and I
thought, “There’s a book here!â€â€™
His
second book, ‘On Directing’, presented his own hard-won experiences learned
over a 50 year- long career as a guide for budding young directors who may have
all the technological know-how, but haven’t yet learnt that building a good
relationship with your actors is the most important skill of all.
John
Badham should know. Taking off like a rocket following his second feature, Saturday
Night Fever, his name became synonymous with success after a long run of
big movie hits like Dracula, WarGames, Short Circuit, Blue Thunder and Stakeout.
In amongst those were smaller critically acclaimed films like Who’s Life is it
Anyway? and American Flyers. By the 1990s, he had built up a
formidable reputation as both a hit maker and an ‘actor’s director.’
Despite
his brawny, all-American back catalogue, Badham is actually a Brit by birth,
making his debut in Luton while his father served here in World War II.Moreover, he spent many months as a child
staying with his grandparents in my own neck of the woods, North Wales. I
chatted with this highly respected Hollywood veteran (and honorary Welshman)
about his book, and about his 1991 hit The Hard Way, which has just been
released as a special edition on BluRay by Kino Lorber.
As
well as still directing hit TV shows, Badham is a Tenured Professor at Chapman
University in Orange, California teaching Film Studies. ‘I’m teaching directing
remotely which is fun.I’ve got people
doing scenes on Zoom - I’m getting very good at Zoom.’
You’re
the ideal candidate to have written a book about the relationship between actor
and director because you’ve always had a reputation as an ‘Actor’s Director.’ It’s
often the first thing any article about you says, including this one. What do
you think makes you so good at coaxing great performances out of actors?
JB.Well, my earliest training was at Yale
University as an undergraduate and later a director at the drama school. As you
can imagine, theatre is extremely actor-oriented and working with actors is one
of the key skills that you have to learn as a director. A lot of film directors
never really get that initial training with actors. They’re great with
machinery, cameras, lights, microphones: that all does what you tell it to do
but unfortunately actors have this annoying way of being human beings! And they
have ideas - at least a microphone has no ideas and won’t answer back.
So, this is just something that I learned early on.
Was
it a help being the son of an actress and the brother too?Did that give you something of an inside
track on how actors tick?
JBSomewhat.I think I have some acting genes in me, I just didn’t get the best set,
my sister did. (His sister, Mary Badham was nominated for an Academy Award for
her role as young Scout Finch in To Kill A Mockingbird (1962).)But I still love acting. I love to do it when
I get to an opportunity, and every single time it makes me appreciate how
difficult and how stressful it is for an actor, especially the poor guy with
one line. How can you screw up one line? Well, I’ve seen it more times than you
can say.
Hence
your advice in the book, recommending that you take as much time to chat to and
encourage the guy with one line as much as your main cast.
JBThat’s right, he or she is the most
terrified one out of everybody!The guys
with big parts have probably long since gotten over their fears. They’re
probably less needy than the poor guy who’s come in for one day, who doesn’t
know any of the players, who hasn’t had a job in a while. Acting, you know, if
you’re not doing it regularly you can get rusty pretty fast.
I
think you’re especially good at getting very naturalistic performances out of
actors. I look back on films like Blue Thunder and Saturday Night
Fever, and no one seems to be acting at all. Is that a style that you
favour?
JB.I do. I want to really believe these
people and in those two particular films, I used a kind of quasi-documentary
technique in the acting scenes in particular. I always encourage the actors to
improvise and ad lib, and they know they have the freedom to try anything which
is very liberating. On Saturday Night Fever, the young cast were just
thrilled to be able to improvise. Many of the scenes that have become kind of
famous were just wonderful improvisations going on in the middle of a written
scene. So we weren’t being quite as stickler about the text as we would have
been had we been doing Shakespeare or Ibsen.
It
does show that you have an innate instinct for what makes a great screen
performance, as opposed to a theatrical performance. It reminds me of the story
of Frank Langella giving an all-guns-blazing performance opposite Olivier in Dracula,
until you showed him what it looked like in the rushes and he redid the entire
scene.
JBOh yes, and it took him a while because
he’s so skilled as an actor on stage but he was trying to change a performance
that he had been giving for eight months on Broadway, y’know six or eight times
a week. Trying to change that is really tough. It’s like trying to teach a
golfer a new swing; their muscles only go one way after time.
You
talk a lot in the book about a natural animosity that exists between directors
and actors - something that for the most part you’ve managed to avoid. That
surprised me. I would have thought there was if anything a mutual
inter-depencency. Why do you think this relationship is so fraught?
JBI think that many actors have just had
bad experiences with directors who don’t know how to talk to actors, who speak
in terms of results - ‘Be happier, let’s have more fun with this scene,’ and
the actors privately, or publicly roll their eyes and they think that this
director has nothing to tell me.
Some
actors, like Brando, like to test their director on the first day of shooting,
just to see what they are going to have to work with. Brando would give the
director two variations of a performance, one of which he knew to be
terrifically dreadful, and see what the director did. And if he didn’t pick the
right one, in Brando’s mind he was done for the rest of the film. He told Richard
Donner he wanted to play Jor-El as a giant tomato! Before he’d even visited the
set of Superman, he went to visit Richard Donner and the writer Tom
Mankiewicz and shocked them with this, and it took them a while to find a way
around the idea!
"Hearts of the West" is a somewhat sentimental, generally amusing tale that displays affection for the early sound era of cinema. Written by Rob Thompson and directed by Howard Zieff, the film barely registered at the boxoffice when released in 1975, despite having received very positive reviews. The story is another familiar "fish-out-of-water" tale with young Jeff Bridges as Lewis Tater, an Iowan who is obsessed with the Western novels of Zane Gray. He's eager to get to the real West to find inspiration for his own plans to become a screenwriter for the horse operas that were all the rage in the 1930s. First, he plans to attend a university in Nevada where he hopes to hone his writing skills. Upon arriving in Nevada, however, he finds that the "university" doesn't exist beyond a post office box where gullible applicants have sent their tuition fees. While still licking his wounds, Lewis checks in to a local boarding house and coincidentally ends up confronting the two men behind the scam (Richard B. Shull and Anthony James.) A brawl ensues and Lewis escapes in their car, while also taking a box that contains a pistol. The con men chase after him to no avail, as Lewis escapes into the desert. What he doesn't know is that the box he has taken has a secret compartment containing thousands of dollars in ill-gotten gains from the tuition applicants. Lewis is saved from dying of thirst when he stumbles on to a low budget movie company that is filming a Western. He befriends veteran stuntman Howard Pike (Andy Griffith), who takes him under his wing and gets him a job as a stunt man despite the fact the Lewis has no experience. Still, his willingness to place himself in danger favorably impresses the director, Kessler (Alan Arkin). Lewis also strikes up a romantic relationship with the script girl, Miss Trout (Blythe Danner), who gets him a job as a busboy in a local diner to help him add to his skimpy wages on the film set. Lewis discovers the hidden money and uses it to try to buy an audience with eccentric film producer A.J. Nietz (a very quirky and funny Donald Pleasence), who he hopes to convince to buy his script for a Western. Things go awry, however, when the two con men track him down and threaten his life.
"Hearts of the West" provides gentle comedy, as director Zieff favors mild chuckles over belly laughs. What enriches the film is the vast assortment of interesting characters. Bridges, then 24 years old, shows star power as the likeable but gullible protagonist and Andy Griffith steals the show as the shopworn, cynical stuntman who never realized fulfillment of his dreams. All of the supporting actors give yeoman performances and there are brief appearances from beloved character actors such as Frank Cady, Dub Taylor, Alex Rocco, Herb Edelman, Marie Windsor, Thayer David and William Christopher, among others. The film is an homage to a bygone era of filmmaking. Ironically, the same can now be said about "Hearts of the West", which is available as a region-free DVD from the Warner Archive. The only bonus extra is the original trailer.
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It's been said that Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes classic "The Hound of the Baskervilles" is the most-filmed literary adaptation of all time. You might be forgiven for thinking that status might belong to Agatha Christie's "Ten Little Indians", which was originally published in the UK in 1939 under a title that was so racist that the mind boggles over the fact it could ever have been socially acceptable. It was later changed to "Ten Little Indians". The original U.S. publication was titled "And Then There Were None" out of racial sensitivity. The book was an immediate sensation and in 1945 and Christie adapted it to a hit stage production. A well-received film version was made by director Rene Clair in 1945 under the title "And Then There Were None". Officially, there have only been four English language feature films based on the book as well as one British mini-series. However, the novel has influenced so many thrillers over the decades that the well-worn central scenario has become a main staple of films and TV programs ranging from any number of crime thrillers to Vincent Price's delightfully campy horror flick "House on Haunted Hill". A common link between three of the film versions was Harry Alan Towers, who produced feature film adaptations of the novel in 1965, 1974 and 1989. Towers had a long career of churning out profitable schlock ranging from low-grade James Bond ripoffs to sexploitation and horror films that were definitely of the "guilty pleasure" variety. The fact that he produced three of the four major adaptations of Christie's novel is quite remarkable.The 1965 and 1974 film versions received major international distribution but the 1989 version is largely unknown by most movie fans, as it only received very limited distribution. (It's entire gross in North America is reported as $43,000 over a two-day period.).
Kino Lorber has released the 1989 version of the film on Blu-ray. The film, directed by Alan Birkinshaw, deviates from the other versions in terms of location. The main plot premise is still followed. In the novel and previous movie versions, a disparate group of strangers turn up at an isolated mansion house at the invitation of a mysterious, wealthy stranger named Mr. Owen, who promises them a lavish holiday. Upon arriving and making each other's acquaintance, the ten guests are bewildered that there host is not present to greet them. Instead, they are instructed to listen to a phonograph record on which Mr. Owen announces the truth behind his invitations. He accuses each of the attendees of having been responsible for the death of an innocent person or persons and has managed to escape justice. Owen promises that he will ensure that the victims are avenged and very soon thereafter the participants are knocked off one-by-one through ingenious and sometimes gory methods. As each murder occurs, the guests realize that one figure from a corresponding set of ten Indian dolls also inexplicably disappears to mark the demise of the latest victim. The 1989 version opens in an unnamed African nation, which in fact is South Africa. The country was by then an international pariah and bleeding red ink in terms of its solvency. This was due to the government's stubborn insistence upon trying to prop up its atrocious system of apartheid. To raise funds, South Africa solicited for film production companies to shoot there in return for attractive tax breaks and other financial incentives. It is undoubtedly for this reason that the end credits of the movie don't mention where it was filmed. The movie was distributed by the famed (or infamous) Canon Films, which was itself a schlock factory that nevertheless proved to be the toast of the film industry in the 1980s for its ability to churn out modestly-budgeted movies that more often than not proved to be hits with undiscriminating movie-goers.
As with previous film versions of the novel, this one boasts a cast of eclectic actors but only a few with name recognition, most notably Donald Pleasence, Herbert Lom (both of whom appeared in the 1974 version), Brenda Vaccaro (an Oscar nominee for "Midnight Cowboy" twenty years earlier) and Frank Stallone. Under Alan Birkinshaw's direction, they are all adequate but some chew the South African scenery a bit too often. With Lom seen in an abbreviated role, only Pleasence makes much of an impression, giving one of his reliably understated performances. Producer Towers was said to have approached Oliver Reed, (another veteran of the 1974 version), along with Peter Cushing, Klaus Kinski and Robert Vaughn to appear in this production. The mind reels at how beneficial their presence might have been. In previous versions, the male and female leads form a romantic attachment. Those roles are played here by Sarah Maur Thorp and Frank Stallone, but aside from some mild flirting, there are no sparks between them. Thorp fares better in terms of character and performance because Stallone has nothing interesting to say or do other than parade about in jungle attire that makes him look like someone attending a Halloween party dressed as Indiana Jones.
Kino
Lorber’s new double-bill Blu-ray release of comedy classics starring the
legendary Alec Guinness features the nautical-themed The Captain’s Paradise (1953,
a London Films production), and Barnacle Bill (1957, the last Ealing
Studios production in which Guinness appeared). The former is often thought of
as one of the Ealing comedies, but it is not so.
Paradise
was
nominated for the “Story†Academy Award (a category that no longer exists), and
it was written by Alec Coppel (best known, perhaps as co-writer of the script
for Vertigo). It is indeed a well-written and clever vehicle for Guinness,
who delivers his usual above-it-all confident demeanor when his character is
faced with domestic and professional disaster. He plays Captain Henry St.
James, whom his chief officer Ricco (Charles Goldner) constantly calls a “geniusâ€
because Henry has found the perfect path to “paradiseâ€â€”a double life with two
women—one in the Spanish town of Kalique (actually Ceuta) in North Africa, next
to Morocco, and one in Gibraltar. His ship, The Golden Fleece, makes
regular trips between the two ports. He is married to Maud (Celia Johnson) in
Gibraltar, and lives a quiet, early-to-bed, and happy but rather dull existence
when he’s “home.†He also has a mistress (or a second wife?), Nita (Yvonne De
Carlo), in Kalique, where he lives a more passionate and fiery life of dancing,
drinking, and lovemaking. Henry manages to keep the two lives separate, until,
well, he can’t.
In
1953, one can imagine that The Captain’s Paradise presented itself as
something exotic and, in turn, quite hilarious. Humor especially abounds in the
sequences in which Maud visits Kalique and accidentally meets Nita. Henry, in a
panic, must exhibit his “genius†to remedy the situation.
Today,
though, Paradise might be considered by some as problematic in that the
story glorifies this man’s unfaithfulness to his wife. Apparently, he was
supposed to have been married to both women in the original version of the
script. It’s not particularly clear, though, whether Henry is married to Nita
or simply shacking up with her. At one point he calls her “Madame†St. James,
but that could be just an endearment. Frankly, the man is a cad, and he is
celebrated for it. For the picture’s U.S. release, this aspect
had to be changed to comply with the Production Code operating at the time, and
other bits were censored. But film historian Stephen Vagg, author of an
academia.edu paper on Coppel, opines, “The women have
agency... both get sick of Guinness, rebel against their station in life and go
off to have affairs with other men, and aren't punished for it (indeed De Carlo
kills someone and gets away with it). The film is also fascinating from a
sociological point of view because it’s about that generation of men who went
off to war and wanted to come back to a world of quiet domesticity and cups of
tea… but also longed at times for excitement and adventure... and it’s about
women who are expected to be in one of two boxes (good girl/bad girl), but
rebel against it.â€
That said, it is difficult to determine
if the version presented here on the Kino Lorber disk (it is true that the
picture is the StudioCanal restoration) is the entire original UK theatrical
release. Certain changes known to have been made to the film are indeed not
present,
and yet it runs only 89 minutes. Online sources indicate that the original
theatrical release was 93 minutes. Vagg suspects that this is only a press
release error supplied to online sites, for all home video releases of the film
have been 89 minutes.
Despite
all of this, all three leading performances are top-notch. Typical for the
time, however, Caucasian British actors, wearing dark makeup, play Arabs (such
as Sebastian Cabot as a black market vendor!). Quaint.
The
1957 feature, Barnacle Bill, fares better for its time, but it’s not on
the same par as other Ealing comedies such The Lavender Hill Mob or The
Ladykillers. In this one, William Ambrose (Guinness) comes from a long line
of seamen (dating back to prehistoric man) and Guinness appears as each one in
brief comedic scenes set through the ages. In the present, Ambrose, who suffers
from seasickness and therefore can’t be on a sailing ship, buys a decrepit
entertainment pier in England, restores it, and commandeers it as if it were
a ship. When the town bigwigs try to shut him down, he and his loyal
employees, including bathing houses manager, Mrs. Barrington (Irene Browne),
work to foil the corrupt officials’ plans. Watch for brief appearances by
future British stalwart actors such as a young Donald Pleasence, Lionel
Jeffries, and Allan Cuthbertson.
Both
films are presented in new 4K 1920x1080p restorations that look good enough.
They come with optional English subtitles. The disc also contains the trailer for Captain's Paradise as well as three other Guinness releases. Kudos
to Kino Lorber for making these Alec Guinness titles available in high
definition for fans of classic British comedy.
