2017 - January
RANKING ALL FILMS:
01. Cop (1988) 4/4
02. 10 (1979) 4/4
03. The Rise and Rise of Michael Rimmer (1970) 4/4
04. Cottage to Let (1941) 3.5/4
05. Arthur (1981) 3.5/4
06. Romantic Comedy (1983) 3.5/4
07. The Bed Sitting Room (1969) 3.5/4
08. Divorce Italian Style (1961) 3.5/4
09. Those Magnificent Men in Their Flying Machines (1965) 3.5/4
10. The Great Race (1965) 3.5/4
11. Experiment in Terror (1962) 3.5/4
12. 48 Hrs. (1982) 3.5/4
13. The Hot Rock (1972) 3/4
14. Tin Men (1987) 3/4
15. Happy New Year (1987) 3/4
16. The Third Alibi (1961) 3/4
17. Ransom (1956) 3/4
18. Micki & Maude (1984) 3/4
19. Bedazzled (1967) 3/4
20. Night Falls on Manhattan (1996) 3/4
21. Dead Ringer (1964) 3/4
22. Hickey & Boggs (1972) 3/4
23. The Hard Way (1991) 3/4
24. Monsieur Gangster (1963) 3/4
25. End of the Game - Theatrical Cut (1975) 3/4
26. Derek and Clive Get the Horn (1979) 3/4
27. The Night Flier (1997) 3/4
28. Six Weeks (1982) 3/4
29. Radioland Murders (1994) 2.5/4
30. Those Daring Young Men in Their Jaunty Jalopies (1969) 2.5/4
31. The Big Fix (1978) 2.5/4
32. Yellowbeard (1983) 2.5/4
33. The Wrong Box (1966) 2.5/4
34. Fender Bender (2016) 2.5/4
35. A Dandy in Aspic (1968) 2.5/4
36. Compromising Positions (1985) 2.5/4
37. Moving (1988) 2.5/4
38. Foul Play (1978) 2.5/4
39. End of the Game - International Cut (1975) 2/4
40. Phantasm (1979) 2/4
41. Freebie and the Bean (1974) 2/4
42. The Empty Beach (1985) 2/4
43. Crazy People (1990) 2/4
44. Arthur 2: On the Rocks (1988) 2/4
45. Phone Booth (2002) 2/4
46. Wholly Moses (1980) 2/4
47. Lovesick (1983) 2/4
48. Black Beauty (1994) 1.5/4
49. High Heels and Low Lifes (2001) 1.5/4
50. F/X (1986) 1.5/4
51. A Film with Me in It (2008) 1.5/4
52. Best Defense (1984) 1.5/4
53. Blame It on the Bellboy (1992) 1/4
54. Like Father Like Son (1987) 1/4
55. Santa Claus: The Movie (1985) 1/4
56. 30 Is a Dangerous Age, Cynthia (1968) 1/4
57. Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland (1972) 1/4
58. Unfaithfully Yours (1984) 0.5/4
59. Find the Lady (1976) 0.5/4
60. The Hound of the Baskervilles (1978) 0/4
01. Cop (1988) 4/4
02. 10 (1979) 4/4
03. The Rise and Rise of Michael Rimmer (1970) 4/4
04. Cottage to Let (1941) 3.5/4
05. Arthur (1981) 3.5/4
06. Romantic Comedy (1983) 3.5/4
07. The Bed Sitting Room (1969) 3.5/4
08. Divorce Italian Style (1961) 3.5/4
09. Those Magnificent Men in Their Flying Machines (1965) 3.5/4
10. The Great Race (1965) 3.5/4
11. Experiment in Terror (1962) 3.5/4
12. 48 Hrs. (1982) 3.5/4
13. The Hot Rock (1972) 3/4
14. Tin Men (1987) 3/4
15. Happy New Year (1987) 3/4
16. The Third Alibi (1961) 3/4
17. Ransom (1956) 3/4
18. Micki & Maude (1984) 3/4
19. Bedazzled (1967) 3/4
20. Night Falls on Manhattan (1996) 3/4
21. Dead Ringer (1964) 3/4
22. Hickey & Boggs (1972) 3/4
23. The Hard Way (1991) 3/4
24. Monsieur Gangster (1963) 3/4
25. End of the Game - Theatrical Cut (1975) 3/4
26. Derek and Clive Get the Horn (1979) 3/4
27. The Night Flier (1997) 3/4
28. Six Weeks (1982) 3/4
29. Radioland Murders (1994) 2.5/4
30. Those Daring Young Men in Their Jaunty Jalopies (1969) 2.5/4
31. The Big Fix (1978) 2.5/4
32. Yellowbeard (1983) 2.5/4
33. The Wrong Box (1966) 2.5/4
34. Fender Bender (2016) 2.5/4
35. A Dandy in Aspic (1968) 2.5/4
36. Compromising Positions (1985) 2.5/4
37. Moving (1988) 2.5/4
38. Foul Play (1978) 2.5/4
39. End of the Game - International Cut (1975) 2/4
40. Phantasm (1979) 2/4
41. Freebie and the Bean (1974) 2/4
42. The Empty Beach (1985) 2/4
43. Crazy People (1990) 2/4
44. Arthur 2: On the Rocks (1988) 2/4
45. Phone Booth (2002) 2/4
46. Wholly Moses (1980) 2/4
47. Lovesick (1983) 2/4
48. Black Beauty (1994) 1.5/4
49. High Heels and Low Lifes (2001) 1.5/4
50. F/X (1986) 1.5/4
51. A Film with Me in It (2008) 1.5/4
52. Best Defense (1984) 1.5/4
53. Blame It on the Bellboy (1992) 1/4
54. Like Father Like Son (1987) 1/4
55. Santa Claus: The Movie (1985) 1/4
56. 30 Is a Dangerous Age, Cynthia (1968) 1/4
57. Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland (1972) 1/4
58. Unfaithfully Yours (1984) 0.5/4
59. Find the Lady (1976) 0.5/4
60. The Hound of the Baskervilles (1978) 0/4
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- DirectorHoward ZieffStarsDudley MooreNastassja KinskiArmand AssanteA composer who suspects his wife of cheating plots to kill her and frame her lover.01-01-2017
"Unfaithfully Yours" is a noisy, dull, bleak and immensely unfunny remake of the brilliant 1948 Preston Sturges film. Gone is the subtlety of the original, gone is the elegance and all the humour with it. Howard Zieff's tragic attempt at black comedy is one of the most profoundly depressing movie experiences of my life. It is akin to a rambling old woman retelling the plot of the original she hadn't seen since its premiere. Dudley Moore tries his best but with material this bad it is quite an achievement that he managed to elicit the few smiles of sympathy he did. I felt bad for him because in right hands this film could have been a triumph. Especially with Dudley in the lead. Unfortunately, instead of treating the material with levity and intelligence, the movie goes straight for the punch with all the camera mugging, pratfalls and loud music it can muster into its 96-minute runtime. Needless to say, it misses very badly. Instead of being funny it's annoying, instead of being entertaining it is ungodly boring. Armand Assante and Nastassja Kinski sleepwalk through their roles (her Italian accent is incredibly grating), Albert Brooks hides his face behind a beard and glasses that make him look like Daniel Stern. Not even the usually brilliant Richard Libertini made me laugh. His overlong bit with a fruit and a knife made me nostalgic for his performance in "The In-Laws". Zieff directs this film with less energy than Sturges could gather from his grave and with the technique that would make a first-year film student blush. This film possesses some of the most egregious examples of messy editing I've ever seen. Sheldon Kahn's hack job wouldn't be paralleled for the next 19 years when three separate editors were called upon to chop up Alec Baldwin's unfortunate misfire "The Devil and Daniel Webster" into incoherent little nuggets of awful. Need I wrap up this review? Need I describe this film as 'overall joyless and unfunny' or 'unbearably awful', do I need to say 'don't watch it'. I guess I answered my own question there really. In the end, I'd like to send out a message to all film fans everywhere. If you ever see a copy of "Unfaithfully Yours" on VHS, DVD or BluRay. Buy it, rent it or steal it. Then destroy it with hellfire. That'll be your good deed for life. Heaven guaranteed.
0.5/4 - DirectorMel SmithStarsKevin McNallyMinnie DriverMary McCormackA nurse eavesdrops with a friend on a cell phone conversation that describes a bank heist. She and the friend then conspire to blackmail the robbers for two million dollars.01-01-2017
Going into this film I wasn't quite at ease. The plot sounded interesting, I was reminded of a film I quite enjoyed called "The Actors" with Michael Caine. It has a lot of good people in it. Mary McCormack and Minnie Driver are good actresses even though neither can boast of an unblemished career. Michael Gambon as a gangster boss gave me pause. Despite his fine turn in "Layer Cake", Gambon in such a role always reminds me of "Midnight in Saint Petersburg" and that is a trauma I did not want to relive. Finally, the film was directed by Mel Smith who directed the good but not great "The Tall Guy" and "Bean" and the much maligned "Radioland Murders" which I actually rather enjoyed. Like I said, I wasn't sure. In the end, I have to say I wasn't impressed. There is not a lot to like in "High Heels and Low Lifes". Minnie Driver is very good and funny as the beleaguered nurse, the film is never boring and well-paced and the finale is lively and entertaining. Unfortunately, the rest of the film falls very, very flat. The plot is unbelievable and largely uninvolving. I didn't really believe the motivations of these two women. What keeps them going even after they encounter murder and danger at every turn. Neither of them has anything to lose if they just back out. The villains as well are of the fairly standard boring cockney breed you see in cheap thrillers. Don't expect anything new in that department. Mary McCormack's performance is way too goofy and brainless. I'm not sure this is entirely McCormack's fault as Mel Smith, even though his directing is always energetic and competent, seems never to manage to coax a successful performance out of his actors. This wasn't a problem in "Bean" where Rowan Atkinson was playing a well-established character or even in "The Tall Guy" with Atkinson playing a variation on his Blackadder character and Jeff Goldblum playing... well, Jeff Goldblum. But in all of his other films are populated entirely by cartoonish, non-realised performances. Finally, most of the jokes are either unfunny or unrealised. Example: In the end of the film an enormous iron statue on top of a house is shot and dislodged. We see it swaying ominously. A man exits the house with a gun. Is this an obvious set-up or what? After 80 minutes of nothing, I was kind of happy to see even this cartoonish nonsense. What happens? Nothing. The statue falls behind him. He doesn't even notice it. Nobody notices it. I kept waiting to laugh. Hoping to laugh. Honestly, I knew I was in trouble when the best joke in the first reel involved Danny Dyer and Kevin McNally arguing over Dyer's insistence of saying "roger" and "over" on the walkie-talkie. That gag went stale during WWII. I came in hoping to see a sharp thriller-comedy like "Sexy Beast" or "The Bank Job", expecting to be at least entertained as I was during the equally brainless but hilarious "The Actors" and all I got was a lot of mugging for the camera from McCormack, a funny but pointless performance from the actor Kevin Eldon and a lot of dead air.
1.5/4 - DirectorMel SmithStarsBrian BenbenMary Stuart MastersonNed BeattyA series of mysterious crimes threatens the existence of a new radio network.01-01-2017
"Radioland Murders" has a ghastly reputation. I don't think I've ever heard anything nice said about this film. So let me be the first. I came in with my expectations very low and colour me surprised when I found myself reeling with laughter from start to finish. Sure the characters are bland, but I found the performances made them work. From the very sweet Mary Stuart Masterson to the cartoonish cameo from Christopher Lloyd, I liked them all and they all made me laugh. Brian Benben is a good lead, he's not as charming as Cary Grant, nor as good a straight man as Rex Harrison, but I found him engaging in that old worldly fashion. I liked the cut of his gib, as no-one ever said. The film is set in the 1930s, but not really. It's set then in the same way the TV series "Ellery Queen" is set in the 1940s. We find ourselves in the 30s are the collective memory would have them. Everyone is dressed up to the nines, the buildings are in art deco and when you phone for a cop you get a hardboiled detective in a raincoat. I love the production design of the film as well as the costumes. The script is paced wildly and the jokes are laid on thick and quite a lot of its success with me relied on the fact that I was laughing so hard I missed most of its flaws, but for god's sake it's a comedy and I don't remember laughing this hard for quite a while. Would it stand up to a second viewing? Who knows, but I sure had a good laugh. Could it have been better? Yes. The murders could have been more outlandish, the characters could have been more colourful, the jokes could have been a little bit more varied (there is only so much you can do with people bumping into each other) and (its biggest sin) it could have been at least 20 minutes shorter. The biggest fault of the film lies in the hands of director Mel Smith. Farces are really hard to do and especially ones this fast. Preston Sturges could do it, Ernst Lubitsch, Billy Wilder. More recently Peter Bogdanovich nailed it with his brilliant film "Noises Off", but it requires a certain steadiness, sense of rhythm and a lot of experience which Smith doesn't have. This is his second film after "The Tall Man" which was as far from a farce as you can get (it was a romantic comedy). His editing isn't quite as on point as it should, he doesn't always manage to give us the necessary information on time to make the joke work (when the actors start reading the wrong lines he first cuts to the audience reaction before cutting to the director going "This is not right"; other than knowing the script how are we supposed to guess the lines aren't right). There are also several failed opportunities and set-ups that don't really seem to pay off. The plot is a little silly as well. It purports to be a murder mystery, but I didn't much care for it. I wish the murders had been more memorable and the mystery more... well, mysterious. However, it worked. I was laughing from start to finish and when it ended I was really glad to have seen it, I'll come back again later and thank you very much indeed. It is a shallow film with a lot of problems, but it is a wild ride with laughs galore along the way.
2.5/4 - DirectorIan FitzgibbonStarsDylan MoranMark DohertyKeith AllenA broke, jobless actor and a broke, jobless screenwriter set out to make a movie and then find that life starts imitating art.02-01-2017
Doesn't the plot to this film sound interesting. Quirky, black, vicious in that well-trodden Britcom style. It'll be funny and controversial at the same time. I'll be uncomfortably giggling at dead people all the way through. If this is what you're expecting you'll be disappointed. It's not your fault, it's just that there is no real way to market a film like this. "A Film with Me in It" reminded me, all the way through, of the 2011 film "Black Pond". It had the same kind of bleak atmosphere, the same kind of humour which is wryly amusing if never really funny. Both films purported to be black comedies even if neither ever truly used the genre to its advantage. Both seemed to be concerned with other things. Unfortunately, in both cases what we don't see is so much more interesting than what we do see. Instead of building up a farcically complex plot akin to a darker version of Alistair Sim comedies of the 40s and 50s, writer/actor Mark Doherty opts for a kitchen-sink atmosphere and more drama than comedy. As a result of that, half-way through the film becomes a dour experience. Its plot, unbelievable from the start became uninteresting and its characters either unlikeable (Dylan Moran) or unengaging (Mark Doherty). This was probably the filmmaker's intention. But unlike, say films by Ken Loach, whose portrayals of hard living, poverty and destitute are depressingly fascinating and mesmerizing, "A Film with Me in It" is simply dull. Indiscreetly crossing between high farce and realism it never quite achieves either. I never laughed at it or with it, nor was I particularly struck by it. Now, the idea itself isn't so bad. It is reminiscent of, say, "Delicatessen" which used it's black comedy quite cleverly to construct devastating social commentary. Unfortunately, the idea here is not executed very skillfully. There is not enough depth nor thought here to support a structure so heavy-handedly put together and the entire film collapsed, quite quickly, under the ambition and inexperience of its authors. No film can take itself so deadly seriously and yet want you to laugh at the same time.
