Showing posts with label 1967. Show all posts
Showing posts with label 1967. Show all posts
 |
| Judy Geeson, Ty Hardin, La Crawford and Diana Dors |
BERSERK (1967). Director: Jim O'Connolly.
"It's a good thing you're inhuman."
The chief reaction of cold-blooded Monica Rivers (Joan Crawford), owner of the Great Rivers Circus, to the "accidental" strangling death of her high-wire star -- in a rousing opening sequence -- is that it will bring in more people who are hoping to see somebody else die. Unsentimental Rivers only cares about her circus, but dapper Detective-Superintendent Brooks (Robert Hardy) is more concerned with preventing future murders, especially after Monica's business partner (Michael Gough) gets a steel rivet hammered into his head. Monica also has her hands full with Matilda (Diana Dors), who gets sawed in half nightly, and who thinks Monica is behind all of the killings. Then there's Frank (Ty Hardin), the new high-wire star, who moves in on Monica as if she were a 25-year-old beauty, and Monica's daughter, Angela (Judy Geeson), who has come home from school with the stern headmistress who's expelled her. Which is the killer, and who will be fricasseed next? The odd thing about Berserk is how entertaining and amusing it is, with more than one well-handled murder sequence, and good performances from most of the cast. Dors has zesty fun as the belligerent Matilda, including a lively cat-fight with another gal who makes fun of her. Some of the sideshow "freaks" sing a zippy tune called "It Might Be You," and John Scott's jangling score is effective. As for Crawford, this will never go down as one of her more memorable performances, but she struts through the picture with her customary authority and exhibits smashing legs when in her ringmaster's outfit. Geeson was also in Inseminoid, and O'Connolly also helmed and wrote Tower of Evil/Horror on Snape Island.
Verdict: No masterpiece, but suspenseful and engaging on its own terms. ***.
 |
| Alone in the dark with a killer |
Blind Susy Hendrix (Audrey Hepburn) is unaware that some men who have come to her apartment pretending to either be friends of her husband or police officers are actually crooks looking for a drug-filled doll that a woman handed off to Susy's unsuspecting husband, Sam (Efrem Zimbalist Jr.). Gradually she realizes that something is wrong, and prepares to fight for her life when the gentlemen come back from a wild goose chase she's sent them on. The main trouble with Wait Until Dark -- which was based on a stage play by Frederick Knott (Dial M for Murder) -- is that the suspense is minimal because the audience is clued in to what's going on from the very beginning. Hepburn gives a very good performance and the rest of the surprisingly C List cast are fine, although Alan Arkin seems about as threatening as Boris Badenov. Julie Herrod is excellent as the neighbor child Gloria who is alternately helpful and bratty. Henry Mancini's score does what it can to increase the limited excitement. It's hard to figure why Arkin and Crenna were billed above the title along with Hepburn.
SPOILER ALERT: Susy has been encouraged by her husband to be as independent as possible despite her blindness, which leads to two problematical developments. We already know she can walk by herself to her husband's office, so instead of barricading herself in her apartment, why doesn't she just leave and ask for someone to help her get to the nearest precinct? [St. Luke's Place where this takes place runs right into Seventh Avenue and the men watching her place have gone off on the wild goose chase.] At the very end when Sam sees her bloodied and huddled by the refrigerator, he waits for her to get up and make her way towards him, but surely in a situation like this he would forget his independence edict and go hug the woman he's supposed to be in love with after such an ordeal? Also, in a moment that made some nervous nellies in the audience jump in fright, Alan Arkin leaps out of the darkness at Susy after he's been stabbed and falls to the ground unconscious. Maybe he might have been able to painfully lurch after her, but leap? The moment is ludicrous instead of startling.
Verdict: If you want to see a better Frederick Knott adaptation watch Dial M for Murder instead. **.
 |
| Simone Signoret |
GAMES (1967). Director: Curtis Harrington.
"I'm afraid I'm accustomed to infinitely more exciting -- and dangerous -- games."