The widescreen "roadshow" films of the 1950s were so profitable that studios kept grinding out prestigious productions in hopes of making the next "Ben-Hur" or "The Ten Commandments". However, the sad truth is that more of these mega-budget spectacles tended to lose money than fill the studio coffers with profits. Indeed, some films that might have made money if they were shot as standard budget productions ended up being elongated to fill the running time of a roadshow presentation. One such film was director John Sturges' "The Hallelujah Trail", a visually sweeping production released in the Ultra 70 Panavision process and marketed under the banner of a Cinerama movie. (By then, the traditional 3-panel, multi-projector presentation process had been simplified, making such films easier to shoot and screen to audiences.) The story was based on a comedic novel by William Gulick. In addition to the prestige Sturges brought to production, an impressive cast was signed up by United Artists with Burt Lancaster getting top billing. However, Lancaster was dragooned into doing the film as part of financial commitments he owed the studio stemming from losses incurred by his own production company. Consequently, he had to make multiple films for United Artists at the bargain rate of $150,000 per picture. Lancaster was said to be in a rather foul mood during production and the mood was only dampened by the death of a stuntman during a wagon chase, a tragedy that cast a pall over the production.
The story is set in 1867 when the boom town of Denver is going through a crisis. It seems the local miners are rapidly depleting the local supply of whiskey. If they can't get a new shipment, they will have to suffer through the approaching winter months in a dry town until deliveries can resume in the spring. It's decided to make a bold gesture by hiring whiskey magnate Frank Wallingham (Brian Keith) to form a wagon train to deliver the booze to Denver. However, this requires traveling through landscapes controlled by hostile Indians. Thus, Wallingham uses his political connections to ensure that a U.S. Cavalry detachment is sent to meet the wagon train and escort them to Denver. That job falls to Col. Thaddeus Gearhart (Lancaster), who is non too pleased about having his men act as personal bodyguards for a profit-making enterprise. Adding to his woes is the arrival of Cora Templeton Massingale (Lee Remick), a noted feminist and leader of an all-female temperance movement. Cora and her followers insist on accompanying the cavalry unit so they can attempt to dissuade Wallingham from delivering the whiskey. Gearhart is a widower who is trying to raise a sexually precocious teenager daughter, Louise (Pamela Tiffin), who is romantically involved with Capt. Paul Slater (Jim Hutton), a key member of her father's unit. The situation worsens when Louise becomes a convert to Cora's cause. The reed-thin plot line involves all sorts of chaos and slapstick that occurs when the cavalry, temperance protestors and attacking Indians all converge with the wagon train in a big shoot-out in the desert.
"The Hallelujah Trail" is a perfect example of a movie that would make for a suitably entertaining 90-minute comedy. In fact, Sturges did just that with the 1962 Rat Pack western "Sergeants 3". However, it is packed with padding in order to justify its length as a Cinerama production. Consequently, scenes and repetitive comedic situations drag on endlessly. (The filmmakers are were so desperate that a joke involving Cora surprising Gearhart in his bathtub is reversed when he surprises her in her bathtub.) By the time the intermission comes, the battle in the desert (in which thousands of shots are fired without anyone being injured) is the cinematic equivalent of a sleep aid.
"The Hallelujah Trail" isn't an awful film, just overblown. The actors perform gamely throughout and there is a marvelous supporting cast, among which Donald Pleasence shines as a phony oracle who reads fortunes in return for booze and Brian Keith is marvelous grumpy as the whiskey magnate. The usually reliable Martin Landau, however, is saddled with the role of a comically drunken Indian that is literally cringe-inducing to watch. There is a wonderful score and title theme by Elmer Bernstein and cinematographer Robert Surtees impressively captures the magnificent landscapes.
Ordinarily, Olive Films produces very admirable Blu-ray product but they missed the boat on this one. The most charitable description of the transfer is "disappointing", though the average viewer might find it acceptable. Those with more discriminating standards will find it awful. The aspect ratio is wrong and the quality is little better than the old DVD releases. If you're watching it on a large screen, it's even more painful, with washed-out colors and a soft focus look that is quite truly below Olive's generally high standards. The film is no classic so Olive probably went with the best available elements but if this was the case, they should have considered deferring the release of the movie on Blu-ray. Despite the interesting back story, there is no commentary track. In fact, there are no bonus extras except the overture, intermission and a trailer that is so unspeakably bad that one suspects it was transferred from VHS. We rarely say this, but let the buyer beware. Our advice: skip the Blu-ray and make due with the DVD until a more promising release comes along.
A
naive but principled young guy from the sticks gets embroiled with outnumbered
and outgunned rebels in an uprising against a tyrannical empire, has his life
saved more than once by a roguish outlaw, is menaced by an older relative, and
goes on the run with a spirited young woman of royal lineage, all in a 1970s
movie featuring a talented cast of fresh newcomers and distinguished veteran
British actors.What, “Star Wars�Well . . . yeah, I suppose so . . . but
actually I was thinking of a substantially more obscure picture, Delbert Mann’s
1971 production “Kidnapped,†now available on Blu-ray from Kino Lorber.Mann’s movie was based on the Robert Louis
Stevenson novel, once widely read by teenage boys but now supplanted, I guess,
by “Minecraft†and Japanese Manga.I saw
the film in a nearly empty theater during its U.S. release in early 1972, a rare,
intelligent G-rated costume drama in a season otherwise dominated by the
cynical and hyper-violent likes of “Dirty Harry,†“Straw Dogs,†and “A
Clockwork Orange.â€It hardly made a stir
then, nor is it much remembered today, even among fans of Michael Caine, who
starred as Stevenson’s dashing, 18th Century Scots firebrand Alan Breck
Stewart.If fans remember Caine for any
film from 1971, it’s undoubtedly “Get Carter.â€Caine himself famously disowned “Kidnapped,†pissed because he had to
help bail it out financially when it ran out of money well into filming.“It was an absolute disaster,†he once
said.It’s difficult to fault Sir
Michael -- no actor likes to be stiffed after months of hard work, whatever the
circumstances -- but you have to wonder if some kind words from the popular
star might have given the film greater critical respect and commercial
visibility.
In
the movie’s tidy, thoughtful script by Jack Pulman, incidents from Stevenson’s
1886 novel are combined with others from its relatively obscure 1893 sequel
(titled “Catriona†in Britain and “David Balfour†here) and sieved through the
real-life social issues of the Vietnam and Bloody Sunday era. That doesn’t
particularly date the movie, since similar issues are still with us in today’s
arguments over Trump’s Border Wall, the Middle East, and Brexit.David Balfour (Lawrence Douglas), an orphan,
travels to Edinburgh in 1745 to claim his inheritance from his miserly uncle
(Donald Pleasence).The older man has
David abducted on board a ship to the Carolinas, where he’ll be dumped into
indentured servitude.Off the Scottish
coast, the ship acquires another passenger, the fugitive rebel Alan Breck
Stewart, who’s trying to keep insurgency against England alive after the Scots’
bloody defeat at the Battle of Culloden and the flight of Charles Stuart,
“Bonnie Prince Charlie,†the pretender to the British throne.(The Scots uprising may be familiar today
from Diana Gabaldon’s “Outlander†series.)When the treacherous ship’s captain (Jack Hawkins) tries to have Alan murdered
for his money, David helps the rebel and the two are subsequently
shipwrecked.In a trek across the
Highlands, they’re given shelter by Alan’s cousin James (Jack Watson).Unlike the nearly fanatical Alan, James is
tired of throwing away Scottish lives to support Prince Charlie’s dubious
cause.In an attack against James‘s
farmhouse by a rival clan allied with England, the Campbells, their chief Mungo
(Terry Richards) is shot to death by an unknown assassin.James is felled and thought killed, and Alan
and David flee with James‘s daughter Catriona (Vivien Heilbron).Eventually reaching Edinburgh, they learn
that James is still alive and in prison, charged with Mungo’s murder.David knows that James is innocent, because
he was standing beside him when the shot was fired from somewhere else in the
house.He tells the family lawyer
(Gordon Jackson) that he intends to appear at the trial as a witness for the
defense, even if the outcome is a foregone conclusion.Lord Grant, the government’s prosecutor
(Trevor Howard), is sympathetic to David’s stubborn integrity, but he knows
that the Campbells demand a scapegoat, and Campbell support is essential for
preventing more bloodshed and anarchy, even at the cost of an innocent man’s
life.“You live in a simple world,
David,†Grant says, not unkindly.“And
who protects that world?I do.â€Catriona seeks Alan’s help, but the rebel is
inclined to sail to France, raise further support for the Cause, and leave
James to his fate.
I must confess from the onset that I have always
considered From Beyond the Grave, directed by Kevin Connor, to be the
least of the Amicus horror anthologies.It’s not a terrible film by any means, but the E.C. Comics-inspired
insanities and dark supernatural energies that powered the franchise for a
decade or so seemed less potent this time around.This final curtain-closing portmanteau from the
folks at Amicus would feature, as usual, a well-established and highly regarded
cast of stars, Peter Cushing, Donald Pleasence, Margaret Leighton, Lesley-Anne
Down and a trio of Ian’s (Bannen, Oglivy, and Carmichael) among them.The talent behind camera was of equal pro
grade, but somehow the celluloid cocktail that resulted was far less kitschy
and exhilarating than its forebears.
An anthology film is only as strong as its collected interior
stories, of course, and the four tales that compromise From Beyond the Grave are, at best, weak tea.Naturally, the same can be said about any
number of standalone episodes from such classic and revered television fare as,
say, The Twilight Zone or The Outer Limits.These series all have their own episodic gem
marks, the handful of entries that everyone recalls and can agree upon as
favorites.Perhaps it was an atmospheric
spine-tingler or perhaps a more thoughtful episode that ends with a novel
twist. The other less-celebrated episodes that buttress these high-water marks are
either – at best – only dimly recalled or simply less regarded.
Amicus was, far and away, the uncontested “studio†of
honor in their presentations of these anthology horror films.The term “studio†is perhaps a bit of a
misnomer as the company had no Bray House or formal studio lot as a permanent
home. Taking a page from the 1945
British classic Dead of Night, transplanted
American producer Milton Subotsky and his mostly stateside partner Max J. Rosenberg
unleashed their first portmanteau horror Dr.
Terror’s House of Horrors in 1965.That film’s success – and its dependable formula – would be tirelessly reworked
a half-dozen times with such subsequent entries as Torture Garden (1967), The
House That Dripped Blood (1971), Asylum
(1972), Tales from the Crypt (1972), and
The Vault of Horror (1973).
In an interview with Gary Smith, the author of Uneasy Dreams: the Golden Age of British
Horror 1956-1976, producer Rosenberg revealed that it was the studio brass
at Warner Bros. who actually approached them one last time to make From Beyond the Grave.When the completed film was finally delivered
to them, Rosenberg recalled “the executives at Warner Bros. hated it†with the
studio declining to even release it.In
a prudent business move to minimize the financial losses of both parties, the
savvy Rosenberg arranged to retrieve for Amicus the sole rights to the film.It was then that Subotsky and Rosenberg were
able to negotiate a mutually less-risky, cost-saving distribution deal with
Warner Bros.
To be fair, I suppose one can sympathize with the
reservations expressed by the Warner executives as From Beyond the Grave (1974) is a somewhat pedestrian entry.The bloom was already off the rose for this
particular sort of production, and the already struggling British film industry
was still in the midst of battling up from the mat.To make matters even more trying, by the mid-1970s,
interest in the two-decade long reign of stylish, stiff-lipped and sometimes
winking British horror films was clearly on the wane.The horror film zeitgeist had moved back to
the U.S. with audiences now grappling with dark devil-worshipping blockbusters
as Rosemary’s Baby and The Exorcist.Not to mention the indie-film slashers who
were waiting in the wings for their own bloody turn.
But there was no crystal ball to see the end was near in
1973, so the machine continued to grind.Amicus was not above pinching talent – especially more recognizable old-school
on-screen talent as Peter Cushing and Christopher Lee – from Hammer Films Inc.The folks at Hammer were Amicus’s most famous
rival in the British horror industry, and non-trainspotting fans could – and
often did - misidentify their films as genuine Hammer productions.While the formidable Christopher Lee was cast
in such Amicus productions as Dr. Terror’s
House of Horrors, The House That
Dripped Blood and the Jekyll and Hyde pastiche I, Monster, it was – unquestionably – his professional contemporary
Peter Cushing who would provide the studio its principal marquee value.
Cushing would appear in no fewer than thirteen Amicus
productions 1965-1976 and he, more than anyone, would become the most public
face of the company’s acting troupe.Likewise, director Freddie Francis who had helmed such horror and
psychological terror films as Paranoiac,
Nightmare, The Evil of Frankenstein and Dracula
Has Risen from the Grave for Hammer between 1963 and 1968, would bring to
Amicus that studio’s recognizable flourish and attitude to his new assignments
for Subotsky and Rosenberg.
The four short stories woven in the creation of From Beyond the Grave were collected
from the ghost and horror tales spun by the British author R. Chetwynd-Hayes:
“The Gate Crasher,†“An Act of Kindness,†“The Elemental†and “The Door.â€I can’t comment on how faithful the film commits
to Chetwynd-Hayes’ original stories as I have not yet had the pleasure of
reading through his collected works.What I can say is that the four tales presented here aren’t particularly
suspenseful or mysterious… though there is, I suppose, enough atmosphere
sprinkled about to keep one interested throughout the film’s ninety plus
minutes.Peter Cushing likely enjoyed
only a day or two of work on the film, his contribution limited to a bit of sketchy
shop-keeping – and episode bridging - at the alley storefront of his macabre
antique parlour Temptations Ltd.The
four tales woven are really minor morality plays that end with unforgiving Old
Testament judgments.Nearly every
duplicitous customer who scams the elderly Cushing gets… well, what they
deserve.
The problem is that the stories chosen for the adapted screenplay
courtesy of Robin Clarke and Raymond Christodoulou are not a particularly
compelling or interesting.For the
earlier Amicus anthologies, Milton Subotsky dutifully combed for ghoulish material
through the grotesquely entertaining stories that appeared in the pages of the
schlocky E.C. Comics.Though Subotsky
was not, even by the account of co-producer Rosenberg, a particularly good
writer, he still managed to successfully capture some of the demented E.C.
Comics spirit in these earliest productions.Freddie Francis, who would go on to direct no fewer than nine films for
Amicus, was impressed by Subotsky’s “passion and perseverance†for the movie
business, but rued matter-of-factly in his own memoir that the producer, ultimately
and alas, “wasn’t very good at making them.â€
Kino Lorber has released a Blu-ray edition of the obscure 1984 thriller "The Ambassador". Despite it's impressive cast, the film was barely seen in the United States and had only sporadic distribution in other parts of the globe. The movie was a production of the Cannon Group, the now legendary schlock factory owned and operated by passionate Israeli movie buffs Yoram Globus and Menahem Golan. Cannon specialized in building often sub-par movies on limited budgets around stars with name recognition. Usually backed by sensationalist ad campaigns, Cannon became the toast of the film industry for churning out product at an almost surreal pace. Initially, Cannon was awash with cash but as moviegoers tastes became more sophisticated their ratio of misses-to-hits increased and ultimately the company folded. Although Cannon is synonymous with low-end action films and tasteless comedies, the company did occasionally seek to elevate the quality of its output by producing higher quality productions. "The Ambassador" was one such instance. It was ambitious in terms of aspirations even if it fell short of delivering on them.
The film was shot entirely in Israel and was based on Elmore Leonard's crime novel "52 Pick-Up". However, when Leonard learned that the screenplay by Max Jack had discarded virtually all of the characters and set-pieces from his book, he disowned the film. (Curiously, Cannon would make this up to Leonard by producing a more literal version of the novel a couple of years later. It was released under the book's title and Leonard wrote the screenplay.) The titular character is Peter Hacker (Robert Mitchum), the U.S. ambassador to Israel. Hacker is an idealist who is determined to use his influence to bring about a two-state solution to the Middle East crisis that will allow Israelis and Palestinians to finally coexist peacefully. However, he not only has to overcome skepticism from mainstream people on both sides, there are also fringe terrorist groups determined to undermine his efforts. The film opens with Hacker and his embassy security man Frank Stevenson (Rock Hudson) attempting to broker a secret meeting in the desert between armed Palestinian and Israeli combatants. Against all odds, both parties send representatives but a terrorist group attacks by helicopter and slaughters most of the attendees. Undeterred, Hacker concentrates on courting young people on both sides in the hopes that he can convince them to use peaceful means to settle their differences. Hacker has other pressures in his personal life: his wife Alex (Ellen Burstyn) is suffering from alcoholism and makes a spectacle of herself at a high profile social occasion. More disturbingly, she's been carrying on an anonymous affair with a local Palestinian merchant, Mustapha Hashimi (Fabio Testi). He doesn't know that his lover is the wife of the American ambassador and she doesn't know that he is a bigwig in the Palestinian Liberation Organization and is under constant surveillance by the Mossad, the Israeli intelligence agency. It turns out someone has secretly filmed the lovers in bed. Hacker receives a phone call threatening to release the film unless he pays a million dollars ransom. This sets in motion a complex but interesting plot in which Hacker and Stevenson work to find the culprits and retrieve the film by any means necessary. The trail leads to mysterious and dangerous characters who attempt to assassinate Hacker even as he doggedly continues his obsession with finding a peaceful solution to Middle East violence.