1.5/4 - DirectorGeorges LautnerStarsLino VenturaBernard BlierFrancis BlancheA dying mob boss hands over his business to an old friend, Fernand. The boss' assistants want to get rid of the latter. But are the Volfoni brothers and Théo real threats? Ensuing fights and shootouts are more comical than deadly.03-01-2017
In a lot of ways "Monsieur Gangster" offers itself up as a natural precursor to Coen brothers’ films. If you're a fan of theirs, you'll recognise the dry and tar-black humour, the non-sequiturs and the witty, quick dialogue. You'll also recognise the setting, the smoke-filled rooms where a motley and mismatched group of gangsters endlessly threaten each other. And what a group! We have two "accident"-prone brothers, a gay Nazi, a not-so-wussy accountant and a French safe-cracking butler who likes to pretend he's English. Lino Ventura stars as a gangster brought out of retirement by his dying best friend and appointed the new boss. It is his job now to bring these guys in line and stop an impending revolution in the ranks. This part of the plot works well. Director Georges Lautner deftly blends humour with sudden outbursts of violence to create an atmosphere that is at the same time threatening and side-splittingly hilarious. The quirky performances are masterful all 'round and the characters memorable. It’s not terribly original nor is it breaking any new ground, but it is entertaining and extremely well-done. The part of the film which doesn't work is the one in which Ventura has to deal with his late friend's teenage daughter. All the cliches are here. Her annoying boyfriend, middle of the night parties, tearful conciliations. Despite an admirable effort from actress Sabine Sinjen, I never warmed to the character and the annoying boyfriend became grating after two minutes. I ended up resenting this storyline as it kept keeping us away from the tense and wacky gangster plot. On the whole, I enjoyed "Les tontons flingueurs". It's a fast-paced, smart and entertaining film even with some flaws. I wanted to see more of the gangsters and less of the troublesome teen. I also wish the ending had been more thought out and less abrupt (even though we get a very nice shootout).
3/4 - DirectorPietro GermiStarsMarcello MastroianniDaniela RoccaStefania SandrelliA married Sicilian baron falls in love with his cousin and vows to wed her, but with divorce illegal he must concoct a crime of passion to do away with his wife.03-01-2017
"Divorce Italian Style" is a clever, witty, wicked comedy, a biting satire that is at the same time cynical and energising. Marcello Mastroianni shines in the lead. Rather than go the obvious way and play him sleazy and unlikeable, his Fefe is charming, engaging and even relatable on some level. His fantasies are certainly not outside of our own experience. There is also a whole host of delightfully quirky side characters. The film is directed by Pietro Germi with style, elegance, and pace. His zest is best seen in the sequences of silent comedy such as the funeral scene later almost re-enacted at the train station, or in any scene where the numerous Cefalu family squeeze themselves into the smallest space they can find at the moment. The noise and bustle of the household really add a lot to the familiar atmosphere of the film which plays out in the same way "Alfie" later did, with the main character retelling you his story. Mastroianni manages this beautifully, by the end of the film we are his friends. We are in his confidence. Add to that a score by the always masterful Carlo Rustichelli and you've got yourself a classic. The black comedy genre is populated by many inferior products, heavy-handed nasty films which fail to grasp the best lesson "Divorce Italian Style" can teach us: the only recipe for a successful black comedy is hold the morals, hold the drama and add a whole lot of levity and farce.
3.5/4 - DirectorBlake EdwardsStarsDudley MooreBo DerekJulie AndrewsA Hollywood composer goes through a mid-life crisis and becomes infatuated with a sexy, newly married woman.03-01-2017
"10" is a startlingly brilliant comedy. Disarmingly smart, sharp and witty. Filled with wonderfully hilarious moments and several tender and sweet ones. Unlike the flop that is "A Film with Me in It", "10" manages to tackle a very serious subject while at the same time being side-splittingly funny. I can't think of any other good movie which contains both one of the funniest slapstick scenes ever shot and a touching monologue about an insecure woman (executed wonderfully by Dee Wallace). The supporting cast here is brilliant. Julie Andrews and Robert Webber lend credence and depth to what could have been cliche characters and Brian Dennehy is definitely the best film bartender. But it is Dudley Moore's pitch-perfect performance in the lead role that makes the film. I have never seen anyone successfully be both cartoonishly silly and so relatable. We believe George Webber is a real person even when he falls around his house pumped full of novocaine. This is certainly his finest moment as an actor. I honestly can't imagine anyone else pulling off this role so perfectly. Perfection is in many ways the keyword here. Blake Edwards walked the tightrope with this one. So easily could it have been too silly to be realistic or too dour and depressing to be funny. The fact that it manages to be both silly and realistic is admirable. And yet the biggest surprise in the entire film is finding out Bo Derek can actually act.
4/4 - DirectorBryan ForbesStarsJohn MillsMichael CaineRalph RichardsonIn Victorian England, a fortune now depends on which of two brothers outlives the other, or can be made to have seemed to do so.04-01-2017
"The Wrong Box" is one of the few films to have the dubious honour of having a quality as hectic as its plot. To address it I'll have to split this review into three parts. The writing, the directing and the acting. The reason shall become obvious.
The screenplay to "The Wrong Box" is without a doubt one of the wittiest I've ever seen. An exquisite farce with hints of wickedly funny black comedy written with usual fervour by the same two people who wrote the brilliant "A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum". They are the comedy writing legend Larry Gelbart (author of such classics as the TV series "MASH", the first comedy about a leveraged buyout "Barbarians at the Gate" and "Tootsie" which needs no introduction) and Burt Shevelove. As in "A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum", "The Wrong Box" is chock full of hilarious misunderstandings, entertaining characters, and quick, witty dialogue. This is why it's such a shame that most of it was wrecked by the boring, static and joyless direction from depressor extraordinaire, Bryan Forbes. Though without a doubt one of the leading directors in the genre of kitchen-sink dramas he is extremely ill-suited to comedy. He has no sense of rhythm, comedic timing. Potentially funny scenes are executed in a manner that is much too slow, bringing the entire film to a halt. This is best noticed in the scenes between Michael Caine and Nanette Newman. Their courtship is meant to be awkward and rambling but at the speed at which Forbes played it out, the scenes instead of being funny become boring and languorous. Note also the film's finale. A proposed exciting and hilarious hearse chase through London akin to the chariot chase that closed "A Funny Thing Happened..." is turned into a static, unfunny and also quite languorous experience by the joke-deaf Forbes. He even managed to make Peter Sellers unfunny. The scenes with him as the doty doctor run for far too long and the joke becomes old very, very quickly. His work on this film can only be described as moribund. Which brings us onto the third section of this review: the acting. Here we have an example of a potential train wreck pretty much saved entirely by the performers. Despite their director's best efforts, most of the performances in the film are energetic and hilarious with Peter Cook and Dudley Moore in the lead. Their two cousins are the finest parts of the film. Also brilliant are the surprisingly hilarious Ralph Richardson and John Mills, their brief meeting is the best and funniest scene in the film. Wilfrid Lawson and Tony Hancock are also quite funny as the decrepit butler and confused detective respectively. The two actors who don't come out unscathed are the aforementioned Michael Caine and Nanette Newman. Newman has always been something of a stiff but I was surprised to find Michael Caine so boring. Perhaps it has something to do with the role he was given. He was always best as the wily, sneaky sod and here he gets to play the ingenue. He is very stiff and unfunny. So in the end, how does "The Wrong Box" fare? Thankfully, not as bad as it could have been. Trimmed for about 30 minutes it could have been even better. Bryan Forbes' stiflingly boring direction almost ruins the film but the fine performances and a brilliant script do shine through in the end. There are unforgettable scenes here and also quite a few overlong and unfunny ones. This is the kind of material Richard Lester would have excelled at. Had only he not been busy filming something called "A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum".
2.5/4 - DirectorKevin BillingtonStarsAnn BeachDesmond Walter-EllisPeter CookFresh-faced young Michael Rimmer worms his way into an opinion poll company and is soon running the place. He uses this as a springboard to get into politics, and in the mini-skirted, flared-trousered world of 1970 Britain, he starts to rise through the Tory ranks.04-01-2017
"The Rise and Rise of Michael Rimmer" is a brave, smart, witty, sharp and utterly irreverent spoof of the politics of its time. It is, for this reason, I find it so depressing that had it been made today I would have written the same opening line. The film is completely and unmistakably relevant to all politics everywhere, anytime. Nothing (but the names) has changed. I guess that star/writer Peter Cook and director/writer Kevin Billington have stumbled upon that rare and untamable beast, the universal film. It is, thankfully, also absolutely brilliant and nearly flawless. From the hilariously absurdist intro to the breathlessly tragicomic finale I roared with laughter and nodded with sad recognition. Almost always at the same time. Peter Cook is excellent in the lead. There's something startlingly demonic in the smile that never leaves his face, in his monotone voice. It takes a great actor to make a character seem dull and flat without actually being dull and flat. Also present are a whole bunch of fabulous actors in supporting roles, far too many to mention, but I do have to say they all give consistently hilarious turns. The script by Cook, Billington, John Cleese and Graham Chapman is presented as a series of interconnected sketches with the same characters depicting the meteoric rise 'without a trace' of Michael Rimmer. This format keeps the film from becoming stale or ever dragging while at the same time allowing it to cover every aspect of politics and machinations within it. Many films have satirised politics, many have covered similar grounds as "The Rise and Rise of Michael Rimmer" but very few of them have done it so thoroughly and wittily and have all balked at getting their hands dirty, so to say. A typical satire deals (too much in my opinion) with shadows and nudge-nudges. Parties are rarely mentioned and real situations are always covered in layers of fantasy and disguise. So no one gets offended and/or sued. "Michael Rimmer" does no such thing. It stops short only of naming names and the reason for that is so the film would remain timeless. This is an unflinching film. Perhaps it is for this reason it remained unseen and sadly unknown for over 30 years. Now it is out, you owe yourself to see it. It is brilliant.
4/4 - DirectorStanley DonenStarsPeter CookDudley MooreEleanor BronA hapless loser sells his soul to the Devil in exchange for seven wishes, but has trouble winning over the girl of his dreams.05-01-2017
"Bedazzled" is entertaining, smart and quite witty. The film is the second cinematic venture of Peter Cook & Dudley Moore and the first (and unfortunately not the only) one which they headlined and they are very well used indeed. Dudley Moore is sweet and relatable as the damned and Peter Cook makes for an incredible Devil. He is witty and naughty and stylish and vicious. The screenplay (also by Cook) is entertaining and acerbic but most notably very subtle. There are no obvious choices in "Bedazzled" beginning with the characterization (the Devil is really a nice guy, only misunderstood) and ending... well, with the ending ("Don't tell me you'll just go check if God's in"). Not all the jokes work but when they do they are really quite funny. The best parts of the film are the scenes between George (the Devil's alias) and Stanley (Moore). Their interactions are actually quite sweet and enjoyable. There is an air of camaraderie I certainly didn't expect. The fantasy sequences, on the other hand, tend to drag a bit, but they are well worth it for the payoffs. The film is stylishly and pacily directed by Stanley Donen at times seemingly channeling Sidney J. Furie's jazzy work on "The Ipcress File". There are plenty of shots from behind panes of glass and through unexpected objects. On the whole, "Bedazzled" is delightfully charming and viciously funny.
3/4 - DirectorPaul MorrisseyStarsPeter CookDudley MooreDenholm ElliottA Sherlock Holmes spoof about a family that has been haunted for years by the curse of a horrible hound.05-01-2017
Watching this film is one of the most depressing movie-going experiences of my life. There was so much promise to this premise. Dudley Moore and Peter Cook reuniting again, a wonderful cast, I always thought Cook would make a wonderful Sherlock Holmes even in a serious production. So coming in I said, rather foolishly, "it can't be THAT bad". Five minutes in I knew I was wrong. So wrong! I was expecting cheap gags, flat jokes, and some hoaky acting, that much I was promised by the reviews I'd read, what I wasn't expecting was "Carry On Holmes". Every line, every word, every gesture is played for laughs in such a broad, melodramatic way Kenneth Williams comes across as subdued. I couldn't believe the amount of hand-waving, bulging eyes, horrible, awful, horrendous, grating, fake accents I was going to have to endure. Here's something I never thought I'd write: Peter Cook and Dudley Moore are awful here. Cook seems elsewhere, uninterested in the proceedings, perhaps dwelling over his failed career. Dudley Moore is the worst, though, his fake accent (alternating between bad Welsh and worse Scottish) is appalling and becomes annoying immediately. There is nothing innovative at all in this spoof, every joke in it is tired and flat. Beginning from Watson being an utter imbecile, Sherlock Holmes having a speech impediment, a parody of "The Exorcist" six years too late. There is even an entire sequence revolving around a dog who won't stop urinating. This coming from the people who brought us "Bedazzled", "The Rise and Rise of Michael Rimmer" and "10". I intentionally didn't mention "Not Only... But Also" because half of this film is recycled straight from there. While Dudley Moore is busy hamming it up around the moors encountering increasingly unfunny characters, Peter Cook is galavanting around London reliving past glories. There is even a complete non-sequitur sequence which is just their old sketch "One Leg Too Few". Word for word. Completely unrelated to the rest of the film. It is just there. As if the film was too short or something. In fact, more than 40 minutes of this film (if I could call it that) are padding. There is a long sequence in which Holmes visits his mother (played well if not funnily by Dudley Moore) who then returns in the end again to contribute absolutely nothing to the plot. In another scene, Holmes goes to a massage parlor. The film is only 85 minutes long and it feels like an eternity. Everyone is trying so hard to make us laugh that we, the audience, feel exhausted for them. Our senses are being raped throughout this charade. And I didn't laugh once. Not once. There isn't a single laugh in the entire film. I have never been less entertained in my entire film. I wish someone could tell me what happened? How do two of the funniest comedians in the entire world turn out this? I bet the story behind this abomination is a million times more interesting. Perhaps it was made to be featured as one of those fake bad films in other films. You know like the one Jerry watched in "Seinfeld" with Larry David and flaming globes of Zigmond. Whatever is the case skip it, please skip it, for the sake of you and your children and your children's children, skip it.