Jennifer Montgomery (Katharine Ross) is a wealthy gal with an artist husband, Paul (James Caan), and a beautiful Manhattan townhouse. Alas, Jennifer isn't too bright. When a cosmetics saleslady named Lisa Schindler (Simone Signoret) shows up at her doorstep and faints from hunger or something, Jennifer invites this total stranger to stay and the woman simply moves in. If you can buy that utterly improbable scenario [I mean, give her a meal and send her on her way] you might buy the rest of this admittedly entertaining but often stupid movie that borrows a plot device or two from Signoret's better known film Diabolique. Paul has a game room full of macabre pinball machines and the like but Lisa tells him his games are tame as, say, compared to Russian roulette, and before long the members of this strange household are playing increasingly violent practical jokes on one another, with delivery man Don Stroud eventually becoming an unintended victim. But there's even more intrigue afoot after that ... Signoret gives a very good, enigmatic performance and Stroud is fine, while Ross and Caan will probably not consider this one of the better showcases for their talents -- they both "underplay" so much after someone is shot in their house that it's almost unintentionally comical. The movie itself cries out for more atmosphere and more inventive direction. Florence Marly of Harrington's Queen of Blood plays a baroness and party guest in one sequence; Kent Smith is the family retainer; Estelle Winwood is a neighbor with cats; and Ian Wolfe is a doctor -- all are on the money. Signoret won a well-deserved Oscar for her work in Room at the Top, which this in no way resembles.
Verdict: These games are a little too familiar. **1/2.
 |
| A striking shot from "Happiest Millionaire" |
THE HAPPIEST MILLIONAIRE (1967). Director: Norman Tokar.
Walt Disney decided to try and get another blockbuster musical like The Sound of Music or its own Mary Poppins by adapting a play about the real-life Anthony Joseph Drexel Biddle, Sr. of Philadelphia. Frankly, Biddle seems an unlikely subject for a light-hearted musical, as he sounds like a rather grim, conservative soul -- despite his eccentricities, which sound more like childish curmudgeonliness -- who started an athletic-religious movement and probably never had to work a day in his life. As embodied by the ever-likable Fred MacMurray, Biddle is made more palatable in this screen treatment, which could have used a little more of a story. The chief plot has to do with the 1916 courtship and ensuing marriage of Biddle's daughter Cordy (Lesley Ann Warren) and Angier (John Davidson) of a prominent New York family. Biddle has two sons but they seem to disappear early in the picture, and even the maid, played very well by Hemione Baddeley, takes a hike after the intermission [the film is nearly three hours long!]. On the other hand, Tommy Steele's winning personality as the butler is on display throughout the film. Greer Garson is cast as Biddle's wife, and while she adds a bit of class to the film, she doesn't really seem to be in the same movie -- you just can't see her as thinking anything but that Biddle is utterly declasse. Garson doesn't make any attempt to be funny, which may have been wise of her. Speaking of class, Gladys Cooper as Aunt Mary and Geraldine Page as Angier's mother nearly steal the picture, especially in the parlor scene when they have a sophisticated verbal cat-fight. An unexpected cast member is Joan Marshall [who starred in Homicidal as Jean Arless] playing a maid who is terrified of Biddle's collection of pet alligators. [More than once we see Tommy Steele pulling one of the larger gators by the tail.] The songs by the Sherman Brothers are vaguely pleasant at times, but not very memorable.This was the first film for both Warren and Davidson, both of whom are excellent. The Disney studio later teamed them in The One and Only, Genuine, Original Family Band. MacMurray is fine.NOTE: The restored, expanded DVD of this movie actually has a kind of vague double-image on the picture and is certainly not as crisp and clear as it should be.
Verdict: The movie is not terrible, it's just too long and aimless and needs a stronger story. **1/2.
Two young ladies decide to go to London and take the town by storm, and they nearly do. Yvonne (Lynn Redgrave of Georgy Girl) is large, gaudy and gauche, and her pal Brenda (Rita Tushingham of The Leather Boys) is slight, homely, but sticks up for herself. They head straight toward Carnaby street where the excitement is. Their assorted misadventures include working in a club where a patron takes a tipsy Yvonne home to his apartment as Brenda follows; Brenda working for a woman who owns a fashion shop but who couldn't care less about business; Yvonne working in a restaurant, "Sweeney Todd," that only serves pies (leading to a major pie fight); and Yvonne becoming a screechy pop singer while Brenda is somehow turned into a model. Smashing Time is amiable and the ladies are fine (although Tushingham perhaps mugs a bit too much), but director Davis lets everything go on too long, including an early scene in a coffee shop and the aforementioned pie fight, until it just isn't funny anymore. Michael York [Something for Everyone] plays a photographer who takes a picture of a delighted Yvonne, but publishes it as a look to avoid, "the girl who got it wrong." There are some pleasant music hall-type tunes in the film as well, and a zany climax.
Verdict: Some fun and an awful lot of silliness. **1/2.