"The Ambassador" features the three principals in very fine performances. An aging Mitchum still shows charisma and can deliver the goods in terms of a dramatic performance, despite the fact that he was said to be drunk throughout much of the shoot. Burstyn (in a role originally intended for Elizabeth Taylor) gives a daring performance for an actress over 50 years old by appearing topless in several scenes. Hudson, in his final feature film, cuts a handsome figure. He was still in fine athletic shape and performs quite a few action scenes with credibility. Mores the pity that the AIDS that would take his life within the next year was probably already beginning to take its toll on him. Donald Pleasence appears fleetingly but impressively as the head of the Mossad. The direction by the once-esteemed J. Lee Thompson is a step up from the celluloid claptrap he had been churning out for Cannon in recent years. It's also interesting to note that 22 years previously, he and Mitchum had teamed for the classic thriller "Cape Fear". "The Ambassador" has plenty of well-staged action scenes and Thompson makes the most of capitalizing on the Israeli locations, bringing a good sense of exotic atmosphere to the production. The script is more problematic because some aspects of the story stretch credibility. Ambassadors are to follow directions from the administration they serve. Peter Hacker is constantly freelancing by taking on well-intentioned but absurd secret missions and rendezvouses. In reality, he wouldn't last a day in the job. The film ends with a bloodbath but tries to mitigate the shock by tacking on a feel-good ending that comes across as contrived.
The Kino Lorber release has a very impressive transfer. There is a commentary track with film historians Nathaniel Thompson and Howard S. Berger, who present an informative discussion the film's editor, Mark Goldblatt. They provide a wealth of great information about the film (i.e. Rock Hudson was a last minute replacement for Telly Savalas). Goldblatt discusses the pros and cons of working for Cannon and bemoans the fact that the film was not widely seen. (He speculates it might have been made for tax shelter purposes.) There are times when the volume on Thompson's voice drops significantly, which is a bit annoying and, unless my ears deceive me, the track consists almost entirely of Thompson and Goldblatt with Berger only weighing in very infrequently. But the track is a great addition that gives valuable insights into a film that should have received more respect. The disc also contains two trailers: one for the American market and another for the international campaigns.
Forty
eight years ago, United Artists continued their series of highly profitable
Bond double features by releasing arguably the biggest 00 double bill of them
all – Thunderball and You Only Live Twice.Both films had coined money on their initial
releases, with Thunderball being the
highest-grossing 007 film of that era – in fact, of many eras, right up until Skyfall in 2012.Thunderball
earned a stunning $141 Million worldwide (over onebilliondollars in today’s money), a number that
must have had UA’s finance department humming the Bond theme at 727 Seventh
Avenue. You Only Live Twice pulled in
over $111 Million worldwide, its profits squeezed perhaps by a competing Bond
film, the over-the-top comedy, Casino
Royale with Peter Sellers, David Niven, Terence Cooper and Woody Allen as various
Bonds or an Italian spy knockoff starring Sean Connery’s younger brother, Neil.
(More on that later.)
Throughout
the 60s, 70s and into the early 80s, United Artists cannily fed the demand for
Bond with double features that also served to ignite audience interest between
new films.The double-bills were pure
cash cows for the studio – the movies had already been produced and paid for,
so all UA had to do was book the theaters, buy TV, radio and print advertising,
then, as Bond producer Cubby Broccoli was fond of saying, “Open the cinema
doors and get out of the way.â€
As
a (very) young Bond fan in New York City, the exciting double feature TV spots
for “The Two Biggest Bonds of All†got my attention and I desperately wanted to
go.My father, an advertising and music executive,
thought noon on a Saturday was the perfect time – instead we were greeted with
a line around the block and a sold out show. Apparently that satisfied my dad’s interest in
the movies because we never went back. Almost
five decades later, I still regretted missing those two fantastic films on the
big screen…
Enter
Quentin Tarantino.Throughout July, his New
Beverly Theater in LA ran most of the classic Bonds in vintage 35MM IB
Technicolor prints, reportedly from his own collection. (The IB refers to
“imbibitionâ€, Technicolor’s patented die-transfer process resulting in a richer,
more stable color palette.) So while
there was no 4-hour, action-packed double feature for me, I finally got
to see both films in 1960s 35MM, only a week apart.Even fifty years later, they didn’t
disappoint:Thunderball remains a bonafide masterpiece.Fortunately Quentin owns a very good print,
so the colors were still lush and it was fairly scratch-free.The main titles set to Tom Jones’ timeless
song still popped in an explosion of colors and sound effects. The scenes of
Domino and Bond meeting on a coral reef were hauntingly beautiful. The frantic Junkanoo
chase fairly jumped off the screen and Thunderball’s
iconic underwater battle is still a showstopper.(The filmmakers cleverly refrained from
wall-to-wall music so the sequence incorporated underwater breathing and other
natural sounds. Kudos again to 00 audio genius, Norman Wanstall.)
You Only Live Twice is a true epic and
only the master showmen, Monsieurs Broccoli and Harry Saltzman could have
pulled it off.They reached into the
highest levels of the Japanese government to secure a lengthy shoot in what was
then a very exotic location in a much bigger world.Japan was almost a character itself in their sprawling
space age tale that occasionally bordered on sci-fi.Much
has been written about Ken Adam’s volcano crater, but seeing it on a big screen
really brings out his mind-blowing vision, especially during the climactic
battle where the “ninjas†rappel down from the roof as controlled explosions rock
the set.One can only imagine how that
went over with 1967 audiences who had never seen anything like it.Putting it in context, Tarantino had selected
various spy-themed trailers to run before the film – including The Wrecking Crew, TheVenetian Affair and The Liquidator.Although they were all successful and well made,
their sets and action sequences looked positively cheap in comparison to a Bond
film.
Both
features starred a young, vibrant Connery whose acting chops were on full
display.Connery played Bond for
real.He made you believe… once you bought into him as 007, then his strapping on a
jetpack to fly over a French chateau, or a SPECTRE construction crew hollowing
out a volcano - in secret - to create a rocket base seemed totally
plausible.Sure Connery had put on a few
pounds between Thunderball and Twice, but he was still fit and looked
fantastic in his custom-made suits.And his
fight with Samoan wrestler Peter Maivia (grandfather to Dwayne “The Rock†Johnson)
in Osato’s office is still one for the ages.
(Above: Mie Hama joins in celebrating Connery's birthday on the set.)
As
most Bond students know, Twice was a
grueling shoot for the mercurial star.He was subjected to intense press and fan interest in a country that had
gone wild for 007.Connery needed security
to accompany him from location trailer to set. Going out for a quiet dinner was
out of the question – even visiting the loo was off limits after an overzealous
photographer poked his lens into Connery’s toilet stall! But if he was feeling angry or bitter about
his situation, he was too much of a pro to let it show in his performance.In spite of the pressures, there were some
good times on the Twice shoot during
the furnace hot Asian summer of 1966 – now-famous photos show Connery-san
laughing with lovely Mie Hama at his 36th birthday party on
location, or back at Pinewood, smiling at Donald Pleasence during a light
moment in the control room that even had Blofeld’s hulking bodyguard (actor Ronald
Rich) laughing in the background.
The year 1976 was a phenomenal time for films
that went into production. George Lucas’s space opera, Star Wars began principal photography in March; Steven Spielberg,
fresh off the success of Jaws, was
given carte blanche to bring Close Encounters of the Third Kind to
the screen and began shooting in May; and Dario Argento, who became emboldened
by the financial success of his latest and arguably best film to date, Profundo Rosso (known in the U.S. as Deep Red), embarked upon Suspiria, a murder mystery involving a
dance school hiding in plain sight while housing a coven of witches, which
began filming in July. Horror author Clive Barker once described this supernatural
extravaganza as what you would imagine a horror film to be like if you weren’t allowed
to see it. I believe that this is a good description of what is unquestionably
one of the most frightening, entertaining and colorful horror films ever made. Suspiria was edited for its American
theatrical exhibition due to some graphic violence that many would have
considered shocking for its day. Distributor 20th Century Fox was
reportedly so embarrassed by the film that they created a subsidiary company,
International Classics, to release it three months after their phenomenally
successful Star Wars, another film
they had no faith in.
Suspiria opened in New York
on Friday, August 12, 1977 at the long-gone Criterion on 45th and
Broadway before branching out to additional theaters. It’s the first in a
trilogy concerning the nature of Death (Inferno
(1980) and The Mother of Tears (2007)
are the second and third parts, respectively). The film’s quad-syllabic title
quite understandably leaves those who attempt to say it tongue-tied (it’s
pronounced sus-PEER-ee-ah). The word itself
has its origins in Latin and roughly translates into “sighs†or “whispers†and
the film is based upon the writings of British essayist Thomas De Quincey. His
most famous work, Confessions of an
English Opium Eater, was published in 1822. Twenty-three years later he
published Suspiria de Profundis which
is Latin for “Sighs from the Depths†and is a collection of essays, the most
famous of which is Levana and Our Ladies
of Sorrow which Mr. Argento used as the source material for his
trilogy.
In Suspiria,
Suzy Bannion, played by doe-eyed Jessica Harper (who was Woody Allen’s
girlfriend at the time and passed on Annie
Hall because she wanted to go to Italy), arrives in Frieberg, Germany to
begin dance lessons at the famous Tanz Academie (the architecture is copied
from Haus zum Walfisch in Freiberg). From the film’s opening frames, we already
know that we are in uncharted territory as the images are bathed in diffused
primary colors. Upon her arrival
at the airport, things are already not what they seem. Once she leaves the
premises and the glass doors close behind her, she enters a fairy tale in the
form of an unusually violent thunderstorm. Hitching a ride from a taxi
driver played by Argento regular Fulvio Mingozzi (min-GOATS-see), who worked for the director no less than ten times
in both film and television episodes, she makes her way to the school (as a
side-note, eagle-eyed viewers can see the director’s reflection in the glass
partition in the taxi 3:31 minutes into the film and it lasts for two seconds.
He appears, with a large smile on his face, in the lower left-hand corner of
the screen).
Just as she arrives, a hysterical woman, Pat
Hingle (Eva Axen), appears on the school’s doorstep and makes an unintelligible
proclamation before bolting into the deluge-swept streets. Suzy carps with a
woman on the intercom, pleading for entry and refuge from the torrential rain. When
she’s denied, she re-enters the taxi and rides through the Black Forest,
catching a glimpse of Pat as she runs, attempting to make her way past the
trees. What could possibly have set her off on such a perilous journey?
Pat makes her way to her friend Sonia’s (Susanna Javicoli) apartment,
hesitant to disclose what she has come to learn about the school. In what is
considered Argento’s finest hour and the film’s most disturbing and celebrated
sequence, Pat is violently stabbed by some inhuman creature with hairy arms and
long black fingernails and is thrown through a stained-glass window, the shards
of which also kill Sonia. It’s been compared with the shower scene in Psycho (1960) for pure shock effect,
though this one is much more graphic.
The calm following the storm reveals a
strange faculty staff consisting of lead ballet teacher Ms. Tanner (Alida Valli),
headmistress Madame Blanc (Joan Bennett), pianist Daniel (Flavio Bucci), and
Pavlos (Giuseppe Transocchi) the handyman. Suzy is told by the headmistress
that one of their expelled students, Pat, was murdered by a madman the night
before. Wouldn’t that be enough to send one packing their bags? The same scenario
plays out for Jennifer Connelly in the director’s other macabre coming-of-age
horror film, Phenomena (1985), and the
information in that film is met with nothing more than a smile and silence. Unbeknownst
to Suzy, the school is a front for a coven of witches who hold black masses
within the massive building’s stealthy labyrinths. Her suspicions that all is
not right with the school become confirmed when people around her suddenly disappear
or are killed off. Like previous Argento protagonists, Suzy plays sleuth to
gain insight into the bizarre goings-on, especially the teachers’ concerted
effort to hide the directress’s presence from her. When she teams up with Sarah
(Stefania Casini) to find out more about one Helena Markos, more people begin
to die as Suzy learns of a shocking secret that lies behind an imperceptible
door.
Suspiria’s simple premise
permits Mr. Argento to stage some of the most shocking and elaborate death
sequences of his career, all performed in-camera (that is without the use of
opticals or blue-screen technology used later in post-production). The Italian
progressive rock band Goblin provides a phenomenal score that, unbelievably,
was composed before filming began and was played on the film’s soundstages
during shooting to maximize the effect on the performers. It’s an astonishing
concoction with shrieks, whispers and wails, which I always assumed to be
non-diegetic in nature, acting almost as a macabre precursor to the far more
relaxing Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response (ASMR) videos that have taken YouTube
by storm.
Mr. Argento has also put together an eclectic
cast, the bulk of whom are women. Joan Bennett, who appeared in Fritz Lang’s coincidentally
titled Secret Beyond the Door… with
Michael Redgrave (1947) as well as her stint on Dark Shadows, provides the proper amount of sinister air that the
film requires. Alida Valli is terrific as Miss Tanner, the “stern and surlyâ€
ballet teacher, arguably the most memorable in the cast. Jessica Harper, fresh
off her role as Phoenix in Brian DePalma’s wildly entertaining Phantom of the Paradise (1974), appears
naïve but turns out to be anything but as she goes to greater-than-usual
lengths to uncover The Big Secret.
Suspiria is unique in that it
was shot on Eastman Kodak film but printed using the now-defunct three-strip
Technicolor dye transfer process which divided the negative into three individual
color bands of red, green, and blue. By manipulating the intensities of these
primary colors both on the set and in the lab, cinematographer Luciano Tovoli
was able to create some truly horrific and stunning images. The set design is
garish, colorful and must be seen to be believed. The
color scheme seems to have been inspired by Walt Disney’s Snow White and the Seven Dwarves (1937) and dance film aficionados
will likely also think of Emeric Pressburger and Michael Powell’s stunning 1948
technicolor film The Red Shoes and their follow-up, 1951’s The
Tales of Hoffman (George A. Romero’s favorite film), but the story seems inspired
by Chicho
Ibáñez-Serrador’s La Residencia, a terrific horror opus from 1970 which pits the borstal’s
headmistress, Senora Fourneau (played brilliantly by Lilli Palmer), against a
school of young women in need of reform. There is a predatory air about
Fourneau that carries over to Ms. Tanner in Suspiria.
A case might even be made that Ms. Tanner is a psychological cinematic
equivalent of the malevolent and sadistic Mrs. Wakehurst in Peter Walker’s House of Whipcord (1974). La Residencia has appeared under such
titles as The Finishing School, The Boarding School and here in the
States as The House That Screamed when
it was released on a double-bill with Anthony M. Lanza’s The Incredible 2-Headed Transplant in July 1971.
Virgil Films has released the remarkable documentary "The Coolest Guy Movie Ever", a unique look at the 1963 WWII classic "The Great Escape". The film cemented Steve McQueen as a newly-minted superstar of the big screen and featured one of the all-time great casts: James Garner, Richard Attenborough, Charles Bronson, James Coburn, David McCallum, Donald Pleasence, James Donald among them. United Artists originally intended the movie to be shot in Hollywood but director John Sturges argued that it would only be convincing if shot on location in Germany. "The Coolest Guy Movie Ever" visits those locations and presents how they look today. In some cases, the iconic locations have changed considerably while others remain instantly recognizable. The documentary was conceived, directed, photographed and edited by Christophe Espenan, a devoted fan of the film. Espenan and a team of dedicated assistants and enthusiasts of the movie painstakingly tracked down even the most minor locations. The documentary details the challenges this presented in Germany's ever-changing landscape. Most vitally, he also tracked down people whose families interacted with the film crew. Most interesting is the small hotel where key members of the cast, including Steve McQueen, stayed during production. The son of the couple who ran the hotel at the time (and who still operates it today) gives first-hand memories of what it was like to have legendary celebrities staying in the cozy venue and how polite everyone was to the family. The documentary is chock full of such wonderful anecdotes and is enhanced by ample film clips from the movie and very rare production photos.