0/4 - DirectorRichard LesterStarsRita TushinghamRalph RichardsonPeter CookIn post-nuclear-holocaust England, a handful of bizarre characters struggles on with their lives in the ruins, among endless heaps of ash, piles of broken crockery and brick, muddy plains, and heaps of dentures and old boots. Patriotically singing "God Save Mrs. Ethel Shroake, Long Live Mrs. Ethel Shroake", they wander through this surrealistic landscape, forever being warned by the police to "keep moving", and prone to the occasional mutation into a parrot, cupboard, or even--yes, a bed-sitting room with "No Wogs" scrawled in the grime on its windows. In particular, this story revolves around the odd "love story" of a girl who lives with her parents in one compartment of a London Underground train, the commuter in the next compartment, and the doctor they meet after returning above ground in search of a nurse for the heavily-pregnant girl.05-01-2017
Works like "The Bed Sitting Room" are really very hard to review. It all comes down to whether you found it funny or not. And I found it very, very funny indeed. Absurdism originated in the theater and that is its rightful home. For obvious reasons it is very hard to pull off in the cinema, but with the right people, it can work. Richard Lester, Spike Milligan and Peter Cook & Dudley Moore are the best people I can think off for the job. Add to the mix Ralph Richardson, Rita Tushingham, Michael Hordern and Arthur Lowe and you've got yourselves a classic. Quickly shifting between comedy and tragedy with the levity of a balloon "The Bed Sitting Room" plays out like the cheeriest of comedies. It was written for the stage by the famous duo of Spike Milligan and John Antrobus and niftily adapted for screen by the very able Charles Wood. Spearheaded by the brilliant and stylish Richard Lester the wonderful all-star cast handles the material with humour and ease adding all kinds of wonderful layers to the characters and bringing on the laughs good and thick. I really, really, really enjoyed "The Bed Sitting Room" and god save Mrs. Ethel Shroake of 393A High Street, Leytonstone.
3.5/4 - DirectorJoseph McGrathStarsDudley MooreEddie Foy Jr.Suzy KendallRupert Street, a piano player and composer, decides to write a musical and marry before he reaches his thirtieth birthday. One minor problem: he'll be 30 in six weeks...06-01-2017
Here we have, possibly the most egregious example of the shameless Richard Lester impressions abound in the 60s. Egregious I say because it is the most joyless, boring, languorous and uninvolving one of the lot. Director Joseph McGrath is the most obvious plagiariser of Lester's style I have ever seen. Not bothering to mask this fact at all, he fills the film with fantasy sequences, non-sequiturs, fast cuts and absurdism. Except that none of them work. The fantasy sequences are overlong and dull beyond belief, the non-sequiturs are not funny, the fast cuts only contribute to the abounding confusion evident all through the film and as for the absurdism, half the time I didn't get it and all the time I didn't want to get it. Even Dudley Moore comes across as a charmless plank. He seems uninterested in the whole proceedings and would rather have them over with. The only two good performances in the whole production come from Eddie Foy Jr. and John Bird, both succeeding in being funny despite the best efforts of the director and the writers. Here is a long forgotten film best left forgotten.
1/4 - DirectorColin HigginsStarsGoldie HawnChevy ChaseBurgess MeredithA San Francisco librarian picks up a hitchhiker whose car has broken down, which leads to her being stalked and hunted by shady individuals. A cop she briefly met during a function eventually comes to her rescue.06-01-2017
"Foul Play" is only good if you look at it as a sum of its parts. The plot doesn't work, Chevy Chase and Goldie Hawn, though both good separately have very little chemistry together and the urgency of the plot is killed by its languorous pacing. However, there are quite a few funny moments spread out across the film. The best involves Dudley Moore as a sex-crazed stranger Goldie Hawn meets in a bar. He is the best thing in the film. Problems arise mostly from the work of director/writer Colin Higgins who obviously had issues with self-editing. The film could have been, at least, 30 minutes shorter, almost all the sequences run too long (there is an excess sequence involving a dwarf and a misunderstanding which though funny overstays its welcome after 5 minutes and delivers the killing blow to the film's pace) and the plot is so nonsensical and unexciting (this is the first thriller I've seen that has no twists) I stopped caring. Almost all of these problems were present in his "Silver Streak" script but the brilliant pairing of Richard Pryor and Gene Wilder worked so well you didn't notice or care about anything else. No such magic here. There are many laughs to be had along the way, Charles Fox's jazzy score explodes from the screen and there is a Burgess Meredith fight scene, but "Foul Play" doesn't work.
2.5/4 - DirectorGary WeisStarsDudley MooreLaraine NewmanJames CocoAn all-star comedy cast hams it up in this hilarious Biblical spoof.06-01-2017
Here is yet another of those comedies that play out more like compilations of sketches than a coherent plot and one of those films that really shouldn't work but do, kind of. The script is pretty bad. It is a collection of really tired, predictable, old gags without any twists or clever observations. It is akin to listening to an old borscht comedian. However, it is a tribute to a very talented cast that they actually manage to make the material funny. Dudley Moore, in particular, shoulders the film with his sharp, likable portrayal of Herschel, brother-in-law of Moses. Some jokes work (the failed orgy, curing the blind and the lame, the entire salt mine sequence), some don't (the framing story, the Devil scene and pretty much everything after they leave New Sodom), all of them are pretty silly and old but I had fun watching "Wholly Moses!". It is fast paced and the performances are good. Watching it is sort of like riffing on the Bible at school. If you find that sort of stuff funny you're in for a treat. I do and I had fun. On the surprising note, the most awkward and unfunny sequence is Richard Pryor's brief cameo as the Pharaoh. I don't know what Pryor was doing but it damn sure wasn't comedy.
2/4 - DirectorAlan MetterStarsRichard PryorBeverly ToddStacey DashArlo accepts what seems to him to be a dream promotion to Idaho. He soon discovers, however, that moving has its own share of problems.07-01-2017
Richard Pryor plays a working, decent suburban dad... There's a plot I thought I'd never read. It must be a joke, right? Is the next line "or so they thought"? Well, no it isn't. Richard Pryor does indeed play one of those neurotic suburban dads who always seem to be dancing on the edge of a nervous breakdown, with a loving wife and unruly children in "Moving", one of Pryor's mildest comedies. And as we all know, Pryor's not the world's greatest actor and it shows. He seems ill at ease in the role throughout and though his comedic timing is brilliant, I never believed for a second he was anyone other than Richard Pryor. He also seems very constrained by the material. The script is funny. Funny stuff happens. I laughed, I enjoyed myself. The problem is that while all the sketches within the film work, all the little bits don't really add up. I laughed at the moment Richard Pryor gives his boss the index finger instead of the middle one, I laughed at Dana Carvey's brief performance, I laughed at the sequence in which Pryor and the wife go house shopping, but the overall film feels disjointed and (excuse the pun) it feels like it's not moving towards anything. The rest of the cast is pretty good, Beverly Todd is excellent as the wife, Randy Quaid is very funny being basically Randy Quaid. Stacey Dash meanwhile gives what can only be described as the world's most unenergetic performance. She is awful. So, all in all, "Moving" is very funny. Not all the jokes work, but it is funny. Funnier than your average 80s comedy. I just wish that it all gelled better.
2.5/4 - DirectorPreston SturgesStarsRex HarrisonLinda DarnellRudy ValleeA man dreams of revenge when he suspects his wife is unfaithful.08-01-2017
Rewatch - 31-12-2016 - DirectorBlake EdwardsStarsGlenn FordLee RemickStefanie PowersA man with an asthmatic voice telephones and assaults clerk Kelly Sherwood at home and coerces her into helping him steal a large sum from her bank.12-01-2017
"Experiment in Terror" is an unlikely title to find in the filmography of Blake Edwards and yet there it is buried among the likes of "Breakfast at Tiffany's", "The Pink Panther" and "10". From the very beginning "Experiment in Terror" boasts a wonderfully gloomy atmosphere and though it loses a little steam towards the end it is sufficiently intriguing and tense to keep one's attention. Like most procedurals, the plot is occasionally plodding and this film could afford to lose some 30 minutes of its runtime, but it is hard not to note that this script could have easily become yet another of those dull, lifeless documentary style thrillers like "The Boston Strangler" and "The Town That Dreaded Sundown" was it not for the work of its director. As unlike him as it is, this tense thriller is made great precisely by Edwards' stylish and unflinching direction giving the film that tough, slick look typically associated with late film-noir ("Kiss Me Deadly" is a good example). Philip Lathrop's cinematography is stunning. The opening sequence, in particular, is a sight to behold climaxing in one of the most nerve-wrecking scenes I've seen in which Ross Martin (face hidden in shadows) gives Lee Remick her first instructions. Their performances are pitch-perfect as is the performance of Glenn Ford, once again proving himself an invaluable screen presence. One could hardly watch this film without noticing the score by the great Henry Mancini. It is one of his best, so subtle and menacing. In fact, those two words could be used to describe the entire film. It was very surprising to me just how low-key this entire film is played. Almost completely in whispers and shadows. Surprising I say because the plot of an asthmatic killer menacing a young woman is as gialloesque as it comes. He even wears black gloves. A masterclass in thriller directing.
3.5/4 - DirectorAlex SegalStarsGlenn FordDonna ReedLeslie NielsenAfter the child of wealthy parents gets abducted, the police and a member of the press intervene to assist the parents in their search but end up complicating their impending decisions.13-01-2017
"Ransom" is based on a one-hour TV play broadcast a year earlier under the title "Fearful Decision" and boy can you tell. It was expanded into a feature film by the same writers, "Forbidden Planet's" Cyril Hume and James Bond screenwriter Richard Maibaum, but somehow their heart wasn't really in it. The stuff they added to the beginning is clunky and cheesy and some of the expansions obviously drag but it must have been some TV play because when the script is taken verbatim from it the film takes off to incredible heights. From the moment the Stannard's realise their boy has been kidnapped to the quietly tense ending the film is packed with tension and quick, cutting dialogue. While it does have its problems, stilted, pedestrian direction by TV's Alex Segal coupled with unimaginative cinematography and an intrusive score and some misguided Christian references, the film boasts a rich, moral argument and three strong performances in the lead. Glenn Ford is incredible as the father, quiet and "made of steel", with a tempest in his soul. Ford is such a natural, effortless actor it is a pleasure to watch him on screen. Donna Reed excels herself as the mother and finally there is a strong film debut from Leslie Nielsen as the surprisingly honest and heartfelt journalist with hints of Humphrey Bogart about him. The central hour is tense and dramatic and disquieting naturalistic. Television writing always translates well to film in these cases, when dialogue and atmosphere run the story rather than action and events.
3/4 - DirectorPaul HenreidStarsBette DavisKarl MaldenPeter LawfordThe working-class twin sister of a callous, wealthy woman impulsively murders her out of revenge and assumes her identity. But impersonating her dead twin is more complicated and risky than she anticipated.13-01-2017
Boasting a good Bette Davis performance (I wouldn't have minded some subtle difference between the sisters), an unforgettably chilling Andre Previn score and moody direction from Paul Henreid, "Dead Ringer" is a sly, elegant and entertaining thriller with a somewhat predictable but still satisfying, ironic twist. Davis' support ranges from Karl Malden's gentle cop who is the highlight of the production to Peter Lawford who hams it up a bit too much. The plot, despite being quite preposterous, is captivating though not all of its potential was used. Someone with a better sense of humour, like Alfred Hitchcock, could have done a lot more with the near farcical nature of the material. Cinematography by Ernest Haller is instrumental in building the atmosphere that definitely gets under your skin. Ultimately I enjoyed "Dead Ringer" which, despite all its flaws, never fails to entertain, intrigue and shock. Most of the film's success lies in the hands of director Henreid. His flawless sense for the shocking is best illustrated in the scene in which Edith, having killed her sister, turns around to look at her body for (what she believes is) the last time. The smash cut to the sight of Margaret's corpse, enveloped in darkness, highlighted by Previn's string cue, sent shivers down my spine. As did the film's very last shot which I won't reveal.
3/4 - DirectorMark HermanStarsBronson PinchotDudley MooreBryan BrownSeveral strangers converge on a hotel in Venice, Italy, where a bellboy's bad English sets them up to clash against each other in a hilarious case of mistaken identity.13-01-2017
"Blame It on the Bellboy" is a very unusual cinema experience. The film features a whole host of great British actors giving very good performances in likable roles (except for Bronson Pinchot who is more annoying than can be described politely in a paragraph), Mike Herman's directing is energetic and stylish, his script full of clever situations and potential. The film moves at a cracking pace, never drags and the music is terrific. But here's the kicker, the really interesting part. It is not funny. Not one laugh, snicker or smile. It is a film entirely devoid of humour. One gets the impression that someone wrote this comedy very quickly and in the haste forgot to put the jokes in. And it's not a case of badly done payoffs or set-ups. The set-ups are there and they are well done and they all pay off quite neatly and logically but it is never funny, let me put that better it is NEVER FUNNY. This is a very, very, very major problem, and as competently made as it is and as likable and engaging as everyone is this film has to be classified as a complete failure. I have never seen a film this unfunny. Never. Most dramas have more laughs. I was left completely perplexed. I don't know how this is possible. How did this happen? A complete mystery. It sounds impossible but here is a comedy with no jokes.