We spoke to Joe Amodei, the President and CEO of Virgil Films, which has released the film as a region-free DVD. Here, Amodei shares his thoughts about the production.
When
did you first learn of the existence of “The Coolest Guy Movie Everâ€
documentary?
Somewhere around three years ago Steven Jay Rubin
introduced me to Chris Espenan who was directing the doc. I had previously
released Steve’s documentary “East LA Marine†about WWII hero Guy Gabaldon.
Steve knew I was a “Great Escape†fan and told me about the movie. I
immediately said “Tally Ho, I am in.â€
What
attracted you in terms of agreeing to distribute the film through Virgil?
â€The Great Escape†was the film that did it for me as a
kid going to the movies in Northeast Philadelphia. In those days I could walk
to the theatre so I went three or four times a week. I learned the meaning of “coolâ€
while watching the film. Steve McQueen was the definition of that word. We are
always on the lookout for film- related docs and this one really came close to
home. I also knew it was something I might be able to get my friend Michael
Meister involved in. He is a fellow “Great Escape†lover who ended up coming in
with finishing funds that allowed us to screen the film in the market at
Cannes. BTW Michael LOVES Cinema Retro!
Where
did the rare production photos seen in the documentary originate?
A lot of them came from Walter Rimi’s son Christian who
graciously allowed us the use of his father’s photos. Walter was second unit
director of photography. Christian is in the film and gives a very emotional
talk about freedom and how important it s.
What
was WWII historian Steve Rubin’s role in making the documentary a reality?
He is the Producer of the film. Our very own Big X. My
Dad and I had the pleasure of seeing the film at Grauman’s Theatre (I still
call it that) in Hollywood a few years back during the Turner Classic Movies
Film Fest. Was very cool seeing it on the big screen with my father sitting
next to me. It’s not something I will ever forget.
What
are your personal memories of “The Great Escape� When did you first see it?
The summer of 1963. The Merben Movie Theatre.
Philadelphia PA. I remember building a ramp for my bicycle to jump over. I was
lucky if I got the bike a foot or two off the ground. But it felt unbelievably
cool!!!!
What
qualities about the movie do you feel resonate most after so many years?
The POW’s never give up. They try to escape from the
minute they get into the camp. They never give up. It is this heroism that the
real Stalag Luft 3 inhabitants had when they made the real escape in March of
1944. John Surges and crew made sure that courage was on display throughout the
film.
Who
is your favorite character in the film?
Simply put Virgil Hilts. But I do have a love for Charles
Bronson’s portrayal of “Tunnel King†Danny as well.
…your
favorite scene?
Nothing like that motorcycle jump over the fence to get
me going. There is also a scene where McQueen takes down a German soldier about
to shoot his friend, “The Mole†Ives. He
doesn’t get to save him but the gymnastic leap off the ground of McQueen’s body
into the German added to the coolness of the character. No one had done this in
movies before. We had cool actors like William Holden in “Stalag 17†or James
Dean in “Rebel Without a Cause.†But no one was cool like McQueen. No one.
Any
reflections on Elmer Bernstein’s score?
In the top two or three of all time. It is the ringer on
my phone. I got the chance to thank him at a screening of “Sweet Smell of
Success†a while back. He was a nice and gracious man.
Your
thoughts on John Sturges as a director and other films of his that have
impressed you.
Sturges never gets
the credit he deserves because a lot of his films were big time audience
favorites but not necessarily critical favorites. This guy not only made “The
Great Escape†but he also brought us “The Magnificent Seven", “Bad Day at Black
Rock,†“The Old Man and the Sea†and “Gunfight at the OK Corral.†Those are
some heavyweights!!
Sam Spiegel was one of the most revered and accomplished producers in Hollywood history. His achievements included such classics as "On the Waterfront", "The African Queen", "The Bridge on the River Kwai" and "Lawrence of Arabia". His body of work, though not nearly as extensive as that of some other producers, was notable in the sense that Spiegel thought big and shot for the moon when it came to bringing to the screen stories that spoke to the human condition. Following the triumphant release of "Lawrence" in 1962, Spiegel did not make another film for four years. When he did, the movie - "The Chase"- turned out to be a star-packed drama that won over neither critics or audiences. Spiegel had a more ambitious idea for his next production, a screen adaptation of the best-selling WWII thriller "The Night of the Generals" by Hans Helmut Kirst. Spiegel had the inspired idea of reuniting his "Lawrence of Arabia" co-stars Peter O'Toole and Omar Sharif. They were reluctant to take on the project, but they certainly owed him. Both were virtual unknowns until Spiegel gave them the roles that made them international stars. Spiegel also added to the mix an impressive cast of esteemed British actors ranging from veterans such as Donald Pleasence and Charles Gray to up-and-coming young actors Tom Courtenay and Joanna Pettet. He chose Anatole Litvak to direct. Litvak had been making films for decades and had a few notable hits such as "Sorry, Wrong Number", "Anastasia" and "The Snake Pit". Spiegel being Spiegel ensured that the production benefited from a large budget and an appropriate running time (148 minutes) that would allow the story to unfold in a measured process.
"The Night of the Generals" is certainly a unique spin on WWII films. There are no battles or major action sequences, save for a harrowing sequence in which the German army systematically destroys part of the Warsaw Ghetto. Instead, it's very much a character study populated by characters who are, indeed, very interesting. The film opens with a tense sequence set in occupied Warsaw. The superintendent of an over-crowded apartment building accidentally overhears the brutal murder of a local prostitute in a room upstairs. From a hiding place he witnesses the killer walk past him. He does not see the man's face but recognizes his uniform: he is a general in the German army. The man keeps this information to himself on the logical assumption that divulging it might mean his death sentence. However, under questioning from the army investigator, Major Grau (Omar Sharif), he tells the shocking details of what he witnessed. From this moment, Grau becomes obsessed with finding the killer. Grau may be a German officer, but he is a pure cynic when it comes to the Nazi cause and the brutal methods being employed to win the war. He can't control the larger picture of how the war is being waged but he can control what is in his jurisdiction: bringing to justice the man who committed this one especially savage murder. Grau soon centers on three suspects. The first is General von Seiditz-Gabler (Charles Gray, channeling his future Blofeld), an effete, well-connected opportunist who is in a loveless marriage to his dominating wife Eleanore (Coral Browne). Then there is General Kahlenberg (Donald Pleasence), a man of slight build and low-key personality who has some eccentric personal habits that may include murder. Last, and most intriguing, is General Tanz (Peter O'Toole), a much-loathed and much-feared darling of Hitler's inner circle whose ruthless methods with dealing with civilian populations disgust his colleagues. Tanz has been sent to control or obliterate the Warsaw Ghetto.
The screenplay (which includes contributions by an uncredited Gore Vidal) is a bit disjointed and cuts back and forth to the present day in which we see a French police inspector, Morand (Phillippe Noiret), investigating the case twenty years later as he tries to tie together Grau's findings with dramatic developments that occurred during his handling of the case. Morand also appears in the war era sequences, having befriended Grau, who does not seem at all disturbed when he learns that Morand is actually a key figure in the French Resistance. Grau becomes particularly intrigued by General Ganz. He is an elitist snob who is devoid of any humor or compassion. A workaholic with seemingly no human weaknesses, Tanz is ostensibly under the command of his superior officer, Gabler, but it becomes clear that his political connections make him the top general in Warsaw. Major Grau interviews all three suspects and finds that any of them could be the murderer. When he becomes too intrusive, he is conveniently promoted and transferred to Paris, presumably to shut down his investigation. However, as the fortunes of war decline for the Third Reich, the top brass is eventually moved to Paris and Grau resumes his investigation when he discovers that prostitutes are being brutally murdered there as well. There is a parallel story that accompanies that of the murder investigation. It centers on Corporal Hartmann (Tom Courtenay), a young soldier who has been reluctantly acclaimed to be a national hero. It seems he was the last surviving member of his unit after a bloody battle. The brass used him as a propaganda tool, bestowing medals on him for heroic actions. In fact, he is a self-proclaimed coward whose only goal is to stay alive through the war. Hartmann confesses this to his superior, General Kahlenberg, who is amused by his honesty. He assigns him to be General Tanz's personal valet and orders him to show Tanz the history and sights of Paris. Neither he nor Tanz wants to partake in the venture, but Gabler orders Tanz to take a few days vacation, largely because he despises the man's presence. The scenes in which Hartmann tries to appease the mercurial Tanz without making any missteps are fraught with tension and suspense. Tanz is a fascinating character, presumably devoid of the vices most men have. However, in the course of their time together, Hartmann realizes that Tanz is somewhat of a fraud. He surreptitiously drinks to excess and changes into civilian clothes in order to meet with prostitutes in seedy bars. Although Tanz chews out Hartmann for every minor infraction, he seems to come to respect the younger man's professionalism. This sets in motion another complex plot development that also involves Hartmann's secret romance with General Gabler's free-spirited daughter Ulrike (Joanna Pettet).
Just trying to summarize the various plot strands of "The Night of the Generals" in this space is fairly exhausting. Oh, did I mention that another subplot involves Field Marshal Rommel (a cameo by Christopher Plummer) and the July, 1944 plot on the part of rebellious German officers to assassinate Adolf Hitler? Nevertheless, although the various story lines become quite complex, they are all tied together eventually in clever and compelling ways. The film is part "Whodunnit", part political statement and part war movie. The movie moves back to the present for its intense conclusion as Inspector Morand is finally able to solve the crime and attempt to bring the culprit to justice. When the killer is revealed it's about as shocking of a development as the revelation that the butler did it in one of those old British film noir mysteries. Still, director Litvak (who shares the producer credit with Sam Spiegel because he owned the screen rights to the novel) keeps the action flowing briskly running time and elicits outstanding performances from his cast. O'Toole, who would later capitalize on playing larger-than-life characters, was at this point in his career still very immersed in portraying introspective, quiet men. He is quite mesmerizing as General Tanz and quite terrifying as well. Sharif is, at least on the surface, badly cast. I'm not aware of any Egyptians who became prominent German officers. Sharif has the map of the Middle East on his face and lingering remnants of his native accent. It's to his credit that he overcomes these obstacles and gives a very fine performance as the charismatic investigator who doggedly pursues his suspects with Javert-like conviction. All of the other performances are equally outstanding, with Courtenay especially impressive- and one has to wonder why the very talented Joanna Pettet never became a bigger star. The international flavor of the cast gives the film a Tower of Babel-like effect. Some of the actors attempt to affect a quasi-German accent while others speak with British accents, and then we have the French and Poland-based sequences with even more diversity of languages. Still, if you could accept Richard Burton and Clint Eastwood speaking "German" in their native tongues in "Where Eagles Dare", you won't find this aspect of "The Night of the Generals" to be particularly distracting. I should also mention the impressive contributions of composer Maurice Jarre, cinematographer Henri Decae and main titles designer Robert Brownjohn (remember when films even had opening titles?) In summary, the film-which not successful with critics or the public- is a thoroughly intriguing experience and affords us the joy of watching some of the best actors of the period sharing the screen.
"The Night of the Generals" has been released as a limited edition (3,000 units) Blu-ray from Twilight Time. The transfer is gorgeous, giving full impact to the impressive cinematography and lush production design. There is also an isolated score track, the original trailer and an informative booklet by film historian Julie Kirgo, who examines Sam Spiegel's attempts to rebuild his career in subsequent years only to find that he was out of place in the new Hollywood.
Although
it would be a wait of 15 months before it hit British screens, Phenomena –
Dario Argento’s ninth feature release – was first unveiled to Italian audiences
early in 1985. It had been three years since Tenebrae (which despite stiff
competition is my favourite Argento) and at the time Phenomena was broadly
considered his weakest offering. It’s narrative core, which concerns a young
girl communing with insects in order to identify a maniac killer, was indisputably
a shade bananas (rather apt given the significant involvement of a vengeful
primate!), but for me it was by no means his least interesting film to that
point and considering the mixed bag of cinematic fodder bearing his name that’s
appeared in the years since, I’d not hesitate to cite it as one of his more
entertaining.
Jennifer
Corvino (Jennifer Connelly), the teenage daughter of a famous movie star,
arrives at The Richard Wagner International School for Girls in Switzerland
where she learns from her new roommate that a number of girls in the area have
gone missing, the possible victims of a serial killer. Jennifer suffers from somnambulism
and one night she wakens to find herself lost in the woods, whereupon she
encounters a friendly chimpanzee which leads her to safety at the nearby home
of its owner, wheelchair-bound entomologist Professor John McGregor (Donald
Pleasence). Jennifer is fascinated by insects and when she tells McGregor she’s
able to communicate with them telepathically the two become firm friends.
McGregor has been assisting police on the serial killer case in an advisory
capacity and believes that the corpses of the missing girls can be tracked down
by the Great Sarcophagus, a species of fly that can detect rotting flesh. He
duly convinces Jennifer she can help solve the case by using one that he has
captive to guide her to the refuge of the killer.
Speaking
of that run-time, if ever proof were needed that it’s possible to have too much
of a good thing then Phenomena is it. There exist three versions of the movie:
the 116-minute Italian cut, a 110-minute international edit, and an American
theatrical cut (retitled Creepers and which, at 83-minutes, had almost a third of
the Italian original’s run-time sheared off it); against all expectation it’s
the latter tightened-up version that arguably plays best.
But
I digress. The Swiss locations are breathtaking and in terms of set-up, Phenomena’s
opening sequence – which finds a young girl on a class trip into the mountains
being inadvertently left behind when the coach departs (they used to count us
aboard in my day!) – is terrific. The girl, played by his teenage daughter
Fiore, goes looking for help and happens across a chalet nestled in the
hillside where someone (or something!) tries to kill her. She flees but is
pursued by the grunting, scissor-wielding maniac to an observation platform
overlooking a waterfall. All the pieces are in place for the film’s first
murder sequence and with almost lascivious relish the camera observes a
stabbing, followed by a slo-mo backwards lurch through a plate glass window and
finally a decapitation. There’s graphic mayhem aplenty peppered throughout the
remainder of the movie (including a protracted wallow in a vile stew of rotting
cadavers), but for sheer style this opener is never quite matched.
Jennifer
Connelly was 14-years-old when she shot Phenomena and given that it was only
her second feature film appearance (following a small part in 1984’s Once Upon
a Time in America), it’s remarkable just how confidently she carries the film;
not only a budding beauty but already exhibiting the talent that would carry
her on to great acclaim (including an Oscar for A Beautiful Mind) in the years
ahead. Donald Pleasence showed up in a fistful of Italian chillers of varied
worth during the 1980s and he’s as reliably entertaining as ever here, adopting
a Scottish accent as the academic whose closest chum is a chimp. Argento’s
long-time partner and go-to leading lady (cf. Deep Red, Inferno, Tenebrae, Opera)
Daria Nicolodi delivers with elan, so too for that matter does gorgeous Flesh
for Frankenstein star Dalila Di Lazzaro, present as Jennifer’s chaperone and
school headmistress respectively. It’s good to see prolific player Patrick
Bauchau on hand too, although he’s a tad underused as the investigating police
inspector, very much relegated to the sidelines of the action.
German actress Karin Dor has died at age 79. She had been in a nursing home since suffering the severe aftereffects of a fall last year. Dor was a popular presence in European cinema. She began acting in the 1950s and became a well-known star in the 1960s. She frequently collaborated with her husband, Austrian director Harald Reinl. She appeared in several of the popular German "Winnetou" westerns and well as German crime programs on television. In 1967 she achieved a new level of fame when she was cast as Helga Brandt, the sultry SPECTRE agent who seduces Sean Connery's James Bond before attempting to kill him in the 1967 blockbuster "You Only Live Twice". Dor's character suffered a memorable fate when her employer, SPECTRE chieftain Ernst Stavro Blofeld (Donald Pleasence) ensures she drops into his piranha-filled moat. She later had a leading role in Alfred Hitchcock's 1969 spy thriller "Topaz". Dor continued to act until recently, with her last screen credit in 2015. She was also a frequent presence on European television programs.