1/4 - DirectorJeremy KaganStarsRichard DreyfussSusan AnspachBonnie BedeliaAn ex-'60s radical now working as a private eye is hired by an old flame to investigate a political smear campaign. The case becomes more dangerous as it unfolds.14-01-2017
Neo-noirs were big in the 70s and I am a huge fan of them. Sometimes I think I like them more than the proper noirs. While the 40s and 50s films played it cynical and dark for style and cool, I always felt that the neo-noirs meant it. The film noirs were teenagers playing it world-weary to be cool, neo-noirs are grizzled and disappointed middle-aged cynics with no dreams and no hopes left. "The Big Fix" is a neo-noir by plot but not by nature. I'll explain. The plot of "The Big Fix" follows the standard noir structure wherein a private eye is hired to investigate a relatively small incident. He starts following clues, interviewing people and bit by bit he uncovers something larger and the deeper he digs the less he can see a way out until eventually in the end nothing will ever be the same again. However, the signature style of emptiness and despair is missing from "The Big Fix". Sure, our lead is disillusioned and divorced and on the rocks, but unlike say his counterpart in "Night Moves" he isn't desperate nor depressed. He also has a great relationship with his kids whom he sees (one gets the impression) a little too often. There is a lot of good in his life. Another unusual element is that while the good old days are brought up often enough, no one seems to be awfully sentimental for them. It seems that everyone has excepted that their former ideals were follies of youth and have moved over into the real world. Even our hero seems to have excepted this, even though he may still harbour some of his old socialist values. There is a great sequence in which an old revolutionary, now an advertising executive with a huge house in the hills talks about his change. "Being a revolutionary in America is like being a spoil sport at an orgy. All these goodies being passed around and you feel like a *beep* when you say no." I liked "The Big Fix" most of all because it didn't force anything down my throat. It isn't a film about the evils or the goods of capitalism. It isn't a partisan film. I liked it as well for its sharp and witty script. The one-liners come in quick and hard and are very funny. I also loved Richard Dreyfuss in the lead. He is believable and energetic and likable. What I didn't like about "The Big Fix" is the plot and the atmosphere. Most great noirs don't have great plots. That's a fact. They're either too complicated, or too simple, or on too cliche. Here we have the former, a plot so complex and labyrinthine I didn't even realise the reveal had come until the credits rolled. What all of the best noirs do have is a great atmosphere, a great environment. That is why they're structured the way they are, so you can, bit by bit, mook by mook, discover its characters and settings and language. The smoke-filled bars are populated by colourful characters, double-crossing dames and tough guys in pin-striped suits. And they all talk in a way that makes them sound like they're writing copy, fast. "The Big Fix" doesn't have this. I wasn't particularly taken by the plot, I didn't really care where Eppis is hiding, nor was I particularly interested in who was fixing the election. John Lithgow, though a great actor, is hardly anything to write home about. A prissy campaign manager with a college degree is hardly gonna give Eugene Roche's Ron Birdwell a run for his money. I kept waiting to get hooked but I never did. I wasn't expecting twists 'cause you don't really get them in noirs, but I was expecting to be charmed, I wasn't. The one great supporting character comes in the form of Rita Karin as the feisty old socialist. She is hilarious and made me wish the rest of the characters were as well written. In the end, I did like "The Big Fix". Not as much as I'd hoped or wanted, but I did. Dreyfuss is great, the script is pretty funny and the car chase was great. The plot, the atmosphere and the near TV direction were bland and forgettable, but there was a certain energy to the film, a certain wittiness to it I appreciated, found interesting. No "The Long Goodbye", but there's life in it yet.
2.5/4 - DirectorSidney LumetStarsAndy GarciaRichard DreyfussLena OlinA newly elected District Attorney finds himself in the middle of a police corruption investigation that may involve his father and his partner.14-01-2017
I don't remember seeing a film as intense as this since John Cassavetes' "A Woman Under the Influence". It starts in fifth gear and doesn't let go until the end. It explodes off the screen, the sparks come flying at you. From the opening action sequence (as tense and as exhilarating as they come) to the finale which may have been a little too hoaky and hopeful for my liking the film is fast, sharp, smart, but above all strangely touching and powerful. Director Sidney Lumet has honed his craft for years and in many ways "Night Falls on Manhattan" is the result of his (at that point) 40-year career. There are elements here of all his previous films. Sure, "Night Falls" isn't as poignant as "12 Angry Men", nor as infuriatingly powerful as "Verdict", nor as bleakly honest as "Prince of the City", but it deserves to stand shoulder to shoulder with those films on the strength of its intensity and belief. Don't get me wrong, Lumet's script is no slouch. Sharp, even witty and to the point, it gave me goosebumps more than once. His directing complements the script beautifully as he maneuvers the film's erratic (but captivating) pace speeding it up and slowing it down. In fact, you can slice the film in two halves almost perfectly symmetrically. The first half relentlessly fast, urgent, upbeat, the second quieter, more introspective, poignant. It is like seeing the dawning of the day and then nightfall in the life of Andy Garcia's character. Two of the film's best sequences are polar opposites. First is a slam-bang action sequence, miles ahead of anything some half-baked Hollywood hack could come up with in a low-blow Arnold Schwarzenegger film. The violence here is direct, mayhem absolute. This is a no-holds-barred takedown and it shows. In the 1990s there was only one film that could parallel this with its action scenes and it was Michael Mann's masterpiece "Heat". The second scene is set in Ian Holm's house at night. Holm plays Garcia's policeman father, Garcia is at this point the district attorney and Holm and his partner (played in a runaway performance by James Gandolfini) have something to tell Garcia. The conversation takes up about 10 minutes of the film which at this point had hardly had a scene running more than 2 minutes. In many ways, it is the heart of the film and it is incredible. The performances are mostly top notch in this film but the two best ones come from Gandolfini and Ron Leibman. Leibman is the top dog in this film, the main man. His performance is the only thing to nearly match the intensity of the film's pace. He is a powerhouse. Garcia is fine but he is no match for the veteran cast. He tends to overact and his hand flailing and wide-eyed reacting sometimes elicit an unwanted snicker. Richard Dreyfuss is second-billed but in truth, his part is rather small. Important but small. He is barely on screen and often overshadowed by events. He shares two heartfelt scenes with Garcia in a sauna that prove conclusively that he should have been given a bigger role. In the end, I'd like to bring up another film. Norman Jewison's "And Justice for All". All the way through "Night Falls on Manhattan" reminded me of it. Of its brutal honesty, harsh realism and, yes, breathless intensity. "And Justice for All" is a better movie because it manages to keep its laser-like course without descending into melodrama like Lumet's film does, but even though "Night Falls on Manhattan" told me nothing new it is still brilliantly made, surprisingly touching and above all cuttingly and devastatingly smart.
3/4 - DirectorJames B. HarrisStarsJames WoodsLesley Ann WarrenCharles DurningAn obsessive, insubordinate homicide cop is convinced a serial killer is loose in the Hollywood area and disobeys orders in order to catch him.14-01-2017
This is a great thriller. Sharp and focused, unflinching and brutal, "Cop" is an antidote for all those idealist, feel-good cop movies out there pretending to be hardcore. Sgt. Lloyd Hopkins is an idealist and he tells it like it is. He is obsessive, cynical, at times even insane, but he is also undeniably right. James Woods plays him almost like a crusader. He isn't dragged into a web of murder and deceit, he wilfully throws himself into it. He isn't one of your cute Hollywood rebels, he is a true insubordinate recusant (note how he even deliberately walks over grass patches between two concrete paths). Woods' particular brand of intensity and sense of humour fit the character so absolutely perfectly I'm convinced that if there is a purpose in life his was to play this guy. The film was based on a novel by James Ellroy and it shows. The film is told in the style of a proper film noir. Hopkins follows clue by clue, one by one and each one leads him to a new character, a new adventure to end badly, usually not for Hopkins. Unlike a film noir the plot here is easy to follow and well organised which was a relief. I reckon this is down to writer/director James B. Harris whose calm and precise direction gives the film an almost mesmerisingly realistic quality. There is no stylisation here, this is real hardboiled stuff. Another admirable thing about the film is that despite being marketed as an action-packed thriller it is actually a very slow-paced film. It allows for a lot of quiet, pensive moments, building a concentrated atmosphere and a lot of that brand of quiet tension I love.
4/4 - DirectorChris ThomsonStarsBryan BrownAnna Maria MonticelliBelinda GiblinA down-on-his-luck P.I. is hired by a beautiful woman to find her missing husband who disappeared after receiving some tapes.16-01-2017
Bryan Brown is an actor I enjoy watching on screen. He is a calming, engaging presence radiating wit and charm. Unfortunately, most of his filmography is filled with fourth-rate thrillers and claptrap. Sometimes he elevates the material and sometimes the material crushes him. It's a big gamble putting on a Bryan Brown film. "The Empty Beach" gives him a great opportunity to flex and show off and he does. His charm on full power, he is entertaining and effortless as the first Australian hardboiled private eye. The film, unfortunately, is average at best. I say unfortunately because an Australian neo-noir is a fascinating prospect especially with such a strong performance at its center. "The Empty Beach", unfortunately, oozes that special brand of televisual insignificance. The plot is standard, the acting well below par (with the exception of Nick Tate and of course Brown) and the directing unimaginative and flat. Even with the runtime of 86 minutes, the film feels padded-out (there are dozens of montages of people walking and enjoying the sun that seem to go on forever) and in the end, the film lacks any kind of impact or atmosphere. It is flat. It really is. Another sad thing is that I feel there is a lot of life in the original source material. I haven't read it, but I think that with a better, sharper, smarter script and a better cast and director this could have been a quirky gem. As it is it is really, really flat. If you're a Bryan Brown fan it's better than "Blame It on the Bellboy" or "Full Body Massage" but I'd recommend "F/X" before "The Empty Beach".
2/4 - DirectorFrank PerryStarsSusan SarandonRaul JuliaEdward HerrmannAn ex-newspaper woman who is now a suburban housewife can't resist getting involved in an investigation of the murder of a philandering dentist who had been having affairs with several of her neighbors.16-01-2017
While aspiring for controversy "Compromising Positions" manages to remain completely bland but not without redeeming features. As a satire, it is a wash-out, with nothing new to say and barely any insight, but if we disregard its aspirations and potential we get ourselves a perfectly workable, quite entertaining and enjoyable comedy/thriller. Most of the characters are either flat, cliched or annoying (usually all three), but Susan Sarandon is engaging enough to guide us through an array of unlikable characters and make us feel like it was all meant to be that way. We are after all viewing these characters through her and she, herself, finds them rather contemptuous. Raul Julia is also very enjoyable (as always) and the two have great chemistry together. Is it funny? Not really. It is quite amusing and elicits quite a few smiles along the way. So what is the real problem here? In my opinion, it lies in the hands of the writer first, and director second. The film is adapted from a Susan Isaacs novel by the author herself but like some hired-gun Hollywood hack she keeps missing all the potential of her own work. I feel the novel is better, I haven't read it, but the sheer wealth of possibilities here tells me it must be. Had the novel been adapted by a seasoned screenwriter of sharp and smart satires, someone like Paul Mazursky or Alan Bennett, a perceptive and witty writer this could have been a real winner. Ms. Isaacs' screenplay is in all actuality quite a dull affair. But it could have been salvaged. Here we get to the responsibility of the director, Frank Perry. He should have resorted to a much different style than he utilised here. This script with the speed and delivery of classic screwball comedies could have turned out well. It needed more speed and energy. Instead, Perry plays it very slowly, with the quiet breaks usually intended for films that have something to say, or a joke that the audience needs a minute to understand. To be honest, I've never been a fan of Frank Perry, best remembered now for his two duds "Mommie Dearest" and "Monsignor" despite his rather well received "The Swimmer" and "Diary of a Mad Housewife". Another one of his films has recently been dug up, the stylish but endlessly dull and predictable "Man on a Swing" which manages to disappoint despite two excellent performances. "Compromising Positions" didn't disappoint me. I just noticed that it missed more tricks than it had. I didn't love it, but I didn't hate it either. I enjoyed it and I fully expect to enjoy it again some day. It is slow and empty but there is something enjoyable and engaging about it, the story, the two leads and the humour are all solid.
2.5/4 - DirectorRobert MandelStarsBryan BrownBrian DennehyDiane VenoraA movie special effects man is hired to fake a real-life mob killing for a witness protection plan, but finds his own life in danger.18-01-2017
"F/X" is a pretty entertaining film with a dull, inept script. You know the type. There are explosions, witty lines, some skullduggery and all the while you're excited and entertained but still questioning the plot's every move. Sometimes it works, in the case of "F/X", it doesn't. It is a missed opportunity. The idea is good and is a brilliant premise for a serious thriller. Imagine what a Fincher or a Lumet or Levinson & Link could do with it. It is the sort of idea Hitchcock would have loved, even the usually dull Brian de Palma could do something with it surely. A special effects man in the center of a thriller. Using his skills do get out of trouble. Perhaps the other way 'round would have worked better. Perhaps had our lead been the killer using his trickery to evade justice it would have worked better. Whatever the case, the script by Robert T. Megginson and Gregory Fleeman misses all the opportunities. I never got the feeling our hero was utilising any real skills. He is either using smoke bombs (which isn't very special) or constructing complex effects in an unbelievably short time period. Not once do we get a peek behind the curtain, see how the real guys do it. The stuff here is as fake as the effects they create. The use of the word hero brings me to my second problem with the script. Rolly (that's the name of the lead) goes through that same instant makeover all action movie characters go through. All his life he was a nice, sweet guy, never hurt a fly, then all of a sudden he is a coldblooded killer and a martial arts expert. In the film's climax, he ends up killing six people in fairly grizzly ways and not once does he have a single moral dilemma. He kills them then cracks jokes. And then, to cap it all off, he becomes a thief as well. I never bought it for a second. The biggest problem in the whole film is the fairly standard and dullish plot. Remove the gimmickry of the special effects and you've got one of the most by-the-numbers and boring thrillers I've ever seen. The plot here is so predictable and cheap that straight-to-video films would be embarrassed to be seen with it. I figured the whole thing out in the first fifteen minutes using the well-worn technique of looking for the conspicuously nice guy. He's the big bad. Besides being inept it is also written in a fairly dull way and lacks the urgency and excitement of a "No Way Out" or "The Fugitive". The rest of "F/X" is surprisingly good. The acting is top-notch. Bryan Brown is excellent as Rolly, even though the script does him no favours. Jerry Orbach is brilliant as the slimy gangster even though his role is very short. Brian Dennehy does Brian Dennehy and is as always a delight to watch. Martha Gehman hams it up a bit, but she comes across fine. Director Robert Mandel does a competent and energetic job bringing the best out of every action sequence. There is one particularly effective shot in the film in which an unsuspecting party is shot by a sniper while looking out of the window. Even though I saw it coming I still jumped. I don't really know how to wrap it all up. The script is bottom grade, awful stuff. The rest is top-notch. It's a case for your own preference. For me, the film didn't work. I wanted more special effects, less shooting, and noise. I wanted better characters and plot. When I don't care about either I tend to tune out and all the car chases and shootouts in the world can't win me over.
1.5/4 - DirectorJohn G. AvildsenStarsPeter FalkCharles DurningClaude LelouchNick and Charlie (Peter Falk and Charles Durning) are two crooks that rob Harry Winston's jewelry store. Nick portrays a rich elderly brother and sister by using prosthetics and make-up to con the manager.19-01-2017
There is something so old-worldly about "Happy New Year" that had someone told me Frank Capra had directed it I wouldn't have been the least bit surprised. Smart, quick, delightful and wickedly entertaining, it has a pace of an Olympic sprinter and a heart of gold. Quite a lot of the film's success relies on a terrific performance from Peter Falk. Many actors would be tempted to ham it up, play it for laughs. In his reliable hands, I could wholeheartedly believe that everyone would be deceived. Make-up from Robert Laden (who did a similar job on Falk's later film "Roommates") also helps. As do three strong supporting performances from Charles Durning, Wendy Hughes, and Tom Courtenay. Courtenay, in particular, manages to elicit laughs and a certain degree of sympathy playing a part most actors would turn into a heartless and dull one. The ending is surprisingly effective and striking and reminiscent of Falk's previous heist film "A Step Out of Line".
3/4 - DirectorWillard HuyckStarsDudley MooreEddie MurphyKate CapshawA military weapons engineer struggles to do his job responsibly, while a hapless tank commander has to live with the consequences in combat years later.21-01-2017
Like in Dudley Moore's earlier effort "Wholly Moses", "Best Defense" is a poorly written film filled with tired and lame jokes elevated (somewhat) by its very talented cast. The big difference here is that while "Wholly Moses" was nothing but a series of loosely connected sketches, "Best Defense" tries to be a coherent, plot-driven comedy. It isn't. "Wholly Moses" was saved by its simplicity, a sketch-show episode-like format which allowed jokes to fall flat without really impacting the film. "Best Defense" becomes more and more tiring and dull with every failed joke until it becomes a little bit painful to watch all these talented people struggling for a laugh. The film has a somewhat infamous story behind it, namely, the film was originally intended as a solely Dudley Moore vehicle. And it was shot as such in 1982. However, it flopped miserably with the test audiences and the studio, in an aim to save it, took it and shot an additional 20 minutes with Eddie Murphy, while also removing (quite noticeably and jarringly) several potentially key scenes from the Dudley Moore storyline. The two parts never meet but are tied together and actually do help the film. The Dudley Moore storyline revolves around Moore as an engineer struggling to figure out how the tank works, the Eddie Murphy storyline involves Murphy as a soldier testing the tank out in a war situation. This provides the film's only laughs and is actually quite amusing if disjointed and brief. The Murphy storyline is actually quite funny and would probably work as a short on its own. There are quite a few funny one-liners from Murphy and he gets a very funny support from his two trainees. The Moore storyline, on the other hand, is a total washout. Like in most of his movies Moore unsuccessfully tries to save it. He is never bad but the material is unsalvageable. George Dzundza and Helen Shaver also try but fail. The only person who manages to be funny is David Rasche (of "Sledge Hammer" fame). His wild energy and manic facial expressions made me laugh. Unfortunately, he is in the film for only about 10 minutes. The rest is dire. Finally, the film fails in a dramatic sense also. I never believed in or liked any of the characters, I was never thrilled or interested by any of the twists and turns. The only exciting part is the climax and only because of the juxtaposition with the Eddie Murphy storyline. The film ends with Moore struggling to convince his colleagues that the only way to save the tank from blowing up due to overheating is to implement a mechanism he invented for a toy. Meanwhile, Murphy is trapped in a war zone and the tank is overheating. Is it going to explode or will Moore's colleagues listen to him? There is some nice tension built here even though the answer is quite obvious. In conclusion, the film should have been scrapped and the Eddie Murphy segments cut into a short and released that way. Those parts are quite funny, and though it wouldn't win any awards it would at least make people laugh for 20 minutes without the rest of "Best Defense" making us bored for the other 70.
1.5/4 - DirectorMarshall BrickmanStarsDudley MooreElizabeth McGovernAlec GuinnessA psychiatrist, who falls in love with a patient, is visited by the spirit of Sigmund Freud, who gives him advice on how to handle it.21-01-2017
Countertransference is a psychiatric term referring to the situation in which a psychiatrist falls in love with his patient. "Lovesick" purports to be a film about this. It also thinks it's a film about psychotherapy and love and society. I think it's merely delusional. It's just a romantic comedy and a below-par one at that. The film boasts a terrific cast. Dudley Moore is relatable as the psychiatrist, Elizabeth McGovern is heartfelt and seductive as the patient and there are a few supporting gems in there as well. David Straithairn is a patient worried about rays and signals radiating from the top of the Empire State Building, Ron Silver is the prima donna actor, Wallace Shawn appears very briefly as a psychiatrist colleague of Moore's. John Huston is also in there but he might as well have not been. My favourite is Gene Saks as the suicidal patient. All these people do their best and yet the film falls very very flat. The trouble lies in Marshall Brickman's script which is neither as funny as it thinks it is nor as insightful or clever. There is nothing in it I haven't seen or heard before, done better. Moore and McGovern do their best and generate a believable relationship on screen but their characters are cardboard cutouts, totally unoriginal and largely without any depth or real thoughts and feelings. They feel written all the way through. The film's plot is contrived and repetitive. It also does the one annoying cliche that always gets me. Dudley Moore begins a relationship with Elizabeth McGovern, he loves her and it's all going great, however, he is married. What is he to do? Well, he goes home and finds his wife cheating on him. Problem solved in two minutes of screen time. It happens a lot in movies and always annoys me. There is no point in Moore being married, it would have been better cut out. No one would have been any the wiser. Finally, I want to mention the recurring device of Moore's character having imaginary discussions with Sigmund Freud. These scenes provided the film with their only two laughs but are entirely redundant and quite sloppily introduced. Appearing at irregular intervals, Freud and Moore have a short conversation and then Sigmund disappears. He rarely advises Moore and when he does Moore doesn't take his advice. His advice is also always wrong. There is no reason for these scenes to exist in the movie. Freud is played by Alec Guinness and it is entirely redundant for me to say he is brilliant in the part, but being that half of this movie is redundant why should I abstain. Marshall Brickman who directed and wrote this film co-wrote several Woody Allen films including "Annie Hall" and "Manhattan Murder Mystery" which are with "Crimes and Misdemeanors" my favourite Allen films. "Lovesick" has none of the sharpness, wit or character present in those films. I wonder what Brickman did for Allen. The typing? A smart writer would have turned a critical eye on Moore's character rather than endorse his fantasies. A smart writer would have actually dealt with the ethical issue at the plot's heart rather than just ignore it for the most of the runtime and only bring it up in the end to prompt an epiphany for Moore's character. A smart writer could have made a memorable satire out of "Lovesick". Brickman evidently isn't a smart writer.
2/4 - DirectorRod DanielStarsDudley MooreKirk CameronMargaret ColinA mysterious potion switches the personalities of a buttoned-up doctor and his laid-back son.21-01-2017
I wish someday someone would explain to me the downward trajectory of Dudley Moore's career. Why did this multitalented, versatile man, one of the funniest comics ever to walk the Earth choose such appallingly bad scripts? He certainly wasn't a stupid person not to realise they were bad and yet he always approached them with the earnest and effort of a method actor. He is inevitably the best, and often the only good thing about them. "Like Father, Like Son" is a bastardisation of the "Freaky Friday" story. An unfunny, badly written rollercoaster of awful distractingly directed by a Hollywood hack. My favourite body swap film is the 2003 version of "Freaky Friday". Not a popular opinion, I know, but it's mine. That film is so smart, heartfelt and funny that it is hard not to love it. "Like Father, Like Son" is an antithesis of it. Whereas "Freaky Friday" took the time to develop its characters, make them into three-dimensional, interesting, likable people, "Like Father, Like Son" dumps us straight into the plot with two cliches. Whereas "Freaky Friday" gave its characters an epiphany to work towards, a central conflict to resolve, "Like Father, Like Son" gives us tired, lame gags. The script is so predictable, so formulaic I could call every following shot. Here's the fancy car wreck scene, here's the wild dancing to rock music, here's the socially conscious speech and finally here's the reconciliation. The plot is arbitrary at best. Do you know what the big problem is? What the film's entire conflict hangs upon? The father wants his son to be a doctor and the son doesn't. That's it. Now that may sound like something big if his son had some sort of an ambition. Perhaps he wanted to be an artist or pursue some other such dream. Does he? No. From what I could gather all he wants to do is lie around watching MTV all day. He has no dreams and no particular reason to not want to be a doctor. His father wants the best for him while he wants nothing. Now to get to the character of the father. Whereas the son was a layabout, the father is a stuck-up snobbish bore who is also not a very good person. He is nasty to everyone, dismissive and is even seen to refuse treatment to a critically sick man because the man doesn't have health insurance. Well, you might say, this is all being built up so they can both learn a lesson. But they don't. No lesson is learned. The father (in his son's body) spends the entire film alienating his son's school friends and being his usual self-important self and his son spends the entire film partying and being his usual reckless buffoon. Neither have a big epiphany moment, neither learn anything nor change in any way. This, of course, doesn't stop the movie from giving us the big reconciliation scene in the end in which the son gives a big speech about how much he loves his father and his father then apologises and leaves his job triumphantly (well not so triumphantly and he probably leaves his job only because they've passed him up for promotion, what a great guy!). This is hardly the film's only inconsistency, though. The script feels like it was written by several people while it was being filmed (which probably is what happened). Ranging from such questions as to why does a cat bark when it exchanges minds (or whatever) with a dog but the father doesn't retain his British accent when he exchanges minds with his son to a pretty key question regarding the actual process of exchanging minds which works thusly. Person A drinks the potion and looks deeply into the eyes of person B and voila! They've become each other. This, of course, prompts the question of why they don't just repeat the process, switch bodies again and swap back. They don't even try it. It might not work, but you would bloody try it.
1/4 - DirectorTony BillBarry L. YoungStarsDudley MooreDaryl HannahPaul ReiserA bitter ad executive who has reached his breaking point lands in a mental institution, where his career actually begins to thrive with help from his fellow patients.21-01-2017
In 1983, Dudley Moore made "Lovesick", a comedy about psychiatry (or at least claiming to be), 7 years later he made this, a comedy about mental illness and advertising (or at least claiming to be). Yes, they both suffer from pretty much the same ailments. The construction is hoaky, the plot is far-fetched, the characters unbelievable. Of course, the biggest problem is that both pretend to be more than they really are. "Crazy People" starts out masquerading as a satire of advertisement but really fails to mock it or make any observations about it. Sure, our lead makes a few zany ads but how is that attacking this global deceit machine? Then the films spirals into a comedy about mental patients and love and acceptance and all that sweet and sticky stuff Hollywood just loves since "One Flew Over the Cookoo's Nest" and becomes an even worse pretender. Instead of providing us with realistic, believable mentally ill people, this film propagating humanity and equality gives us cartoonish, over-the-top, cliche crazy people. There's a guy there obsessed with SAABs, there's a guy who only says 'hello', a guy who thinks he's a judge... you get the picture. And finally, we find ourselves in the farcical situation of watching a film claiming to be a satire on advertisement lying to us. It all felt so disingenuous and fake. This is a very stereotypical, unbelievable and crass portrayal of mental illness. The only thing missing is the guy who thinks he's Napoleon. But wait a minute, you may say, who says this is a satire? Perhaps you're right, maybe we are the ones giving the film the burden of being smart and satirical and cutting etc. Nowhere in the promotional material does it say it aspires to be anything but a sweet, simple, romantic comedy. If we look at it that way, it is mediocre at best. Sure, it's more heartfelt and innocent than most cynical Hollywood romcoms aiming to exploit the gullable public but it's still a fairly dull story populated by laughably badly drawn characters. I never really cared for the romance between our two leads and I certainly didn't laugh much either. Some of the ads are funny, not in a laugh out way mind, but rather wry and amusing. Somehow, Dudley Moore's landed himself in yet another mediocre comedy with good intentions but a really hoaky, shallow execution. A shame really, 'cause he's good in it.
2/4 - DirectorTony BillStarsDudley MooreMary Tyler MooreKatherine HealyIn this heart-warming drama, a terminally ill young girl strives to bring together her wealthy mother and a California politician, fulfilling her dream of having a family during the last six weeks of her life.21-01-2017
"Six Weeks" is based on a formulaic plot, contains formulaic situations and is played out entirely around three formulaic characters. The loving mother, the precocious child and the witty stranger. What makes it work however is the honest, strong and heartfelt emotion behind each scene and performance. The three leads are Dudley Moore (in his best performance so far), Mary Tyler Moore (her performance features a few creaky moments but is overall very good) and Katherine Healy. Healy is a dancer in her feature debut and she impresses every second she's on screen. Here we see a great child actor at work and I wish all Macaulay Culkin's of the world would take note. She is not just a cute little girl. The film's script is high melodrama and it culminates in an ending so preposterous, so manipulative that it parallels the death of Little Nell. It would have elicited laughter and anger from me had it not all been played out so painfully honestly. I never felt the film was cynical, I never felt I was being cheated. This is very much down to the three leads and particularly to Healy. Her role is a tough one. So easily could she have come across as annoying rather than adorable, but I really enjoyed her performance and her company and I truly cared for the character. Dudley Moore brings the politician truly to life. He is written badly, as a cliche wisecracker, a cardboard goody two-shoes, but Moore gives him so much depth and (yes, again, I'm repeating myself) honesty. He is brilliant. The big spanner in the works of the film is a forced and unbelievable love story between Moore and Moore, I never bought it and I'm guessing neither did they. The two of them don't have that kind of chemistry. Anyway, I feel the film would have been even more poignant had they remained just friends. Dudley Moore doesn't need another motive and the film doesn't need the subplot. There's a lot wrong with "Six Weeks" but I can't in all honesty not recommend it. It worked for me. I cared about the characters, I liked the sentimentality of it, the emotion, the energy. There are several really great scenes, like a heart to heart between Dudley Moore and Healy in which a bond of trust is established and the final scene between Dudley Moore and Mary Tyler Moore in which he reads out of Healy's diary. Manipulative, yes, melodramatic, yes, but also very touching and well executed.