In what may have been her last interview, Dor discussed the making of "You Only Live Twice" in-depth with Cinema Retro contributing writers Matthew Field and Ajay Chowdhury. The interview appears in the latest issue, #39.
Cinema Retro issue #39 has now shipped worldwide. For subscribers, this is the final issue of Season 13. Please renew for Season 14 (see below) and keep supporting the world's most unique movie magazine.
Issue #39 devotes a full 32 pages to celebrating the 50th anniversary of the James Bond film "You Only Live Twice", which starred Sean Connery as 007 and introduced Donald Pleasence as the immortal villain Ernst Stavro Blofeld. Why did we dedicate half of the pages in this issue to the film? Largely because of the outpouring of contributions from talented writers from around the world, not to mention esteemed names like composer David Arnold, actress Karin Dor, who played the villainous femme fatale Helga Brandt, Tsai Chin who played Bond's bedmate in the pre-credits scene, legendary lyricist Leslie Bricusse, assistant director William Cartlidge, future Oscar-winning production designer Peter Lamont and Nancy Sinatra, who recalls the nerve-wracking experience of singing the title song. Plus in-depth looks at composer John Barry, the cars of "You Only Live Twice", the inside story behind the Little Nellie autogyro, "now and then" photos of key locations and a Bondwagon full of rare photos and promotional art, some of which are published here for the first time- plus a look at all the accompanying international 007 collectibles.
Issue #39 also concludes our celebration of the life and career of actress Susan George and examines the kinky little-seen crime thriller "Night Hair Child" (aka "What the Peeper Saw") plus the obscure-but-worthy cult flick "Deadly Strangers" starring Hayley Mills- plus tributes to the late, great Sir Roger Moore.
In reality, you only live once- so don't miss this limited edition issue.
You can still subscribe to Season 13 and get all three issues shipped to you
at once, including issue #37 and #38, which honor "Rocky" and "The Dirty
Dozen" respectively.
The
plot of Dario Argento’s 1985 thriller Phenomena
has long been the subject of ridicule and derision by critics and fans alike
since its initial release. The inevitable complaints about the film range from
the bad dubbing and stiff performances to the ludicrous notion that insects can
be employed as detectives in a homicide investigation (this is true and has
actually been done, providing the inspiration for the film). If the film does
not sound familiar, that could be attributed to the fact that Phenomena was severely cut by 33 minutes
and retitled Creepers when it opened
in the States on Friday, August 30, 1985.
Jennifer
Corvino (Jennifer Connelly) is a fourteen year-old student attending an
all-girls school in Switzerland while her movie star father is away for the
better part of a year shooting a film. Her mother, who left the family when
Jennifer was a child, is merely mentioned but never seen. Unfortunately, her
roommate Sophie (Federica
Mastroianni) has just informed her that the school is
beset by a killer who stalks girls their age and kills them. Well, that’s unfortunate! You would think that
someone would order the school closed and the girls sent away. As you can
imagine, this doesn’t sit too well with Jennifer who suffers from a bad case of
sleepwalking and manages to find herself embroiled in the very murders she was
hoping to avoid. She meets entomologist John McGregor (Donald Pleasence), a
wheelchair-bound Scot who lacks a Scottish accent but possesses an avuncular
disposition that endears Jennifer to him and his chimpanzee Inga who doubles as
his nurse. Fortunately for Jennifer, he is aiding the police in their
investigation into the murder of a Danish tourist (Fiore Argento, the
director’s eldest daughter) and the disappearance of McGregor’s former aid.
Together with the help of McGregor, Inga (yes, the chimp!) and a very large
fly, Jennifer sets off to locate the murderer. When she does, she nearly
regrets it.
Jennifer
Connelly was chosen by Mr. Argento to play the lead as he had seen her in
Sergio Leone’s Once Upon a Time in
America (1984). His decision to set the film in the Swiss Alps is
unorthodox but provides the perfect backdrop to the story as the scenery is
utterly breathtaking. He also makes terrific use of the Steadi-cam and it never
feels over-used.
Phenomena has been released on home video more times than I can
count, but the new Blu-ray from Synapse Films is gorgeous and has completely
different extras than the 2011 Arrow Video release which had the more
well-known 110-minute cut and an array of then-newly-produced extras. Phenomena has more detractors than
admirers if you believe what you read, and even staunch proponents of Mr.
Argento’s vision (Maitland McDonagh and Alan Jones) have written off the film
as silly. However, the amount of love and dedication that has been lavished
upon this film restoring it to its former glory on Blu-ray says volumes about
those who cherish it. This set is absolutely beautiful and definitely worth the
price of an upgrade as it sports the following:
The
set comes with two Blu-rays which consist of three (3) different cuts of the
film, all available in high-definition for the first time ever in one
collector's edition package:
the 83-minute United States Creepers cut in HD
the 110-minute International Phenomena cut in HD
the 116-minute English/Italian hybrid
audio Phenomena cut in HD
With a screenplay penned by an
otherwise obscure advertising copywriter named Ceri Jones (adapted from an
original story by director Gary Sherman), the premise of Death Line is rather simple.Late night travelers on London’s famed underground tubes have been
disappearing with alarming regularity from the Russell Square Tube
Station.Two young, unmarried collegians,
Alex Campbell (David Ladd) and Patricia Wilson (Sharon Gurney), unwittingly get
themselves entangled into the mystery when they find an unconscious, well-dressed
fop lying comatose on the lower steps of the station.They alert a wary and hesitant policeman to
investigate, but the slumped body – whose wallet had earlier identified the
body as Sir James Manfred, O.B.E. - is suddenly nowhere to be found.
We soon learn that Manfred (James
Cossins) is merely the latest delicacy in the supper plans of a gruesome character
billed only as “The Man.†Even putting
his cannibalistic appetite aside, “The Man†(Hugh Armstrong) still cuts a
pretty morbid figure. Filthy, ragged,
and with skin tone that’s both beyond the pale and ravaged with festering sores
(think of the iconic and disheveled – but still healthier appearing - figure that
graces the cover of Jethro Tull’s seminal Aqualung
LP), this mostly mute subterranean has – somewhat reluctantly - become the last
surviving offspring of a band of tunnel dwellers.
There’s a back story here,
of course. It seems that during the
construction of the South London tube in 1892, there was an unfortunate cave-in
that entombed a team of construction workers. The company contracted to build that particular section of this nineteenth
century subway went immediately into bankruptcy, coldheartedly making no
attempt to rescue those (apparently) mixed-sex workers trapped in the dank and
rat infested arc-shaped tunnels.
This was unfortunate as some
of those abandoned not only managed to survive, but to reproduce and flourish
(more or less) by eating the flesh of their less fortunate comrades. It’s never adequately explained why in the
eighty years between the tunnel collapse of 1892 and the film’s current date of
1972, the youngest and last surviving of the mining offspring has lost all of
their language skills aside from a grunting, guttural mimic of the rail line’s oft-repeated
conductor’s phrase “Mind the Doors.†Likewise, it’s never explained why – while searching out potential
future meals on the underground platforms - the “trapped†tunnelers simply didn’t
walk up the stairwells and out into the sunshine. Of course, if they had, there
would be no drama. Certainly romancing University
students Campbell and Wilson wouldn’t have been begrudgingly dragged into the
on-going police investigation – much in the manner of Fred and Daphne from the
old Scooby Doo cartoon series. To some degree it hardly matters. They’re
window dressing. British actor Donald
Pleasence is the true star of this vehicle, bringing more than a dollop of
churlish intensity to his blue collar character, Inspector Calhoun. Pleasence is a decidedly old-school policeman,
a cantankerous, prudish sort who continually badgers his secretary for cups of
tea. He also relishes belittling and
sneering at young Campbell and his generation’s immoral lifestyles, live-in
girlfriends, and hippie mindset. He’s
particularly disdainful of privileged middle-class kids dabbling in the
political protest movements of the day.
To be fair, Calhoun shows
little regard for the more well-heeled citizens of Britain either, tossing more
than a few cynical barbs at the newly deceased snob James Manfred, O.B.E. He also possesses an almost pathological
antipathy toward M.I.5. He views the
organization not as an ally but more as a smug, self-important competitor in his
street level fight against crime.
Though horror film icon
Christopher Lee gets a feature billing in Death
Line, his role is relatively small and the single scene he does appear in does
little to move the narrative forward. Producer Paul Maslansky had previously worked with Lee on a number of
films (including the very atmospheric and spooky black and white chiller Castle of the Living Dead). It was through Maslansky that Lee was cast as
Pleasence’s smirking antagonist, the condescending and derby-topped
Stratton-Villiers of M.I.5.
Though the two actors would
only share a single scene together – oddly, the pair would only share the
briefest of moments seen together on the big screen – Maslansky recalled Lee gladly
accepting the small role if only to work with Pleasence, an actor he much
admired. The young American actor, David
Ladd, was also duly impressed by Pleasence, describing him as the consummate
“actor’s actor.†He found working
alongside him somewhat “intimidating.†Ladd is the younger brother of Oscar-winning producer Alan Ladd, Jr.,
and was certainly no leading man in Britain. He had previously worked mostly in the U.S. as a child actor. Though Ladd’s role of Alex Campbell was
originally purposed for a British actor, the producers thought having an
American in the part might make the film an easier sell in the States.
Nigel
Kneale, who passed away in 2006 at the age of eighty-four, was responsible for
some of early British television’s seminal moments, and is best remembered by
popular audiences for scaring the population half to death in 1953 with The Quatermass Experiment, followed over
the next few years by Quatermass II (1955)
and Quatermass and the Pit (1958). In
1954 he was responsible for adapting George Orwell’s 1984 into a television play starring Peter Cushing and Donald
Pleasence, a production that was considered so shocking that questions were
asked in Parliament. The repeat performance the following week was only allowed
to go ahead once word came through that the Queen had liked it.
Despite
Kneale’s success at the BBC he had a difficult relationship with the
corporation and eventually became an independent writer, spending most of the
next few decades writing television dramas and film scripts, as well adapting
novels for films. Some of this work was relatively pedestrian, but when he
wrote scripts like The Stone Tape (1972),
depicting the scientific exploration of a haunted house, or the dystopian
nightmare The Year of the Sex Olympics
(1968), a world in which television serves up a constant diet of violence and
pornography, his legacy as one of the most important writers of horror and
science fiction was assured.
Ironically
he hated being associated with science fiction and horror, constantly rejecting
requests to write for shows like Doctor
Who, (1963 – 1989, 2005 –), which he thought was too frightening for
children, and in the 1990s he rudely turned down an invitation to contribute to
The X-Files (1993 – 2002, 2016 –), stating
“This is the worst kind of science fiction,†before going on to denigrate the
main cast. This no doubt disappointed the show’s creator Chris Carter who was a
big fan. His influence on a new generation of filmmakers and TV producers from
the late 1970s onwards meant that Kneale was constantly being offered work,
including from Hollywood, where he worked with John Landis on an unrealised
remake of The Creature From the Black
Lagoon (1954) before scripting Halloween
III: Season of the Witch (1982) for John Carpenter. Upon seeing the
finished film and how, in his opinion, it had veered drastically from his
script, Nigel Kneale was so furious he had his name removed from the credits.
First
published in 2006, this vastly updated and expanded edition of Andy Murray’s
excellent biography of Kneale is a fascinating insight into one of television’s
most influential, important and occasionally belligerent writers. From his
childhood on the Isle of Man to his final moments, no aspect of his life has
been neglected. The book is built around a series of interviews with the Kneale
and his wife, successful children’s author Judith Kerr, as well as with dozens
of people who have either worked with Kneale or are fans, including John
Carpenter, Russell T. Davies and Mark Gatiss. Andy Murray has also identified
many of the references and homages to Kneale’s work in film and television,
including, ironically, Doctor Who,
the show which Kneale despised so vehemently. Most notably the 1970s stories
featuring Jon Pertwee battling alien invasions of Earth alongside UNIT were
effectively Quatermass stories under a different name.
Into the Unknown: The
Fantastic Life of Nigel Kneale is a thorough and well-researched read
for anyone interested in television history, science fiction, or who might have
spent Saturday nights as a child hiding behind the sofa during Quatermass and the Pit, and is highly
recommended.
Told
from the point of view of an idealistic and patriotic German boy from high
school graduation and military basic training to the trenches of WWI
battlefields, “All Quiet on the Western Front†is a classic tale of the horrors
of war. Written by Erich Maria Remarque and published in
1929, the German WWI veteran based the novel on his own experiences in the
trenches of WWI. A Hollywood movie quickly followed staring Lew Ayres as Paul.
Produced and released in Hollywood by Universal, it was awarded the Best
Picture and Best Director Oscars for 1930, a few short years before the rise of Adolf Hitler who banned the book and
movie.
Fifty years after the novel’s release, a
made-for TV movie was broadcast on American TV in November 1979. It starred
Richard Thomas as Paul Baumer, who was fresh off the hit TV series “The
Waltons†when he went to work on this movie which is not so much a remake as it
is a new adaptation of the classic book. The wide-eyed innocence of Thomas, who
was in his late twenties at the time, works well in his interpretation of Paul as
he transforms from German patriot seeking adventure to disillusioned soldier
tired of war.
The
movie follows Paul, a thoughtful and likable student who enjoys art, literature
and intellectual conversations; as he joins his friends who become soldiers at
the outbreak of the war. His school teacher, Donald Pleasence as Kantorek, is
an outspoken patriot who urges Paul to join the army. Paul and his friends, the
local postman, Himmelstoss (Ian Holm), as they bully him and knock him to the
ground for not serving in the army. We also meet Paul’s mother, played by
Patricia Neal (Thomas’ mother in the TV pilot for “The Waltons†TV series - the
Christmas classic, “The Homecomingâ€) saying his goodbyes to his family before
heading off with his friends to their military training.
When
Paul and his friends arrive at basic training, they’re met by now Army Corporal
Himmelstoss who has not forgotten their cruelty toward him and returns it to
them during their training. I never got the sense that Himmelstoss was overtly
cruel during the training sequences. All basic trainees wish they were
elsewhere during boot camp, but we are led to believe that he is over-the-top
in his cruelty. Holm does sport a menacing mustache and he has harsh words for
the recruits, but its typical stuff and the scenes are too brief to get a sense
that anything cruel is occurring apart from what we learn from the characters.
The
movie moves along at a predictable pace and finally settles into the meat of
the story when Paul and his friends arrive at the front and meet up with their
mentor, Stanislaus Katczinsky, played by Ernest Borgnine. He’s the old soldier who
advises the inexperienced recruits and tells them to forget everything they
learned in basic training because he’s going to tell them the correct way of
doing things in order to survive.
Paul
and his friends become seasoned soldiers after months of fighting in the
trenches. Friends are killed and wounded and Paul ends up in the hospital after
he is wounded where we see soldiers suffering from shell shock, commonly known
today as PostTtraumatic Stress Disorder. After his recovery, Paul is allowed a brief
visit home where he visits with his mother and Kantorek. Himmelstoss ends up
being transferred to the front with the boys, but he disappears from the story
without explanation shortly after his arrival. It was good to see Holm,
Pleasence and Neal once more, but they have too little screen time.
Thomas
does a good job as Paul, but it felt like something was missing. I never got
the sense Paul was truly transformed in the end of that any of them were
experiencing the horrors of war. Thomas and the actors playing his friends are credible,
but are not quite up to the screen presence of the more seasoned actors in this
movie. Borgnine carries much of the water in the film and he is a welcome part
of the production in every scene he appears, but the movie is not about him.
The
production is very good television and it is an impressive version of a classic
tale that benefits from the cast of great actors and by the on-location filming
in Yugoslavia. Perhaps I’m simply jaded after the superior production values in
similarly themed television projects like “Band of Brothers†and “The Pacificâ€
which depicted warfare in graphic detail as well as combat related post
traumatic stress. This production touches on it in a way that was acceptable on
1979 television, but which appears dated today.
The
movie was directed by Delbert Mann who moved very successfully from Emmy
winning TV director to Oscar winning movie director in the 1950s and returned
to TV in the early 1970s after directing a string of dramas and light comedies
during the 50s and 60s including the Oscar winning best picture “Marty,†his
motion picture debut, which also starred Ernest Borgnine. Pleasence, Neal and
Holm’s scenes are welcome, but all too brief and little more than cameo roles.