3/4 - DirectorArthur HillerStarsDudley MooreMary SteenburgenFrances SternhagenA successful playwright employs a new female writing partner, and it's love on first sight, but it happens to be the day he gets married. They both suppress their feelings for each other in order to form a successful writing partnership.22-01-2017
Unlike most Dudley Moore comedies "Romantic Comedy" is smart, sweet, sharp and endlessly charming. I was in love with this film from the first shot, the first quip, the first laugh and they all kept getting better and better. Moore and Mary Steenburgen sizzle from the screen, they have the chemistry that could rival Hepburn and Tracy, Astaire and Rogers. Having dialogue as great as this also helps. The script is cutting and heartfelt and awfully well written. Moore's character is sardonic without being annoyingly condescending, Steenburgen's is sweet and innocent without being sickeningly dull. Their performances complement each other beautifully. They are both so subtle, yet expressive. See for instance the scene in which Steenburgen and Frances Sternhagen (as their agent) catch Moore cheating on his wife. They speak of other things but the looks say it all. The romantic tension between them is also subtly built. We don't need to have long heart-to-heart talks between Moore and his psychiatrist for instance (a character surprisingly and mercifully not present) in which he goes on and on about how much he is in love with Steenburgen. In fact, I can't think of a single instance when it's discussed until the ending. It is all in the looks and the performances. The supporting cast is marvelous as well. There is a whole bunch of realistic and funny characters. The aforementioned Sternhagen as the crusty, world-weary, cynical agent, Janet Eilber who is great and utterly believable as the wife (not a cheating one like in "Lovesick") and Ron Leibman as Steenburgen's beleaguered husband. I believed in each and every one of them. I believe that is because the plot is played it out in such a natural way. There is nothing neat about the construction, their respective spouses don't just step aside at a convenient moment. Everything is so lifelike and everyone's motives are understandable and relatable. If I had any problems with the film it is the forced second ending. The film should have ended when the play does (you'll know what I'm on about if you see the film) but even that works in a way because you like the two of them so much. I smiled all the way through "Romantic Comedy" and my face hurts but I feel great, good and enlivened. All is fine.
3.5/4 - DirectorJeannot SzwarcStarsDudley MooreJohn LithgowDavid HuddlestonThe legend of Santa Claus is placed into jeopardy when an unscrupulous toy manufacturer attempts to take over Christmas.22-01-2017
"Santa Claus" is a dishearteningly bad film. A shameless monetisation of a wonderful, touching legend. And to make the matters worse it is also hypocritical. It has the nerve to make its villain a corporate magnate whose goal is to make as much money off of Christmas as possible. I cannot recall seeing a movie this exploitative and, dare I say it, evil. Yes, this film is the embodiment of all those money-hungry, finger-tapping villains with maniacal laughs from Christmas films. It is a cold, calculated money-grubbing opportunity complete with gizmos and gadgets thought up specially to be turned into bestselling lines of children's toys. It is also a completely charmless, dull, boring exercise. This is the film that epitomises the cliche of bad Hollywood would-be blockbusters that compromise artistic and moral integrity for a quick buck. A movie this lacking in imagination is hard to remember. It ticks off every cliche from the jolly musical number to the plucky child lead (played appallingly by a child actor whom even Ed Wood would recast for being more wooden than an old oak writing desk). This much cynicism made me sad for any child who sees this film. It is made even sadder by the fact that the film boasts a talented cast. David Huddleston could be a great Santa and Dudley Moore is a great elf. There are also some terrifically convincing special effects and a nice if intrusive score by Henry Mancini. Despite their fine effort, there is no real joy in this film. Sure, everyone jumps around and smiles a lot but it all feels artificial, fake, which could be the keywords to this film. The film is shot in a similarly stagey, intentionally fake way which gave "Superman" a stylish, comic-book look. It doesn't work here. It just makes the film look cheap and rushed (the latter I have no doubt it was). The only person with the right idea in mind is John Lithgow. He is the only thing in the film worth seeing and manages to elevate every scene he is in (at least makes them watchable). He is so over-the-top, so cartoonish that had everyone else followed suit the film might have even worked at a purely campy, intentionally bad way. Instead its faux sincerity insulted and saddened me. A pure joyless cash-in.
1/4 - DirectorRussell MulcahyStarsDudley MoorePeter CookJudy HuxtableRussell Mulcahy (of "Highlander" fame) films British comedy luminaries Peter Cook and Dudley Moore recording their last comedy album featuring two of their most beloved characters, lavatory attendants Derek and Clive. Booze, drugs, strippers and practical jokes (sometimes bitter and sick on the part of Cook) are provided. Throughout the recording, Moore has to weather the abuse and disdain of his longtime partner in the wake of his success in the American market (with films like '10' (1979) and Foul Play (1978)). The film marked the last appearance of Peter Cook and Dudley Moore together as a team and the end of their partnership which began with "Beyond the Fringe" in 1959. The men discuss "getting the horn" (i.e. getting "in the mood") at the most unlikely times, improvise songs filled with obscenities (Cook's two-note piano opus entitled "Dutch Bitch" is coarse and hilarious to those who are not easily offended) and work out their aggressions toward one another in the strangest ways, in the midst of putting the album together. They engage in all-out war and undeniable camaraderie.22-01-2017
John Cleese said in an interview that when people saw Alan Bennett doing a spoof of an Anglican sermon they screamed with laughter which was actually a release of years of pent-up tension. They had to listen to this pretentious claptrap every Sunday and were thought that it could not be mocked. Most great comedy is like this really and it extends not just to taboo subjects or those that are considered beyond mockery but rather to all humour. Laughter is a release of tension. The way to judge good comedy is to see if after the tension has been released it's still funny. Peter Cook & Dudley Moore are among the best comedians Britain has ever produced, at times I would say the best. Most of their work does hold up to this test but the Derek and Clive records present a quaint problem. I honestly don't think they'll ever be socially acceptable. They are that out there and insane. I don't think we'll ever get over the initial shock of hearing it. Somehow, this makes them timeless. They were improvised on the spot by Moore and Cook, recorded and released in three separate instances in bootleg editions because no label company would carry them. "Derek and Clive Get the Horn" was recorded during their final session for their final album "Ad Nauseam". At this point, Cook and Moore's relationship was strained beyond repair and Moore didn't even show up for the following (by schedule final) recording session. He was, at the time, building a Hollywood career which would take off only a year after "Ad Nauseum" was released and was nervous someone would discover these recordings and circulate them among his showbiz friends and contacts. The reason I bring all of this up is that this is the backstory that makes the film all the more interesting. Going in cold this is a very funny movie as well. The material is crazy, off-the-wall. It's 50% hit and 50% miss but it comes at you so quick you'll laughing for most of the runtime. But with the backstory in mind, it becomes even more interesting. There is nothing out in the open here showing the strains between Dud and Pete. No huge argument, or dramatic on-screen break-up, but an eagle-eyed observer will notice occasional side glances between the two, a certain tension in Dudley and resentment in Peter and a quite glorious moment in which Cook triumphantly blows a puff of smoke as a punctuation mark to finally making Dudley Moore corpse for the first of many times (he held out for about five minutes). My favourite scene is the fake police raid orchestrated by producer Richard Branson on the two. Dudley Moore has a shocked look of impending doom on his face all the way through. This is not a film for a casual viewer. It isn't a documentary on Derek and Clive, it isn't even a documentary on Peter Cook & Dudley Moore. It is just a recording or a recording session, but I found it mesmerising and very interesting. I like behind-the-scenes stuff a lot and this one is just great. I enjoyed seeing how the magic happened and their facial expressions and Dudley's constant muffled corpsing just enhanced the experience.
3/4 - DirectorMontgomery TullyStarsLaurence PaynePatricia DaintonJane GriffithsA married composer finds that his affair with his wife's half-sister has resulted in her death.23-01-2017
There was a slew of films produced in Britain from the 1930s till the late 1960s, they were all second-features (meaning they were up to 70 minutes long), thrillers (mostly by Edgar Wallace) and were usually entirely forgettable. They were sometimes bad, sometimes good, but never horrible or great. The acting was adequate, as was the cinematography, the directing, the writing. There was nothing remotely stand-out about them. Out of all I've seen "The Third Alibi" is probably the best. What I admire about it is its laser-sharp precision, every scene, line and shot moves the story forward, no deviations. And yet it doesn't feel forced or rushed. I also admire how well the story is set-up. It reminded me of one of those internet videos in which you see a person setting up the dominos, meticulously, carefully and then just knocking them over. "The Third Alibi" is that neat and in the same way fascinating. A lot can be learned about storytelling from this film. There is no depth here, no aspirations to it. It is just a short, fast, well-written thriller and I enjoyed it for that.
3/4 - DirectorSteve GordonStarsDudley MooreLiza MinnelliJohn GielgudAlcoholic billionaire playboy Arthur Bach must marry a woman he does not love, or he will be cut off from his $750,000,000 fortune. But when Arthur falls in love with a poor waitress, he must decide if he wants to choose love or money.23-01-2017
I don't normally like comedies with affected characters. Be they stupid, drunk or Borat. I don't find them funny. I find intelligent people funny in realistic situations. Now, I'm not saying this to provide myself an excuse to dislike "Arthur" but rather to praise it because its drunk with a heart-of-gold won me over within five minutes. Dudley Moore's performance is brilliant. Funny, over-the-top yet believable, this is one of the best comedic performances ever and he is not even the best thing about the film. His love interest is played by Liza Minnelli. She is smart and cutting without coming across as annoying or overbearing. This performance rivals the one she gave in "Cabaret", not even she is the best thing in the film. No. That honour goes to the great John Gielgud, unbelievably good as Jeeves to Arthur's Bertie. He is the heart, soul, and wit of the movie and you wouldn't know it to look at him. He gives such a subtle performance, stony-cold outside and Africa-warm inside. He is brilliant and to give "Arthur" the best compliment possible this is one of Gielgud's greatest performances. Top five. The trio is assisted by an assortment of great supporting characters each of whom could get a spin-off of their own. I was secretly hoping to see more of Geraldine Fitzgerald as the tough grandmother. Also great is Jill Eikenberry as Arthur's Stepford-smiler fiancee. Barney Miller and Anne de Salvo are also in the picture and it is telling of how great it was that I almost forgot to mention them. The second best thing about the film is the script. The story is told in such a straightforward manner you wouldn't even know it is being told. It is light and fluffy but also memorable and witty. In reviews such as these, this is the part when I would list some of my favourite moments. If I were to do so for "Arthur" this review would be fifteen pages long. It is impossible. So I'll skip straight to the finale. "Arthur" is very cliched. They do every romantic comedy staple here from the fair shooting gallery to the surprise wedding interruption. However, it is a testament to the brilliance of the cast and the script that the film never feels tired never feels boring and never gives you the sense of deja-vu. It is one of the best, sweetest comedies I've ever seen.
3.5/4 - DirectorWilliam SterlingStarsFiona FullertonMichael JaystonHywel BennettAlice (Fiona Fullerton) falls down a rabbit hole and into a magical dream world populated by surreal characters and bewildering adventures. It's a journey of self-discovery for Alice as she searches for a way out of Wonderland and encounters many bizarre creatures such as the White Rabbit (Michael Crawford), the March Hare (Peter Sellers), the Queen of Hearts (Dame Flora Robson), and the Dormouse (Dudley Moore). Musical highlights include the inspiring song "The Me I Never Knew".23-01-2017
"Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" is a doddering movie best described with the word awkward. Every aspect of the film can be described as awkward from the performances to the costumes. Nothing gels here at all. This becomes evident from the moment people start randomly bursting into song. "Well" you might say "it IS a musical". "No" I shall answer and explain the fact that people don't actually sing songs here, they sort of rhythmically recite certain lines to the same tune or a variation of it. The music is really repetitive. From what I heard there were only around three different pieces in the whole film none of which last longer than two minutes. They are fine pieces (of course they are as they were composed by John Barry) but after you hear the same tune accompany the tone-deaf singing of two lines over and over it really becomes grating. The fact that people burst into songs doesn't really add to the whole experience at all. In the 1951 classic Disney cartoon, the memorable songs added to the atmosphere and served to further immerse us into the weird and wonderful world of Wonderland. Here they have no point other than to give this film some meager excuse for existing. There are no grand musical numbers, only one (pretty lifeless) dance sequence and no rhyme or reason to when they will begin and when they will end. The acting is stiff and lifeless. None of the characters were brought to life and all of the actors felt like they were reciting their lines rather than speaking them. Which brings us onto the film's biggest problem. The whole thing feels like a recording of an amateur production. It is shot entirely on a soundstage and it shows. It looks cheap. None of the supposed exteriors feel like anything other than badly-dressed sets, painted in pretty much the same colour. Apparently, the idea was to imitate the iconic Tenniel illustrations of "Alice in Wonderland". But those drawings were beautiful, imaginative and lively. This film looks like it was clobbered together in an afternoon on a shoestring budget. The costumes look awful as well. What is the point of bringing in all these wonderful actors (Michael Crawford, Ralph Richardson, Roy Kinnear, Peter Sellers, Dudley Moore, Dennis Price, Spike Milligan, Michael Hordern) if you're going to drown them in shoddy fur and plastic. I saw better-looking costumes in Halloween stores going for 10 quid. It is all so amateurish. Robert Helpmann makes for a surprisingly dull Hatter and even his comrades the March Hare (played by Peter Sellers) and Dormouse (played by Dudley Moore probably atoning himself for missing the same role in the wonderful 1966 Jonathan Miller production) are boring and joyless. The feeling is that the film was rushed, rushed, rushed. I have long since learned to stay away from "Alice in Wonderland" adaptations since they mostly miss-the-point, are childish and almost always badly done. I decided to give this one a try for its brilliant cast and boy was I wrong. A total failure, a flop, a bomb.
1/4 - DirectorBud YorkinStarsDudley MooreLiza MinnelliJohn GielgudArthur loses his fortune for staying with Linda, right as the two were preparing to adopt a child. As their marriage suffers, Arthur plans for a way to get his money back, but first he must sober up and get a real job.23-01-2017
There is no way "Arthur 2" could have worked. Not because Steve Gordon died before he could write it, not because the spirit of the original couldn't be recaptured, but because the ending of the original was so perfect a single shot extra is an insult to its memory. Two other things that should be taken into account are that the original was about a happy drunk looking for love, well he finds at the end and supposedly he cuts down on the drinking. So that's that part of the plot gone and the second was that the best part of "Arthur" couldn't possibly be in "Arthur 2". John Gielgud's brilliant character Hobson died memorably in the first film. If there was ever a film that didn't need a sequel it's "Arthur". Well, what do you know, they only went out and made it. Is it awful? Surprisingly, no. Is it good? Unsurprisingly, no. I'll start with the good stuff. First off most of the jokes work. It's a pretty funny film at times. Not as funny as the first one, and certainly not as witty and sharp, but it has a few laughs, pretty cheap ones, but they are laughs. Secondly, Moore and Minnelli are great both individually and together. The old spark is still there and when they're together the film sizzles with energy. Now the bad stuff. The bad stuff can be simply described as everything else. Oh boy, are there problems. To begin with what made "Arthur" so great and charming is how straightforward it was. There were no sprawling subplots, no complex twists and turns. It was just Arthur on the quest for love. As mentioned before "Arthur 2" isn't written by Steve Gordon. It's written by Andy Breckman and he weaves a complex, languorous plot involving the return of the father of Arthur's fiancee from the first movie. The one he dumped at the altar. Through some machinations, he leaves Arthur penniless and won't give him back the money until he marries his daughter. While in the first film the father was a colourful and funny character here he is just your run-of-the-mill comedy villain complete with a game of clay pigeons. Arthur and Linda have to slum it now and this stuff just doesn't work. I don't say it couldn't work but it is so badly written I didn't believe in or care about any of it. It is melodrama stuff devoid of interest or humour. Breckman fails to develop any real emotion between Arthur and Linda. They remain entirely cheerful all the way through the predicament. They apparently care as little about it as I did. And then two key things happen. The two things that put "Arthur 2" over the edge and into the cesspit. Two examples of lazy writing. Laziest I've seen in a long time. First of all, Linda leaves Arthur. Why? I don't know. She says it's so he'll be happy but we all (including her) know he won't be happy without her. She does it without any prior warning, without any moment where she or he are shown to be unhappy in any way. There is no build up to it. She just ups and leaves because... well there was another 50 minutes on the runtime and something had to happen. It's shoddy and cheap but wait for this kicker. The second thing happens in the very climax. Arthur's ploy to win his money back fails miserably and just as he is about to face the fact that he has no options a miracle happens. A key character has a major change of heart and just gives Arthur his money back. I'm not kidding, that's the ending. The film ends when a person who is just about to get what he/she wanted all along decides to just let Arthur be. Why? Well because there was no running time left. This is the worst writing I've ever seen. Two of the biggest moments in the entire film and this is how you handle them. This isn't even first draft stuff, this is stuff a good writer wouldn't even consider. Hell, it wouldn't even occur to a good writer. And then to put the final nail into its coffin Breckman brings back John Gielgud in the least dramatic and emotional scene of the film. Moore and Gielgud had such great chemistry between them, the characters loved each other so much and yet their big reunion is a wash-out. A cold affair. Nothing happens, there are no sparkles, no humour, no drama. It is the blandest scene in a pretty bland film. "Arthur 2" is a failure due to its disjointed, overly complex, unfunny, shoddy script. The two stars are good, the supporting cast is alright and the music is actually better than in the first one, but with a script like this it's a miracle it worked as well as it did.
2/4 - DirectorBlake EdwardsStarsDudley MooreAmy IrvingAnn ReinkingA bigamist must keep his wives from meeting each other, which becomes tricky when both become pregnant.24-01-2017
"Micki & Maude" is a careful movie about an irreverent subject. Now when I say careful I mean it tries its best to handle the situation with grace and sincerity which is a plus and a minus. "Serious" Blake Edwards comedies like "10" are known for being smart and genuine but not shy to occasionally break into high comedy which he became well known for. But while "10" was funny and entertaining all the way through "Micki and Maude" plays it a bit too seriously, too carefully. Writer Jonathan Reynolds never utilises the material to its full potential and the film suffers. I would have preferred some more farce, some more melodrama. Blake Edwards has proved he can do it and so has Dudley Moore. He is terrific here even though he only gets to show off his talents in the wonderfully funny ending. In it, we get the film like it should have been from the beginning but it is way too late. I mean Preston Sturges did some long and meticulous build-ups but they never lasted 100 minutes. Now, I'm not saying that the film was never funny up until then but it was only chuckling never laughing. Moore elicits a lot of sympathies like always as does Amy Irving. Ann Reinking's character is played for different emotions and gets them as well. The film is really well set-up, I just wish it was fuller. The way it was presented is great for a 90-minute movie but at 118 I felt there was a lot of emptiness. The film also lacks the edge of "10", there is almost no satire here. The whole film is very sincere and gentle and as a result comes across a bit shallow. It is all emotion without the satirical edge needed to make something out of the premise. However, if one considers writer Reynolds' other films this comes as no surprise. "Micki & Maude" features three good performances and is well directed by Blake Edwards but its light approach left me cold and empty-handed.
3/4 - DirectorJohn TrentStarsLawrence DaneJohn CandyEd McNamaraThree kidnapping plots simultaneously target the same young woman.24-01-2017
To list all things wrong with "Find the Lady", an inept and mindless comedy would take way too much time then it deserves so I'll just describe a very early scene. In it John Candy playing a bumbling cop bends over to pick up a pencil inadvertently pushing a chair which bump a different cop who trips Candy up who then falls onto a table. Then some more similar things happen and series of walls collapse. That gives us the idea of what kind of unintelligent and old humour we're dealing with here. The way the scene is handled gives us yet another revealing look at the film's quality. Instead of letting everything happen in a single long wide shot, letting us understand the geography of the room and see clearly all the things happen, the director amateurishly shoots everything in a series of close-ups. While we are trying to figure out what just happened we forget to laugh. Actually, I wonder if we'd be laughing if we could see it. The film then shuffles awkwardly and loudly to its conclusion and oblivion. Other than being horribly written and directed it is also obnoxious. It tries so hard for a laugh that it throws one bad joke after another at us. In several scenes, the jokes come in every five seconds and they all bomb. Lawrence Dane and John Candy aren't bad, in fact, I think that they could have been great in some other movie. Peter Cook is the only person who manages to elicit a laugh with several inspired ad-libs. The rest of the film is awful.
0.5/4 - DirectorCaroline ThompsonStarsSean BeanDavid ThewlisDocs Keepin TimeThe fates of horses, and the people who own and command them, are revealed as Black Beauty narrates the circle of his life.24-01-2017
I've never been overly fond of animal films. They're sort of like cat videos on the internet. I take one look smile at how cute the cat is but I don't linger around for hours looking at what the cat is about to do. Now I'm not talking here about movies in which animals possess human qualities such as "Babe" or some cartoon. I'm talking here about films which consist mainly of animals doing things like walking around or eating grass or are edited in such a way that it appears that the animal is doing something funny like in that grossly sickly-sweet film "The Adventures of Milo & Otis". I say this in the beginning because it increased my dislike of this movie immensely. "The story of my life is the story of the people in it." says the titular horse at the beginning of "Black Beauty". Apparently the animal understood the key thing writer/director Caroline Thompson failed to. In book form horses are interesting narrators in movies they aren't. Movies need interesting characters, unpredictable situations. This script has neither. It is a script for a Saturday morning cartoon. When Robert Bresson made "L'Argent" he didn't make it about the note, he made it about the characters it comes into contact with. Had "Black Beauty" done the same it could have been excellent. The human characters are played by a wonderful bunch of actors. We have Alun Armstrong, Sean Bean, Jim Carter, Peter Davison, Peter Cook, Eleanor Bron and David Thewlis. All wasted. None of them appear in the film for more than 20 minutes and all of them play cardboard cutouts. This film knows of two characters: the character which is good towards the horse and the character which is bad towards the horse. There is no further distinction. It's all black and white. The situations are predictable and cliched. We have the farm where everyone's nice and then the manor where everyone's horrible and so on and on and on. Every moment in this film can be guessed. An eight-year-old could tell you what's gonna happen next. The biggest point of contention I have with "Black Beauty" is the horse itself. Not the performer, no, his voice. First of all, why have the horse narrate the film? What's the point? This isn't a Mister Ed version of "Black Beauty" is it? It is entirely pointless. The horse itself is expressive enough to handle the emotional moments and the rest of his monologue is spent either delivering almost Buddhist remarks or stating the obvious such as "Oooh, that hurts" or "He is a bad man" or "This is depressing". This tendency isn't related only to our lead. This is the kind of script in which everything is verbalised. People go around saying things like "Oh, that damn kid left the lamp on" or "He's won the race". Show don't tell is the first rule of film screenwriting for god's sake. The biggest problem with the horse narration though is the voice itself. Alan Cumming is a fine actor but his peppy, hammy, over-the-top performance is unbelievable grating almost immediately. I won't be able to watch him in anything for at least a month until I recover. He'll haunt my dreams. It is unfortunate that the script and Cumming are so awful because on the technical side this is one hell of a great film. The cinematography by Alex Thomson is beautiful with several unforgettable shots of horses running across fields and meadows. Danny Elfman's score is haunting and deserving of a far better film.
1.5/4 - DirectorAnthony MannLaurence HarveyStarsLaurence HarveyTom CourtenayMia FarrowThe British and Soviet Intelligence services attempt to out-fox one another using the homesick double-agent Krasnevin a.k.a. Alexander Eberlin as a pawn in a complex spy-game which takes place in Berlin.25-01-2017
"A Dandy in Aspic" came at the height of the cold-war spy thriller craze of the 60s. Never has there been such diversity in a single genre in a single five-year stretch. From "The Spy Who Came in from the Cold" to "Goldfinger" you had your "Callans" and your "Avengers". Everything from the cynical realism of le Carre to the colourful romps of Sean Connery and his bikini-clad girls. "A Dandy in Aspic" falls somewhere in the middle along with Len Deighton's Harry Palmer. I never perceived Deighton as being truly cynical and dark, there were too many guns and malevolent computers. The same goes for this. I suspect Mr. Bond wouldn't feel too out of place in "Dandy's" moody London. Laurence Harvey plays a double agent in one of England's security services. Posing under the name Alexander Eberlin he is actually one Alexandar Krasnevin and his latest assignment is to catch himself. Accompanied by the suspicious and straight-laced Gatiss he travels to Berlin nominally to wheedle out Krasnevin but secretly hoping to defect. The film's first problem is already visible. Eberlin or Krasnevin or Dancer (his Berlin alias) isn't a particularly likable character or identifiable. Harry Palmer has a certain roguish charm, Le Carre's George Smiley is flawed but impressively intelligent and James Bond is... well James Bond. Eberlin, on the other hand, is playing a double game and this makes him automatically unlikable. He is a rat, a traitor. And Harvey doesn't do much to help his image. He plays him as a put-upon, depressed, angry man. Almost always miserable. He is very convincing but in this case, it is not a particularly good thing. Tom Courtenay as Gatiss is also highly unlikeable, but he isn't even supposed to be so you can't blame him. The film's director, the legendary Anthony Mann seems to have understood this and tries to cover it up by shooting the film in a highly stylish manner with a brilliant supporting cast. The scenes in London are masterfully shot and edited in a hyper jazzy psychedelic style. It is hard not to be mesmerised by them. Then the film moves to Berlin and everything disintegrates pretty quickly. Anthony Mann died during the early days of Berlin location shooting and Laurence Harvey took over. Harvey, unable to mimic Mann's style, shoots the film in a by-the-numbers fashion, creating a jarring discrepancy between the segments. The plot slams to a halt here as well. The previously pacey and tense spy story turns into a repetitive melodrama in which Harvey, miserable as can be, wanders the streets of Berlin followed by mysterious fat men and Tom Courtenay who always jumps out in front Harvey when least expected in a highly cartoonish manner. If that is not enough there is a shoehorned, unconvincing romance between Harvey and Mia Farrow which crops up occasionally like an afterthought to bore us senseless. The fine supporting cast is interesting to watch especially Lionel Stander obviously channeling Oskar Homolka's jovially ominous performance in "Funeral in Berlin", but they have so little to do and appear so sporadically and seemingly erratically that it is little consolation. The film has a big twist in the end, or at least it was supposed to be because I was convinced that it was a given. What Harvey finds out in the end I knew from the beginning, it was so obvious I thought I had been outright told it. I guess I was wrong. "A Dandy in Aspic" isn't a bad movie it is just a failed one. The cinematography is great, as is the music. The opening England scenes are excellent. This is no Harry Palmer and certainly no le Carre but OK for completists and those who enjoy a forgettable spy romp.
2.5/4 - DirectorMark PaviaStarsMiguel FerrerJulie EntwisleDan MonahanA reporter is on the trail of a vampiric murderer who travels by plane.25-01-2017
All over America, airfield attendants are being murdered by a mysterious vampiric figure flying around in a black plane. He hypnotises his victims and then kills them and sucks their blood dry. No, this is not a new episode of "The X-Files", though it plays out like one. Spearheaded by a brilliant performance from Miguel Ferrer, "The Night Flier" may be derivative and predictable, but it is also startling, entertaining and quite spooky. Director Mark Pavia confidently takes us through the beats of the story while building up suspense and tension worthy of the name above the title, Stephen King. He cleverly avoids showing too much gore too soon allowing our mind to fill in the blanks before finally hitting us with a blood-spattered, though somewhat unsatisfactory finale. Unlike the short story the film goes for a punchier ending which directly contradicts a statement made only a few minutes before, but hey it's showbusiness right? Our villain is quite effective and mostly in shadows and in the end when he is revealed it is done in a highly effective sequence (the most memorable of the lot) though it does come with a lot of post scriptum quasi-mystic claptrap. Other than the plot and Ferrer there isn't much more to the film other than his two journalist colleagues. Dan Morrison is excellent as the gleefully amoral editor and Julie Entwisle is quite good in her (as of yet unfollowed) debut as the eager young reporter. Her relationship with Ferrer is the only part of the film that didn't develop as expected. I did hope for a smarter film and there was a lot of potential for something spookier and more original, but Miguel Ferrer's colourful performance and Pavia's noirish direction make "The Night Flier" a journey worth taking. Not a remarkable film, but good television indeed.
3/4 - DirectorMark PaviaStarsBill SageMakenzie VegaDre DavisIn a small New Mexico town, teenager Hilary gets into her first fender bender and innocently exchanges her personal information with the other driver, a terrifying and bizarre serial killer who stalks the country road for his next victims.25-01-2017
Mark Pavia's career has been a long set-up with no punchline. 19 years ago he made "The Night Flier" and then dropped off the face of the Earth. After nearly two decades of false starts and cancellations he finally made "Fender Bender" and the set-up continues. Pavia's entry into the stalker/slasher genre is a predictable retread of cliche grounds established firmly in "Halloween" 38 years prior. However, I can still claim with absolute asurance that Pavia is an excellent director, just a bad writer that's all. He really needs a lot better material. His debut "Drag" dragged a bit and "The Night Flier" was essentially a short story uncomfortably stretched into a TV movie script which was then equally uncomfortably made into a feature film. Completely unpredictably, though, he made both of them work and he does the same with "Fender Bender", barely. The man is such a competent director that one has to wonder what a well-scripted Pavia film would be like. Probably the best horror film in a long, long time. Unfortunately, here we have a film that is recognisable from the opening sequence. In it we see a young, beautiful woman come home after (what is presumably) a long day. Get in the bath and then receive an ominous SMS from her "fender bender friend". it implies that she is being stalked and soon enough she is killed. 20 years ago "Scream" started in exactly the same way. The plot then moves onto Hilary (played well by Makenzie Vega). She is a typical (for slasher film standards) teenager who is left home alone by her parents after she has a fender bender. Of course, she too starts getting text messages from her new "fender bender friend" and a game of cat and mouse ensues. Of course not before a 60-minute build-up. I was reminded here of an old Peter Collinson film called "Fright" which had a brilliant build up and then it all went to hell. Well, Pavia is miles better than Collinson and "Fender Bender" is better than "Fright". It never descends into unnecessary turns & twist nor does it ever attempt to be anything more than a slasher film. And yet Pavia achieves in making an above average rip-off with his inspired, energetic direction. Note how nimbly he switches perspective in one of the chase scenes. First we see Hilary running away from the killer, then she hides and we follow the killer as he suddenly becomes the prey. Bill Sage plays the killer and he isn't bad though he gets more laughs than scares. I honestly can't wait for Pavia's next film. Good or bad I bet it will be interesting, I just really hope he gets someone else to write it for him.