Borgnine is wonderful in every scene and works well with Thomas.
The
movie is presented in widescreen 1.78:1 aspect ratio, although I doubt it was
originally broadcast in that format in 1979. Its possible the movie was filmed
in widescreen with the safety area left open when broadcast on television and on
early home video releases. The run time is also longer here on the Blu-ray than
in the original CBS broadcast of 131 minutes clocking in at 156 minutes on this
Shout! Factory release. The Blu-ray looks and sounds terrific and includes the
trailer and a photo gallery as extras. The movie is an entertaining and welcome
release.
No matter the
conveyor-belt of bubblegum product proliferating at 21st century multiplexes,
it will always be the classics that endure. Robert Louis Stevenson's celebrated
novel “Kidnapped†– initially serialised in magazine form before being
published as a single volume in 1886 – has been tailored for cinema and
television many times, notably (for the big screen) in 1948 starring Dan
O'Herlihy and Roddy McDowell and in 1959 featuring Peter Finch and James
McArthur. 1971’s Kidnapped from
director Delbert Mann doesn't seem to get as much love as some of its siblings,
but for this writer it’s one of the most enjoyable of the clan, specifically
due to the presence of Michael Caine atop the cast.
Following the terrible
slaughter at the battle of Culloden, during which the Jacobite forces are
overthrown by government troops, an orphaned lad, David Balfour (Lawrence
Douglas) arrives at the home of his Uncle Ebenezer (Donald Pleasence) to claim
his inheritance. However, intent on securing it for himself, the grasping old
man slyly arranges for his nephew to be shanghaied, whereupon David finds
himself prisoner at sea of Captain Hoseason (Jack Hawkins), destined for sale
into slavery. When they run across notorious Jacobite rebel Alan Breck (Michael
Caine), David seizes the opportunity to ally with Breck and escape. They make
it back to shore and seek refuge with Breck's relatives, his uncle, James
Stewart (Jack Watson), and cousin Catriona (Vivien Heilbron). But their
adventure is only just beginning.
Although, of all Robert
Louis Stevenson's stories, "Treasure Island" remains the premier
boys' own adventure, "Kidnapped" is a cracker of a good yarn. Jack
Pulman's screenplay for this 1971 adaptation draws not only on that story but
also a chunk of its 1893 sequel "Catriona". And regardless of the
fact it all ends rather sorrowfully, it's still a rousing piece of fiction, the
recounting of which is well worth journeying alongside.
Delbert Mann (Oscar winner
for romantic drama Marty and much
admired by this writer for early 60s Doris Day rom-coms That Touch of Mink and Lover
Come Back) treated movie-goers to a star-studded and colourful period
costume drama whose glue, as previously remarked upon, is indisputably Michael
Caine. Admittedly the actor's Scottish accent waivers dreadfully at times, but
otherwise he's on excellent form with his infinite charisma and inexhaustible
brio serving to paper over any perceivable cracks. He certainly outshines
co-star Lawrence Douglas, whose David is more than a touch insipid; Douglas
worked almost exclusively in minor TV roles, with Kidnapped representing his only silver screen appearance of note.
Flame-haired Vivien Heilbron fares a little better as the lovely Catriona and
there's strong support from dependables Jack Watson as her father, Trevor
Howard as the surly Lord Advocate, Gordon Jackson as lawyer Charles Stewart,
Freddie Jones as cardsharp Cluny, and Jack Hawkins as the odious Captain
Hoseason (discernibly dubbed by Charles Gray who, due to Hawkins suffering from
throat cancer, often re-voiced the actor during this period of his career).
Special word for Donald Pleasence (who’s delicious as the slimy and duplicitous
Uncle Ebenezer) and a young Geoffrey Whitehead, nicely reptilian as Loyalist
Lieutenant Duncansby.
Thesps aside, the
undisputed star of the film is the beautiful location photography of Paul
Beeson (whose skills can also be admired in the likes of Mosquito Squadron, The Sound
of Music, Never Say Never Again
and the Indiana Jones trilogy); seldom have the Scottish Highlands looked so
stunningly beautiful. Arguably, Vladimir Cosma's music for a late 70s TV
adaptation will probably never be surpassed (so gorgeously honeyed that, if the
mood is right, it has the power to move this writer to tears). However, Roy
Budd's score for Mann's film – along with the closing romantic ballad performed
by Mary Hopkin – is memorably redolent and contributes immeasurably towards
making this more than respectable screen adaptation of its source story a very
worthy investment of one's time.
Network Distributing, who
originally released Kidnapped on DVD
in the UK in 2007, have reissued it in a nicely fulsome package as part of
their continuing 'The British Film' series. The feature itself is a clean
2.35:1 ratio presentation with only the most minimal traces of wear. Caine fans
will delight in the inclusion of no less than three lengthy archive interviews (with
a combined running time of over an hour), two of them hosted by Russell Harty
during the actor's promotional tours for Sleuth
and The Eagle Has Landed, one by
Gloria Hunniford focusing on Educating
Rita. Then there’s a short 1971 behind-the-scenes featurette hosted by
Lawrence Douglas, a gallery of poster art, FOH and lobby cards and an extensive
collection of production stills, plus an original trailer. For those hesitant
as to whether the film alone is sufficient inducement to warrant purchase, the
wealth of supplementary material served up on Network’s disc should definitely
clinch the deal.
Guillermo Del Toro is set to direct a long-planned, often delayed big screen remake of the 1966 sci-fi hit "Fantastic Voyage". James Cameron is behind the plans to bring the remake to reality. The film centers on a group of scientists who are miniaturized and inserted into the body of another prominent scientist in order to remove a blood clot that has endangered his life. Matters of international security depend upon successful completion of the mission but things go awry and endanger the would-be rescuers. The original film, directed by Richard Fleischer, was acclaimed for its (then) state-of-the-art special effects. The film also provided an early career hit for young Raquel Welch who was then a contract player at 20th Century Fox. Other original cast members included Stephen Boyd, Edmond O'Brien and Donald Pleasence. The remake is still in its early stages with no completed script and no casting decided upon.
For
an artist as prolific as Woody Allen, someone who’s essentially made nearly a
film once a year since 1969 (forty-four and counting), there’s bound to be some
misses along with the hits. The thing is, with Allen the misses can be
rewarding in their own right. Ever since the writer/director stopped making the
“early, funny†zany comedies and jumped light years in maturity with Annie Hall in 1977, Woody Allen became a
“European filmmaker.†In other words, his films began to resemble the art-house
foreign works of say, Francois Truffaut—small, intimate, slice-of-life comedies
(or dramas) about people and their
lives. Yes, there were the Ingmar Bergman influences, and sometimes inspiration
from Federico Fellini. Mostly, though, Allen developed his own voice, style,
and thematic material that has been appreciated by an intellectual,
sophisticated audience.
Each
Woody Allen movie is a little “gem†that seems to reside in one of three tiers.
Tier One is, of course, the masterpieces—the ones that prove that Allen is a
brilliant writer and director (and sometimes actor)—of which there are maybe
around twelve to fifteen. Then there’s Tier Two—pictures that are not complete
successes, but they have a lot going for them and are enjoyed by his fans.
These might include experimental works where Allen tried something different.
The bulk of his work is here. Tier Three contains the complete misses, of which
there are a few, to be sure, but even these might have moments that shine—these
are strictly for Allen completists.
Shadows and Fog, from 1991,
belongs near the bottom of Tier Two, but that doesn’t mean it’s not an interesting
and worthwhile experience at the movies. It helps if you know your Bertolt
Brecht and Kurt Weill, German Expressionism, and Franz Kafka. Filmed in black
and white with lots of contrasting light and shadows by Carlo di Palma, the
style of the picture evokes the works of F. W. Murnau, G. W. Pabst, Fritz Lang,
and other practitioners of German silent cinema of the 1920s. The references
are boundless, and the more you know about this stuff, the more you will enjoy
the film.
The
story takes place in some sort of fantasyland of a German Expressionistic
village in a period that resembles the ‘20s or ‘30s. A serial killer is on the
loose, and bands of vigilantes are roaming the town looking for him. Kleinman
(Allen) is a nervous clerk who is drafted into the gang, but he is quickly lost
in the labyrinth of the winding cobblestone streets. On the outskirts of town
is a traveling circus. There, the sword swallower (!) Irmy (played by Mia
Farrow) is in a relationship with a clown (John Malkovich), but the clown is unfaithful
to her—he has intentions with the tightrope artist (Madonna). When Irmy runs
away from him and the circus, she meets a bevy of prostitutes at a brothel
(played by Lily Tomlin, Jodie Foster, and Kathy Bates!), a rich student customer
(John Cusack), and eventually Kleinman. As with any Woody Allen film, there is
much existential discussion, meditations on the meaning of life, and a few
funny lines, too. In the end, it takes a village (literally) to get rid of the
serial killer.
Obviously,
Shadows and Fog is one of Allen’s
experiments. It doesn’t totally work, but the picture is still fascinating a)
if you’re familiar with the Expressionistic references and b) for the game of
“spot the player†with the amazing cast that Allen assembled. It’s an all star
vehicle with familiar faces popping up throughout, mostly in cameos. Besides
the aforementioned actors, you’ll see Donald Pleasence, Kenneth Mars, Philip
Bosco, Fred Gwynne, Robert Joy, Julie Kavner, William H. Macy, Kate Nelligan,
James Rebhorn, John C. Reilly, Wallace Shawn, Kurtwood Smith, Josef Summer,
David Ogden Stiers, Charles Cragin, Fred Melamed, Eszter Balint, Richard
Riehle, Peter McRobbie, Victor Argo, and Daniel von Bargen. Apprently even
Peter Dinklage appears uncredited as a circus dwarf.
The
music—always a treat in an Allen film—is mostly by Kurt Weill. You’ll hear
selections from The Threepenny Opera,
Seven Deadly Sins, “Alabama Song,â€
and more.
Twilight
Time’s new Blu-ray release doesn’t really clean up the blemishes and artifacts
in the image, but the black and white cinematography is sharp and good-looking.
The grain is welcome for the style with which the film was made. There are no
supplements other than the trailer, a collector's booklet with extensive liner notes and an isolated score track. As with all of
Twilight Time’s releases, Shadows and Fog
is a limited edition of 3000 units, so get it while they last!
I have seen virtually every James Bond clone released by major studios during the 1960s but "Assignment K" had eluded me until it was released as a burn-to-order title by the Sony Choice Collection. I was expecting another low-brow effort done on a small budget and perhaps affording some guilty pleasures throughout. However, "Assignment K" was a pleasant surprise. It's an intelligently written, well-acted espionage yarn that goes to some lengths to avoid Bondisms in favor of a realistic scenario populated by realistic characters. The film was directed by the woefully under-rated Val Guest, whose talents were generally dismissed at the time as workmanlike competence but which today seem much more impressive. (Guest had some spy movie experience, having previously directed key segments of the multi-director farce "Casino Royale".)
Stephen Boyd stars as Philip Scott, a high-powered executive of a London-based toy company. When we first meet him, he is attending an international trade show in Munich. We learn very quickly that the dapper, charismatic Scott is actually a secret agent of sorts. There are cryptic messages passed and even more cryptic conversations that take place at the toy fair as well as Scott's luxury hotel. (He seems to have a Bondian expense account, if nothing else.) The plot centers on a real MacGuffin: something about sneaking a strip of vitally important microfilm back to MI6 in London. Naturally, there are bad guys who want the microfilm, too, though I was never clear about precisely what information the strip contains. Nevertheless, Scott is not above mixing business with pleasure and during the course of his visit to Munich he meets Toni Peters (Camilla Sparv), a gorgeous young Swedish woman on holiday at a ski resort. She initially resists his attempts to get a date, but finally she relents. Scott goes all out to show her a good time and his substantial expense account certainly aids in the effort. He takes her a non-stop, dizzying agenda before succeeding in getting her back to luxurious villa. It isn't long before the undercover man is literally under the covers with his new flame. Before long, the two are madly in love- and Scott doesn't seem to be bothered by that gentleman's code for secret agents that dictates you shouldn't get too romantically involved with any "civilians". Scott's selfish obsession with Toni is understandable. (Hey, she looks like Camilla Sparv!). However, his judgment proves wrong when he continues to date her even after one of his contacts is murdered on a ski slope by adversaries who are after the microfilm. Ultimately, Toni is kidnapped and held for ransom, the price being that Scott must identify his key contact in Munich. Surprisingly, he agrees to do so, though the resolution of the problem is a little confusing in terms of his motivation. Throughout the plot, Scott keeps assuring the perplexed Toni that the real danger is over and the couple returns to London. Here, we see Scott report to his MI6 boss, Harris (played with amusing world-weariness by Michael Redgrave), who reminds him that he is putting an innocent girl in jeopardy. Sure enough, Toni is kidnapped once again, thus forcing Scott to follow in 007's footsteps in one key respect: he goes to the "toy company's" version of gadget master "Q" (Geoffrey Blaydo,n in an amusing reprise of virtually the same character he played in "Casino Royale") in order to use hi tech methods of tracking down where the kidnappers are located. He also imposes on the branch to devise a time bomb in a desperate attempt to free the innocent woman whose life he has now placed in danger. That's the extent of the hardware and gadgetry used in this film. Scott doesn't drive fantastic cars, nor does he have the ability to press buttons to get himself out of jams. He loses fist fights and takes beatings in a refreshing nod to realism.
Boyd's character is in the mode of Harry Palmer: he's clearly not enamored of moonlighting as a secret agent. (Unlike Palmer, he freelances, and thus can quit the profession at any time.) His cynicism, however, never reaches the depths of Alec Lemas, the despondent protagonist played by Richard Burton in "The Spy Who Came in From the Cold". Lemas was so cynical and disillusioned that you felt all the joy had been sapped from his life. Scott, however, adopts Palmer's ability to thumb his nose at his superiors but has not lost his joie de vivre when it comes to his vices: smoking, drinking and bedding beautiful women. The character is very well played by Stephen Boyd, an actor who could go over-the-top occasionally (see "The Oscar"!) Here he delivers one of the most restrained and impressive performances of his career. Sparv provides the kind of old world, spy girl glamour that is in short supply nowadays- and she is a more than competent actress, as well. The supporting cast is terrific and includes the great Leo McKern and Jeremy Kemp as heavies, as well as an appearance by Jan Werich, who originally filmed sequences as Blofeld in "You Only Live Twice" only to be replaced by Donald Pleasence. The film has an exotic look to it, as director Guest maximizes locations in London, Austria and "West Germany". (Isn't it satisfying that we can now eliminate "West" and "East" when describing Germany?) The plot is a bit confusing but the characters and dialogue are intriguing and there are some genuine surprises that are unveiled at the climax of the story. The only complaint is the musical score by Basil Kirchin, which is far too lightweight and zippy for a film with this somber premise.
"Assignment K" didn't make much of an impact during its initial release. Perhaps audiences were so jaded by the tidal wave of spy movies. In the U.S., the film was released as the second feature on the same bill with the horror film anthology "Torture Garden" and was dismissed by the New York Times in a few sentences that indicated it was nothing more than a glorified travelogue. It's a pity because if the film had received the reception it deserved, Boyd could have continued to play the character of Philip Scott in some well-warranted sequels.
The Sony Choice Collection DVD has a fine transfer, but is devoid of any extras, including a trailer or even a menu. Can't this film get some respect?
There is a frightening scene in “Prince of The Night†when
Klaus Kinski chases a woman through the streets of Venice. She runs into
an empty building, but like a jungle cat bringing down an impala, Kinski catches
her and smashes her to the stone floor. Actresses Barbara De Rossi and Elvire Audray
complained that Kinski was too rough on them during the making of this 1988
Italian production, but when Kinski is hired to play Nosferatu, a creature
“belched forth by the Devil,†one can’t expect the off-screen neck nibbles of
Bela Lugosi. As he did throughout his hellacious career, Kinski played the role
with an utter lack of restraint. De Rossi and Audray were lucky he
didn’t actually tear open their jugulars.
It turns out that Kinski’s untamed acting had a payoff.
As we can see in the recently released DVD from One 7 Movies, Kinski outshines
the rest of the cast, including such gallant journeymen as Christopher Plummer
and Donald Pleasence. If a few
actresses got scuffed up along the way, so be it.
The cast should have known what to expect when, on his
first day of shooting, Kinski and director Mario Caiano got into a violent
argument. Part of the beef was that Kinski was reprising his character
from Werner Herzog’s 1979 picture “Nosferatu the Vampyre†and was supposed to
wear the same bald head, and corpse-white makeup. However, the petulant
Kinski arrived on the set wearing long hair and asserting that he had no intention
of enduring another painful make-up sessions. This is why Nosferatu of
the 1988 film looks like Aguirre and nothing like the original character
from the Herzog movie (or for that matter, the F.W. Murnau silent
film). Kinski’s only nod to tradition was that he wore the same rodent teeth
he’d worn for Herzog.
Waylaid by Kinski’s bellicose attitude, Caiano left the
production after being paid his full salary. Caiano’s departure wasn’t a
surprise, since the film had already been through several personnel changes.
Producer Augusto Caminito had already hired and fired directors Maurizio Lucidi
and Pasquale Squitieri before hiring Caiano. When Kinski forced Caiano off the
set, Caminito decided to direct the film himself. Since Caminito had little directing
experience, he enlisted the help of Luigi Cozzi, a veteran of many Italian
horror films (as well as the Lou Ferrigno “Hercules†of 1983). Not
surprisingly, even Kinski is alleged to have directed a few scenes.
Somehow, this debacle of a production yielded a highly
watchable movie (originally titled “Vampire In Veniceâ€). I imagine some
of the credit must go to cinematographer Tonino Nardi, who lovingly feeds us
one eye-popping scene after another. It’s as if Nardi knew, while
chaos swirled all around him, that all one needed to make this vampire movie
was Kinski, a few beautiful women, and the gorgeous scenery of Venice.
One can almost turn the sound off, ignore the rickety plot, and simply
enjoy the movie for its visual delights.
The movie is supposed to take place in 1780s
Venice, a time of plagues and death. The
streets are a weird mix of the morbid and the frivolous. You’re as likely to
step over a corpse as to be pestered by a dancing harlequin. Yet, one of my
favorite moments is when an extra steering a gondola is not in period costume,
but is instead wearing a denim jacket and tight fitting jeans, as if a member
of The Doobie Brothers had been somehow teleported into the 18th century.
Caminito was probably so sick of reshoots that he hoped no one would notice the
gaffe.
James Cameron's The Terminator is a masterpiece of
cinematic storytelling, conceived by Mr. Cameron while in Rome with a fever
years earlier (the late director Robert Altman had a similar situation that led
to the writing of my favorite film of his, Three
Women, released in 1977).Shot in
early 1984 for roughly $6M (the amount spent solely on the sound mix of the
superb $90M sequel seven years later), this futuristic action powerhouse grabs
the audience by the throat and takes us on a wild ride.Despite the inexorable pace – much like the
titular villain’s nature – the film manages to come up for air and miraculously
never feels over-the-top, long-winded or plodding.
The
Terminator opened on Friday, October 26, 1984 and yours truly
missed out on seeing it, electing to see the horror film greatest hits
compilation Terror in the Aisles instead.I had to wait until the end of the school
year eight months later to see the film in a classroom on VHS, the small-screen
presentation diminishing none of the film’s raw emotional power to my teenage eyes,
both of which were glued to the television. The film made Arnold Schwarzenegger a super
star and was the surprise sleeper hit of the season, his depiction of a
terrifying cyborg with a relentless mission it will stop at nothing to complete
solidifying his place as an action icon.Two weeks later Wes Craven's A
Nightmare on Elm Street was unleashed on unsuspecting moviegoers and cinema
hasn't been the same since, introducing a child killer who invades teen-agers’
dreams in his attempts to murder them.The
Terminator added “Come with me
if you want to live.†and the oft-quoted “I’ll be back.†to the American
lexicon and became as familiar as “May the Force be with you.†and “Go
ahead.Make my day.â€Nightmare,
of course, contributed the creepy “One, two, Freddy’s coming for you…â€
children’s song.
Linda Hamilton shines as Sarah Connor,
a 28 year-old diner waitress who unwittingly is targeted for termination by the
Terminator after it travels from the future, determined to kill her so that her
unborn son cannot rise against the machines.Kyle Reese (Michael Biehn in a terrific and underrated performance) is
the human counterpart sent to intercept and destroy the Terminator so that
Sarah may live.What makes the film so
brilliant is not only the ideas it presents but how it conveys them to the
audience.For the first thirty-five
minutes, we are just as in the dark as Sarah (not knowing she’s about to be on
the run for her life) and Kyle (since the Terminator looks human on the
outside, he has to wait until it moves in on Sarah before he can strike) and
are only given little bits of information until Kyle and the Terminator meet
face to face at the TechNoir dance club (the shootout in this ultra-Eighties club, followed by the escape, are
beautifully edited set pieces that set the tone for the rest of the film).
The film may be low-budget, but it honestly
does not feel like it.The story is
enthralling and completely believable. Mr. Biehn gives a performance just as compelling as Donald Pleasence did in
Halloween (1978).Without his history, conviction and attempts
to make those around him believe that what he is saying is true, Kyle Reese,
the soldier from the future who comes across time to father John Connor with
Sarah, would fall under the weight of the film.There is a level of plausibility to the story that is lacking from other
films about the future, heightened by Stan Winston’s special effects work.The flashback battle scenes of the war in
2019 recall Mad Max (1979) and Mad Max 2 (1981) (retitled The Road Warrior for its 1982 US
release).The
Terminator is the boiler plate for future films about, well. The future!
Composer Brad
Fiedel has created a magnificently menacing score, robotic and simplistic like
the Terminator.Dick Miller provides a
great cameo as a gun store clerk (I just noticed the store’s address as 14329
and its similarity to 14239, the address of the first Sarah Connor the
Terminator kills from the phonebook listing – and I have seen the film many
times over!Oh, the clarity of high
definition!).
The Blu-ray, which was released at least
twice before (once in a special version containing a hardcover book), comes
with the same extras ported over from the previous editions:
·Behind
the scenes – runes about 13 minutes
·Terminator: A Retrospective – runs just over 20 minutes and contains interviews from
1986 and 1992
·A
collection of deleted scenes
I wish that this
time around the disc included a running commentary with the director at the
very least.This is a watershed film
that rewrote the book on science fiction action films and it is deserving of
more extras than the studios have lavished on it thus far.If you have not yet picked up the film on
Blu-ray, this edition will do quite nicely.
The film has been
remastered and looks as good as it is going to in 1080P.
The Alamo Drafthouse Cinemas, which present contemporary and classic films at their unique restaurant/theaters, have delved into the DVD business- and retro movie lovers can thank their lucky stars. One of the most prominent of the Drafthouse releases is Wake in Fright, a 1971 Australian film classic by Ted Kotcheff, a Canadian born director who had never previously set foot Down Under prior to making this movie. Based on the novel by Kenneth Cook, Wake in Fright is unknown to many film scholars who pride themselves on being acquainted with worthwhile, little-seen films. (I must shamefully admit that I fall into this category myself, having never even heard of the film prior to reviewing the Blu-ray release). Based on the title, I assumed this was a suspense thriller or a horror film. It is neither. In fact, it is virtually impossible to pigeon-hole this movie into a specific genre. Suffice it to say that is one of the most visually arresting and mesmerizing movies of the 1970s- one that will haunt you long after viewing it.
The film opens with a panoramic shot of a tiny one room schoolhouse set against the expanse of the Outback desert. We are introduced to John Grant (Gary Bond), a handsome young teacher who seems curiously out of place in this environment in his jacket and tie. Grant is trying to maintain the universal standards of school teachers but we soon see that he is frustrated at having been powerless in choosing his designated school district. Thus, he has been assigned to one of the most remote places imaginable, teaching a class that is so small that teenagers are compelled to share the room with first graders. As the story begins, Grant is bidding his students farewell as he eagerly anticipates a six-week school holiday. He longs to return to Sydney and the loving embrace of his attractive girlfriend, whose well-worn bathing suit photo adorns his wallet. En route home, however, Grant's train makes a fateful stop in a small city of Bundanyabba (known to the fiercely territorial locals as "The 'yabba"). Grant is initially bored at being stranded for 24 hours in this unattractive mining town where the residents are either openly hostile to strangers or overbearingly friendly. He becomes acquainted with the local constable, Jock Crawford (the wonderful Aussie character actor Chips Rafferty, in final, and perhaps, best performance.) Crawford is an eccentric but he takes Grant under his wing and escorts him to a cavernous bar where hoards of local men are carousing and drinking alcohol with almost superhuman abilities. Grant is at first repulsed, but he finds himself accepted by the locals since he is vouched for by Jock. Soon, he's pretty inebriated himself and he becomes fascinated with a game of chance that dozens of men are participating in. The simple premise involves a toss of a coin and you win or lose based on whether you bet heads or tails. The sheer emotion of the participants intoxicates Grant and he tries his hand. He soon wins a small fortune. Tempted by the fact that winning even more money will allow himself to be freed from his undesirable teaching position, he makes the fatal mistake of returning to the game and gambling one more round. Within seconds, the drunken Grant loses every penny he has. By the next morning, he can't afford a train ticket to continue to Sydney and has to rely on the kindness of strangers (in the words of Tennessee Williams) to find housing and food.
This is where the film becomes completely compelling, as Grant rapidly meets a succession of overbearing- and potentially dangerous new "friends". They include Tim Hynes (Al Thomas), a friendly but consistently drunken elderly man who introduces Grant to his mates: two obnoxious and crude musclemen, Joe (Peter Whittle) and Dick (Jack Thompson in his screen debut). He also discovers Tim's attractive daughter Janette (Sylvia Kay), who can hardly stand the deplorable life she leads in having to serve her sexist father and his misogynistic friends. She is drawn to Grant's sensitivity but his attempts to satisfy her repressed sexual desires go awry. He is next introduced to Tydon (Donald Pleasence in brilliant form), a one-time doctor who has lost his license because of alcoholism. He lives a threadbare existence, trading medical advice to townspeople in return for a spartan diet and all the booze he can handle. Before long, Grant is coerced into joining Tyson, Joe and Dick on a brutal hunt for kangaroos. The drunken Grant becomes as savage as his out of control companions and he reaches bottom when he willingly kills and tortures these lovable, harmless creatures for mere amusement. As the story progresses, Grant devolves even further and goes off an alcohol-fueled abyss that culminates in a most unexpected homosexual encounter.
Wake in Fright startled audiences in Australia when it was first shown, leading to some audience members screaming at the screens "That's not us!" in objection to the way the Outback dwellers were portrayed. In reality, there are no overt villains shown on screen. These are just hard-bitten people who live in an inhospitable part of the land where you have to be tough in order to survive. The film was an entry at Cannes but had a limited release before fading into obscurity. It was virtually impossible to market. The Alamo Drafthouse Blu-ray does justice to the film's astonishing cinematography by Brian West, as well as the unique and atmospheric score by John Scott. Kotcheff's direction is letter-perfect right up through the final frame. Kotcheff is interviewed on the Blu-ray and he expresses gratitude for the team of film historians who searched the world in order to find the elements that have made the restoration of the movie possible. He also recalls how, when the film when was shown at Cannes, one young man sitting behind him kept gushing about his enthusiasm for the film. When Kotcheff asked who the young man was, the dismissive answer was that he was an unheard of new director named Martin Scorsese! The Blu-ray includes vintage interviews with Kotcheff at Cannes in 1971, audio commentary with Kotcheff and editor Anthony Buckley, an extensive interview with Kotcheff at a 2009 Canadian film event, a vintage TV obituary for Chips Rafferty, a documentary about the restoration of the movie, theatrical trailers and an absorbing 28 page collector's booklet.
Wake in Fright is now justly regarded as the first "adult" Australian movie. It instilled pride and confidence in a generation of Aussie filmmakers and its legacy lives on through their works. Kudos to Alamo Drafthouse for presenting this moody and haunting cinematic experience through this first-rate Blu-ray release.
At the risk of being drawn and quartered, I have to say that, with all due respect to the magnificent Alastair Sim, my favorite version of Dickens' A Christmas Carol is the wonderful 1984 TV production starring George C. Scott in a magnificent, Emmy-nominated performance as Scrooge. The film features many other excellent actors and performances including Frank Finlay, Edward Woodward, Susannah York, David Warner, Angela Pleasence, Nigel Davenport and Michael Gough- all under the inspired direction of Clive Donner. Scott's performance is every bit as impressive as that of Sim, who has basically owned the role since appearing in the 1951 big screen version, which is alternately titled Scrooge. For a great double feature, watch these two films back-to-back. In the meantime, however, sit back and enjoy this full length presentation of George C. Scott in A Christmas Carol.
Ever
since I saw Rick Rosenthal's Halloween II
(1981) on home video in 1983 I cannot help but associate it with The Chordette’s
1954 hit “Mr. Sandman†which plays briefly during the opening and over the end
credits. Stanley Kubrick managed to
completely alter our images and impressions of Singin’ in the Rain with A
Clockwork Orange. What use of
pre-existing music!
Halloween II is one of my favorite horror film
sequels, which is saying a lot as most of them are silly or unnecessary. It was one of the earliest movies that I ever
owned on home video on the RCA Capacitance Electronic Disc (CED) system which
was an analog video disc unit in which video and audio was played back using a
stylus cartridge and a high-density groove system similar to phonograph
records. Unlike DVD or Blu-ray today,
CED presented viewers only the movie. There were no special editions, no
running commentaries, no trailers, and no additional interviews. If you were
looking for added value, you had to go to the far more expensive laser disc format
that was in full swing some ten years later which usually included a
letterboxed version of the film in addition to the aforementioned goodies. This double-disc standard DVD set will make a terrific addition to
your collection as the transfer is very crisp and clear; plus, there are a
multitude of extras that puts the original Halloween
II DVDs from Goodtimes Home Video in 1998 and Universal Home Video in 2001
to shame. Those versions provided no
extras and somewhat noisy transfers.
Lance
Guest, who played the lead in 1984’s The
Last Starfighter, is very likeable as an EMT who looks after Laurie. Leo Rossi is his usual sleazy self as his
partner. Comedian Dana Carvey is seen
briefly and is listed in the credits as "Assistant." He appears
twenty-two minutes into the film wearing a blue sleeveless jacket and a blue
cap. He is pointed out on the commentary
by director Rosenthal.
Michael
Myers was primarily portrayed by Nick Castle in the original, and close-ups
were done by Tony Moran. Here, he is
portrayed by Dick Warlock, and his gait is obviously different, slightly less
menacing than the previous actors.
The
extras that appear on this set consist of the following bonus features:
The
theatrical version and the television cut with added footage not seen in the
theatrical version
Audio
commentary with director Rick Rosenthal and actor Leo Rossi
Audio
commentary with stunt co-ordinator/actor Dick Warlock
The Nightmare Isn't Over: The Making Of
Halloween II featuring
interviews with director Rick Rosenthal, actor & stunt coordinator Dick
Warlock, actors Lance Guest, Leo Rossi, Nancy Stephens, Ana Alicia, Tawny
Moyer, executive producer Irwin Yablans, director of photography Dean Cundey,
co-composer Alan Howarth, costume supervisor Jane Ruhm, co-editor Skip
Schoolnik, and filmmaker Tommy Lee Wallace
Horror's Hallowed Grounds: The Locations
of Halloween II – Host
Sean Clark revisits the original shooting locations of the film
Deleted
scenes with optional audio commentary from director Rick Rosenthal
Alternate
ending with optional audio commentary from director Rick Rosenthal
Theatrical
trailer
TV
and radio spots
Stills
gallery
All
in all, this is the version of Halloween
II to own. Released by Shout!
Factory under their Scream Factory line, they are proving themselves as a force
to be reckoned with, releasing genre favorites in deluxe special editions with
lots of lavished extras, including new cover artwork, with the original artwork
viewable in the form of a reversible sleeve.
RETRO-ACTIVE: THE BEST ARTICLES FROM CINEMA RETRO'S ARCHIVES
Bradford Dillman: A Compulsively Watchable
Actor
By Harvey Chartrand
In
a career that has spanned 43 years, Bradford Dillman accumulated more than 500
film and TV credits. The slim, handsome and patrician Dillman may have been the
busiest actor in Hollywood
during the late sixties and early seventies, working non-stop for years. In
1971 alone, Dillman starred in seven full-length feature films. And this
protean output doesn’t include guest appearances on six TV shows that
same year.
Yale-educated
Dillman first drew good notices in the early 1950s on the Broadway stage and in
live TV shows, such as Climax and Kraft Television Theatre. After
making theatrical history playing Edmund Tyrone in the first-ever production of
Eugene O’Neill’s Long Day’s Journey into Night in 1956, Dillman landed the role of blueblood psychopath Artie
Straus in the crime-and-punishment thriller Compulsion (1959), for which
he won a three-way Best Actor Prize at Cannes (sharing the award with co-stars
Dean Stockwell and Orson Welles).
On the And You Call Yourself a
Scientist! Web site, Dillman’s Artie Straus is described as “all brag and
bravado, contemptuous of everything but himself, with his
bridge-and-country-club parents, and his vaguely unwholesome relationship with
his mother.â€
In the early years of
his career, Dillman starred in several major motion pictures, picking and
choosing his roles carefully. He was featured in Jean Negulesco’s romance A
Certain Smile (1958) with Rossano Brazzi and Joan Fontaine; Philip Dunne’s
World War II drama In Love and War (1958) with Robert Wagner and Dana
Wynter; and Tony Richardson’s Sanctuary (1961) with Lee Remick and Yves
Montand, a rancid slice of Southern Gothic based on the novel by William
Faulkner.
Yet in the early sixties, Dillman started
taking any part that came along to support his growing family. From 1962 on, he
guest starred in dozens of TV series -- among them Espionage, Kraft
Suspense Theatre, Twelve O’Clock High, Shane, Felony Squad,
The Man from U.N.C.L.E., Marcus Welby, M.D., The Streets of San
Francisco, Bronk, How the West Was Won and FantasyIsland.
In 1975, Dillman won an Emmy Award for
Outstanding Actor in a Daytime Drama Special for his performance as Matt
Clifton in Last Bride of Salem (1974), an excellent tale of modern
witchcraft. The 90-minute Gothic horror movie aired on ABC Afternoon Playbreak and was so well received that it was
rebroadcast during primetime.
Over the years, Dillman appeared in scores
of made-for-TV movies and theatrical releases, such as Walter Grauman’s drama A
Rage to Live (1965) with the late Suzanne Pleshette; John Guillermin’s war
story The Bridge at Remagen (1969) with George Segal; Hy Averback’s satire
Suppose They Gave a War and Nobody Came (1970) starring Tony Curtis; and
Jud Taylor’s horror-thriller Revenge (1971), with Shelley Winters.
Dillman also played a psychiatrist who goes ape for Natalie Trundy in Don
Taylor’s Escape from the Planet of the Apes (1971) and a scientist battling
firestarting cockroaches in Jeannot Szwarc’s Bug (1975) — the final film
produced by legendary horror schlockmeister William Castle.
Dillman is
now 81. After retiring from acting in 1995, he took up a second career as a writer. He is excellent at his new avocation,
requiring no ghostwriters to tweak his prose. Dillman’s autobiography Are
You Anybody? is a series of amusing anecdotes about his Hollywood
years. He has also written a harrowing adventure tale entitled That Air
Forever Dark, set in Papua New Guinea
and Indonesia.
“It’s a terrifying account of the Jet Age meeting the Stone Age – Deliverance
in a jungle setting,†the actor-turned-author says.
Dillman’s latest book,
published in 2005 by Fithian Press, is a comedy of errors entitled Kissing Kate. “The novel is about an
amateur production of Kiss Me Kate,â€
Dillman relates. “An out-of-work professional actor is hired to play the male
lead opposite a wealthy community icon. Ultimately, of course, they end up
in bed together, where a ‘catastrophe’ occurs and all hell breaks loose. I
assure you that Kissing Kate is not in the least bit autobiographical!â€
Fifty-two years after
appearing on stage in O’Neill’s landmark theatrical event, Dillman is now a
playwright as well. His Seeds in the Wind
made its debut in May 2007 at the Rubicon Theatre Company in Ventura, California.
The play is set in 1939 in Santa Cruz,
California, during a weekend
celebrating the 40th birthday of a society hostess' daughter. The interaction
of the houseguests is both humorous and dramatic, and all manner of unexpected
events occur, Dillman assures us.
The
veteran performer spoke to Cinema Retro
from his home in Santa Barbara,
California.
Cinema
Retro: You achieved
international prominence in Richard Fleischer’s Compulsion, in which you
were unforgettable as the frightening and magnetic Artie Straus, a wealthy
law-school student on trial for murder in this taut
retelling of the infamous Leopold-Loeb case of the 1920s. You had been playing
romantic leads up until then, so this leap into villainy was quite a daring
career move on your part.
Bradford Dillman: I had a commitment to Twentieth Century Fox to do two pictures a
year and, as fate would have it, the timing of the filming of Compulsion coincided.
Nothing to do with the moguls’ belief that I had talent. It was just dumb luck,
pure and simple.
Compulsion (1959) with Dean Stockwell and Orson Welles
CR:
Following Compulsion, you were often cast in villainous roles. In 1964,
you co-starred with B-movie cult figure John Ashley (The Mad Doctor of Blood
Island) in an episode of Dr. Kildare with the intriguing title Night
of the Beast. What was that one about?
BD: I was the beast. I was such a bad guy I had my
thugs hold Kildare down while I raped his girlfriend in front of his very eyes.
When we came to the comeuppance scene, I learned that Richard Chamberlain had
obviously never been in a fistfight in his life. The stunt men couldn't teach
him how to throw a punch; I couldn't teach him. So we had a gentle comeuppance.
He's a nice, sensitive man who has since come out of the closet.
With Carol Lynley, Robert Vaughn and David McCallum in the Man From U.N.C.L.E. feature film The Helicopter Spies (1968)
CR: In 1967, you were the guest villain on The
Prince of Darkness Affair, a two-part episode of The Man from U.N.C.L.E,
later repackaged as a theatrical release – The Helicopter Spies (1968).
You were great fun as Luther Sebastian, the Third Way cult leader who steals a
rocket.Did you have any scenes with
lovely Lola Albright?
BD:The Helicopter Spies has disappeared in
the vortex of remaining brain cells. I don’t remember if I exchanged words with
Lola Albright.
The Scorpion DVD label has released the notorious 1976 British horror flick I Don't Want to Be Born under its American title, The Devil Within Her (It was also known as Sharon's Baby). It's easy to see why this cult movie has gained its reputation, as its a real hoot. Joan Collins stars as Lucy, a one-time London stripper who gives up her wild lifestyle in favor of a more sedate life. She marries a successful Italian businessman, Gino (Ralph Bates) and finds herself pregnant immediately after their wedding night. Trouble is, she suspects the real father is actually her sleazy ex-boyfriend Tommy (John Steiner), who she slept with the night before her wedding in order to have one final fling. Things are moving along swimmingly with the happy couple living the good life in a tony section of London. However, when Lucy goes into labor, the process of giving birth proves to be particularly agonizing, causing speculation that it was almost as if the baby did not want to be born. Nevertheless, she takes home a healthy, if robust 12 pound baby boy. Immediately strange and disturbing things start to happen. Visitor are injured and Lucy herself is scratched severely by the baby. Strange noises come from his nursery and furniture in the room is inexplicably tossed about.Before long, the mayhem results in people disappearing while others are killed under strange circumstances. Lucy is terrified to be alone with her own baby, as she is convinced he is possessed by the devil. The fear is not unwarranted, as she recalls having her pregnancy cursed by a sex-crazed dwarf whose attentions she once spurned. (I'm not making any of this up, folks.) The film borrows so heavily from two horror classics it should have been titled Rosemary's Exorcist. Yes,
there is an exorcism performed by Lucy's sister-in-law, an Italian nun
(Eileen Atkins).
Veteran Hammer films director Peter Sasdy
throws in every cliche the genre has to offer, although he does do a good job of maximizing actual locations in London, which at least lends some atmosphere to the production. His biggest challenge is insurmountable in that, while you can coach even an angelic child actor to appear menacing (a la The Omen), you can't give direction to an infant. Thus, Sasdy has to resort to some unintentionally funny gimmicks such as showing a glimpse of the super-tyke's arm as he assails innocent people who are only trying to "koochy koo" him. Meanwhile, when the camera comes back to focus on the baby, he looks as menacing as a coffee table. What makes the film so much fun is the determination of the cast to play it straight, as though they were performing in an erstwhile production at the Old Vic. Collins is gorgeous, of course, but has to contend with a deadlier enemy than her demonic baby: the styles of the 1970s. Thus, she goes through the proceedings often sporting a hair style that appears to emulate that of George Washington. Sasdy does, however, provide the prerequisite Collins scene in which she is shown in "stockings and suspenders", as the Brits would say and we do get a gloriously torrid and superfluous love scene between her and Bates. Sasdy also breaks up the laughs by centering other scenes at a strip club as an excuse to show plenty of T&A. Joining Collins onscreen is an impressive cast that occasionally manages to make the viewer begin to take the proceedings somewhat seriously. Donald Pleasence, cast as Lucy's sympathetic but bewildered doctor, is as compelling as ever, managing to steal every scene even while underplaying. Eileen Atkins also delivers a fairly admirable performance as the much-troubled nun trying to save her sister-in-law and ultra sexy Caroline Munro makes a few welcome appearances as Lucy's best friend. Cult favorite John Steiner is amusingly over-the-top as the villainous boyfriend who may have sired the son of Satan.The film's appeal as a camp classic remains intact and despite its flaws, remains a thoroughly enjoyable romp- if even for the wrong reasons.
Scorpion's DVD edition includes an original TV spot and a very entertaining recent interview with Steiner, who tells funny stories about the legions of B movies he has starred in. (He even gets a plug in for his new career as a real estate agent). Unfortunately, Steiner doesn't remember much about the making of this film, but he does render some fascinating anecdotes about others he has appeared in. The DVD also has an optional introduction by Katarina Leigh Waters, who I understand is a professional wrestler. I'm not sure how this qualifies her to introduce a horror film, but she does a fine job, providing some interesting facts about the production as well as some eye candy. In the tradition of Elvira, Waters also hosts other horror films for the label. The DVD also features a trailer gallery of other Scorpion releases.
Examining
early pictures by directors who went on to bigger and better things is always a
fascinating exercise. In this case, the experience is both academically
rewarding and monumentally entertaining. They are a tremendous amount of fun to
watch, yet film aficionados will certainly study the pieces and place them in
perspective with the later, betterl-known masterpieces by these two iconic artists.Are there common thematic elements?Do we see glimpses of the later Stanley
Kubrick or Roman Polanski in these early efforts?Without a doubt, The Criterion Collection’s
new releases of The Killing and Cul-de-sac display the beginning of masterful
craftsmanship from two youthful filmmakers.
The Killing package is two
bangs for a buck—not only do you get a crisply clean, picture-perfect
remastered edition of The Killing,
but on a second disk you also get the same quality remastering of Kubrick’s
earlier independent film noir, Killer’s
Kiss.What a deal!I remember the first time I saw these movies;
there were a double bill at a New York revival house, so I’ll always think of
them as a pair.
Killer’s Kiss was Kubrick’s
second feature film, released by United Artists in 1955.Kubrick made it guerilla-style on the streets
of New York—he never had permits to film at city locations, so the director quickly
shot what he needed and then skedaddled.Kubrick directed it, produced it, wrote it, shot it, edited it, and did
the post-sync work.Then he went out and
marketed it himself and sold it to a distributor.That’s impressive independent filmmaking,
especially for the early 1950s, when indy productions were not what they became
in the seventies and beyond.As an
entertainment, Killer’s Kiss is unquestionably
B-movie material, but most film noirs are.The story is passable, but the picture is so well photographed that it
doesn’t matter.Watch for the surreal
fight amongst naked mannequins in the warehouse toward the movie’s climax—it’s
pure Kubrick.
Donner with David Hemmings and Colin Blakely on the set of the 1969 film Alfred the Great.
Clive Donner, the distinguished British film director, has died at age 84. He had been suffering from Alzheimer's Disease. Donner made his directorial debut with The Secret Place, a well-received 1957 low-budget crime drama starring young David McCallum. His biggest financial success was producer Charles K. Feldman's madcap hippie comedy What's New Pussycat?, though he also had a hit during that era with another British youth comedy Here We Go 'Round the Mulberry Bush. Donner gained great acclaim with his 1963 film adaptation of Harold Pinter's play The Caretaker which starred Robert Shaw, Alan Bates and Donald Pleasence. His 1964 film Nothing But the Best was also highly praised. In later years, however, Donner's track record was checkered, directing semi-epics like Alfred the Great and low-brow comedies such as The Nude Bomb. He did gain much praise for his 1980s TV adaptations of Dickens' Oliver Twist and A Christmas Carol. In the 1960s, Donner also directed episodes of popular British TV series such as Danger Man starring Patrick McGoohan. Click here for more
One of Charlton Heston's best performances was presented in one of his least-seen films of the 1960s. The 1968 Western Will Penny, ably directed by Tom Gries, finds Heston as an aging cowhand who is facing the prospect of getting too old for his chosen profession. His life takes an unusual turn when he ends up aiding a desperate woman who is trying to raise her young son against the dangers of prairie life. Complicating matters are a family of cutthroats led by Donald Pleasence and his murderous sons - among them: Bruce Dern. . For Will Penny trailer click here
RETRO ACTIVE: THE BEST FROM CINEMA RETRO'S ARCHIVE
P.B. HURST, AUTHOR OF THE NEW BOOK THE MOST SAVAGE FILM: SOLDIER BLUE, CINEMATIC VIOLENCE AND THE HORRORS OF WAR (McFarland) LOOKS BACK AT WHAT IS PERHAPS THE MOST CONTROVERSIAL WESTERN OF ALL TIME.
A good
number of critics in 1970 believed that Soldier Blue had set a new mark
in cinematic violence, as a result of its graphic scenes of Cheyenne women and
children being slaughtered, and had thus lived up – or down – to its U.S.
poster boast that it was “The Most Savage Film in History.â€
A massive
hit in Great Britain and
much of the rest of the world, Soldier Blue was, in the words of its
maverick director, Ralph Nelson, “not a popular success†in the United States.This probably had less to do with the
picture’s groundbreaking violence, and more to do with the fact that it was the
U.S. Cavalry who were breaking new ground.For Nelson’s portrayal of the boys in blue as blood crazed
maniacs, who blow children’s brains out and behead women, shattered for ever
one of America’s most enduring movie myths – that of the cavalry as good guys
riding to the rescue – and rendered Soldier Blue one of the most radical
films in the history of American cinema.The film’s failure in its homeland might also have had something to do
with the perception in some quarters – prompted by production company publicity
material – that it was a deliberate Vietnam allegory.
I was
unaware of most of this in 1971 when, as a nervous fifteen-year-old English
schoolboy, I read about the film’s horrors in newspapers, and heard lurid
accounts of the cutting off of breasts from my classmates, who had illegally
seen the film at a cinema that wasn’t too bothered about the age of the patrons
(all of whom should have been at least eighteen to view what was then an X
certificate film).
I had
managed to survive several Hammer horrors – Scars of Dracula, Lust
for a Vampire and Countess Dracula spring readily to mind – at the
very same cinema when I was underage.But
having been scared witless by the mutilation scene in Hush, Hush Sweet
Charlotte, when that gripping movie had played on TV several months
earlier, I wisely realised that any of the various cuts inflicted on the
Indians by the cavalry in Soldier Blue represented a mutilation too far
in terms of my well being.So I waited
for the picture to turn up on television (as it takes considerably more guts to
walk out of a packed cinema than to hide behind the sofa!).Waited and waited as it turned out.
I eventually
viewed the picture, which stars Candice Bergen, Peter Strauss and Donald Pleasence, when ITV
transmitted it in 1980.However, there
was a small problem: the notorious massacre sequence, which is the picture’s
reason for being, had been removed virtually in its entirety (seemingly more
cuts had been inflicted on the film than had been perpetrated on the American
Indians!), as it was deemed too horrific for television.(It took another twenty-two years for the
film to be shown on British terrestrial television in something resembling its
theatrical release form!)So I still
hadn’t viewed the notorious scenes that had sparked, in conjunction with films
such as The Devils, Straw Dogs and A Clockwork Orange, the
screen violence inferno that engulfed Britain in the 1970s.