2.5/4 - DirectorDon CoscarelliStarsA. Michael BaldwinBill ThornburyReggie BannisterA teenage boy and his friends face off against a mysterious grave robber, known only as the Tall Man, who employs a lethal arsenal of unearthly weapons.26-01-2017
"Phantasm" was originally three hours long and a mishmash of various genres. It was to start as a family drama then move into a light-hearted mystery and then into real horror. Director Don Coscarelli then had the thought that no one would want to watch this three-hour cocktail and cut it down to 88 minutes. I'm not sure he was right to do so. Because of this late decision, the film feels disjointed and amateurish. All of the scenes are really leisurely paced but the plot moves so quickly you'll often find yourself playing catch-up. Most of the film consists of loosely connected scenes of Michael Baldwin, the film's tough kid lead, getting himself into various nightmarish and scary situations. There is very little build up and almost no character development both of which got lost on the cutting room floor. As a result, we get fully formed characters but no idea who they are, why they are doing what they are doing and consequently we don't care for them at all. The horror aspects suffer also. With little to no build-up, most of the scary scenes also lack audience investment. While we are spooked out by what we are seeing we are not really interested in it. We don't want to find out what's happening. What "Phantasm" doesn't lack are originality and atmosphere. The design of the film is absolutely brilliant with its long marble hallways and shiny silver orbs. The music is some of the best I've ever heard in a horror film without seeing the name Claudio Simonetti in the credits. The creepy, slow-burn feel of the film is also great and shows that Dan Coscarelli is certainly at home in the horror genre. The original version of "Phantasm" could have been a fascinating picture. A sort of "It" before "It" and I'm sure it would have worked. If the story had time to develop and was told in a coherent and well-paced way. Admirably well-made but poorly told "Phantasm" falls on its face as a result of misadvised editing and lack of bravery on the part of Coscarelli to share his vision as originally intended.
2/4 - DirectorJoel SchumacherStarsColin FarrellKiefer SutherlandForest WhitakerPublicist Stuart Shepard finds himself trapped in a phone booth, pinned down by an extortionist's sniper rifle. Unable to leave or receive outside help, Stuart's negotiation with the caller leads to a jaw-dropping climax.26-01-2017
"Phone Booth" reminded me of an old "Twilight Zone" episode called "The Jeopardy Room". There is no particular likeness in plot between the two other than the fact that in both the lead is trapped in a confined space with a threat he has to resolve quickly. Both, however, have the same feel of frustration and claustrophobia. As a "Twilight Zone" 30-minute long episode this could have been great, as an 80-minute movie, it stretches very thin but director Joel Schumacher manages to keep the tension up even if the premise goes stale. Colin Farrell failed to convince me in the lead role. He is not the first person who comes to mind when I think of sleazy publicists and he is done no favours by a script which makes him so over-the-top and banal that he'd look out of place in a Salkinds' "Superman" movie. As the film progresses his performance improves, he can do scared and defiant but he still fails to inject any character into an underwritten cardboard cutout. Kiefer Sutherland, on the other hand, is great as the menacing caller who's got a sniper trained on Farrell. I believed all the time he would shoot if Farrell disobeyed him. His voice is perfect for the part. The other characters are so small and insignificant that I failed to get any taste of them during the film. The script is written by Larry Cohen, a man whose audacity and crazy ideas I've admired for years. He is the king of such high-concept schlock-fests like "God Told Me To", "Special Effects" and "The Ambulance" featuring killers receiving orders from God, a director murderer and an ambulance which collects people who then mysteriously disappear, respectively. All of these are paper thin and silly but fun. Alas, "Phone Booth" reaches higher and thus fall harder. I wasn't at all interested in Farrell's character nor was I interested in the identity of the caller and being that not much else happens, I had nowhere to look. There are several tense moments, I'll admit, but after one look at my watch, I knew the outcome of each. This is a flawed concept and not much can be done with it. This becomes very apparent the more you stretch it out. Despite a fine effort from Schumacher, whose energetic direction makes it fun, "Phone Booth" is a silly, underwritten film without much excitement or character or, in the end, point.
2/4 - DirectorRobert CulpStarsBill CosbyRobert CulpTa-Ronce AllenBill Cosby and Robert Culp ("I Spy") are united again as private eyes in this Walter Hill-scripted "film noir." Searching for a missing girl, they find themselves involved with vicious criminals and precipitating a string of deaths.26-01-2017
Interestingly, in what is arguably the first movie in the buddy cop subgenre (though the leads are private detectives not policemen), director Robert Culp and writer Walter Hill strike a somber, depressing note that would now be thought of as innovative. Not a lot of people realise that the buddy-cop subgenre became what it is now after the upbeat and largely humorous "48 Hrs." and "Lethal Weapon". Before them, though, we had movies like "Hickey & Boggs" and "Busting" (a brilliant Peter Hyams film which he later remade into a very good upbeat and humorous type buddy-cop film "Running Scared"). Slow, ponderous and noirish, the film stars Bill Cosby & Robert Culp, reuniting after the show "I Spy" as two hardboiled private detectives. All buddy-cop films rely entirely on the chemistry between the two leads and Cosby & Culp are great together. The characters are quite interesting on their own even though they aren't probed nearly deep enough. Their performances are the crux of the film's success. Both fully realise their characters and the internal struggles they carry. Both are troubled in ways only movie detectives can be and the two charismatic leads make these downtrodden guys realistic and likable. Bill Cosby. in particular, is brilliant in what is his only straight role ("Man and Boy" wasn't a comedy per se but it was far from the gritty realism of most dramas). Acting comes so naturally to him he should have done much more of it. He manages to convey more through looks and movements than most actors can through a lifetime of words. A particularly haunting example is his performance in the final shot of the film. Robert Culp's directing, though, is the first point of contention. While he certainly has a stylish restraint apt in a film noir he makes many rooky mistakes (this is his film directing debut) in storytelling. It took me a long time to figure out exactly what was going on. I have never seen a movie opening sequence this confusing with all its time-lapses, various characters being shown (never introduced) and a fairly confusing moment in which a suitcase is first shown being removed from a train then dug up from a flower bed with nothing in between to indicate a time lapse. The part of the film which really falls apart though is the script. First of all, we get a story so cliched and typical that it is tiresome. That is when you can follow what's going on because the second problem is the storytelling. Characters enter and exit without any explanation as to who they are or how they connect to the plot. I'm against hand-holding the audience as well but this is ridiculous. The third problem is the fact that despite coming up with two interesting characters, the screenwriter never takes the time to truly explore them. We are introduced to their problems, their characteristics, but somehow we never get to truly know them. I was none of the wiser of who Hickey & Boggs are when the film ended than when it started. I know one is a former cop, the other is an alcoholic and was married to a stripper. That's it. On the whole, I found "Hickey & Boggs" an enjoyable experience. Suitably depressing (though nowhere near as cynical as "Busting", nor is it nearly as good), moody and stylish. The film thankfully escapes the docudrama feel so prevalent in the 70s (see "The Laughing Policeman" for an egregious example) and provides us with two excellent performances and a witty if jumbled script.
3/4 - DirectorWalter HillStarsNick NolteEddie MurphyAnnette O'TooleA hard-nosed cop reluctantly teams up with a wise-cracking criminal temporarily paroled to him in order to track down a killer.27-01-2017
The movie that popularised the buddy-cop genre and Eddie Murphy is every bit as good as they say. Tough, dark, yet entertaining and funny "48 Hrs." takes the no-holds-barred approach and creates a tense, fast-paced action/thriller like only Walter Hill can. His no-nonsense, nuts and bolts direction and sense of pace make even this fairly standard, plodding story into a rollercoaster plot. This is some of his best work bettered only by "The Warriors" and "Southern Comfort". Eddie Murphy displays the confidence and lightness of touch of a seasoned pro, Nick Nolte does his usual schtick. I usually don't like him but here his over-the-top, scenery chewing, macho approach feels apt rather than bland. The two of them work together brilliantly and have the chemistry most double acts can only wish for. The startling violence only adds to the realistic flavour of the film. The best scene is the opening shootout in the lobby where Hill shows off his brutal and unflinching style.
3.5/4 - DirectorBarry LevinsonStarsRichard DreyfussDanny DeVitoBarbara HersheyA minor car accident drives two rival aluminum-siding salesmen to the ridiculous extremes of man versus man in 1963 Baltimore.27-01-2017
Like in "Diner", director/writer Barry Levinson builds a story around a series of what we now call Seinfeldian conversations and connected events in lives of similar yet vastly different people. The cast is down to two now. Danny de Vito is a jocular yet acidic and unhappy aluminum salesman whose life is going to hell. The IRS is after him, his marriage is falling apart and he hasn't got a pot to piss in. Richard Dreyfuss is an energetic and pragmatic aluminum salesman whose life is on the upward scale. He's got himself a new car, figured out how to get out of a business he's started to dislike and is surrounded by people he likes and who like him. And then they have a car crash. They develop a rivalry which is the main crux of the film, but following their game of one-upmanship Levinson unravels to us two interesting characters and how two different people treat the same situation and get two vastly different results out of it. Both their performances are great but like always Dreyfuss steals the show with his manic, energetic and charming presence. The lively discussions and witty comments really make the film, though, and it is more than a possibility that both Jerry Seinfeld and Quentin Tarantino borrowed a lot from Levinson. The supporting cast is great and features such greats as John Mahoney, Bruno Kirby, and J.T. Walsh. The script is a little overlong and underwritten, I wish we'd learned more about the men and their plight than about the problems in "Bonanza" but "Tin Men" is a smart, entertaining and very funny movie with a real heart and a good point to make.
3/4 - DirectorPeter YatesStarsRobert RedfordGeorge SegalRon LeibmanDortmunder and his pals plan to steal a huge diamond from a museum. But this turns out to be only the first time they have to steal it...28-01-2017
Before George Clooney and Brad Pitt (and all the other nine), there were Robert Redford and George Segal. Well, there were also Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin but we'll forget about them for the moment. They play two hapless criminals who with the help of Ron Leibman and Paul Sand organise a series of heists to steal the same diamond. All of the heists work brilliantly save for the fact that each time they get out without the diamond. The premise is genius. The best film comedies rely on the incompetence of their main characters and show their best-laid plans go hilariously wrong. The script is by the legend that is William Goldman and is based on the novel by another legend Donald E. Westlake. It is pitch-perfect and very funny indeed. Where the film goes wrong is the tone. Somehow it seems that director Peter Yates and Redford didn't get the memo that this is supposed to be a comedy. Both play it very straight which ends up jarring with the brilliant comedic goofballs that are Segal, Leibman, and Sand. And then when Zero Mostel shows up one starts getting the feeling that one is watching two films at the same time. Note the scene in which the group is threatening Mostel whom they believe has stolen the diamond before them. They do so by pretending to beat up and throw his son down an elevator shaft. However, instead of playing it for laughs, Yates shoots the entire scene in deep shadows and languorous, almost melancholic shots. I wasn't quite sure if they were kidding or were being serious until the scene ended. This causes several other quite uneasy moments. It is a testament though to great material and the three goofballs that the film actually does work. While I think it should have been funnier, faster and wittier, like the screwball comedies of old, it is still a delight and a whole lot of fun to watch.
3/4 - DirectorMaximilian SchellStarsJon VoightJacqueline BissetMartin RittWhen a Swiss cop is murdered, a veteran homicide inspector and a rookie are assigned to solve the case but they are obstructed by interfering Swiss politicians.28-01-2017
When I first saw "End of the Game" I watched the shorter international cut. The film had 15 minutes cut out of it in 1978. This is the only version available on home video. I didn't really like the film. I loved the story but it had many flaws. However, I was sufficiently intrigued to track down the theatrical cut and when I did I ended up enjoying it a lot more. OK, it still has a lot of the same problems but it fleshed out one key character making the entire film more believable and actually making something of an opportunity I originally thought missed. The plot concerns a murder investigation into the death of a policeman handled by an eager young detective played by Jon Voight and an old, grumpy, dying cop played by Martin Ritt. However, both men are hiding something and seem to be playing games of their own. Voight is the character in question. While in the international cut he comes across as wild, silly, almost laughable, he is a lot more believable in the theatrical cut for reasons I won't reveal. Movies like this are quite difficult to review because so much of it hinges on the big twist which is here brilliant. What was cut is a dark, strange, obsessive and almost abusive relationship between Voight and Jacqueline Bisset which puts a very different spin on his character. This subplot provides a counterpoint to a different, very different relationship in the film. That between Ritt and a mysterious politician played by Robert Shaw. They've been engaged in a rivalry for a long time. There is a weird kind of amiable playfulness between them, though. The kind that exists only between old enemies in movies. While in the international cut it comes across as heavy-handed due to it being the sole focus of the film, in the international cut it is evened out by the Voight-Bisset relationship taking over some of the weight. Another thing evened out in the theatrical cut is the film's tone. Odd and jarringly disjointed in the shorter cut, switching manically between an almost David Lynchian weirdness and an atmospheric, downbeat tone reserved for 70s thrillers, here it seems a lot more balanced, nicely distributed. The film is directed by actor Maximillian Schell. I'm not sure I'd have taken the same approach but his jocular tonal shifts do actually work. He does a very competent job. Appropriately, the star of the film is director Martin Ritt. Ritt was an actor before becoming a director and even taught directing for a short time but this is his first film acting job since 1944 which is surprising to me. He is excellent as the grizzled old detective. Voight chews the scenery quite a bit, but his performance makes a lot more sense in the theatrical cut. Shaw is also guilty of overacting, but he can be forgiven. Bissett is good but forgettable. She does nothing special here. The two other truly impressive things about the film are the cinematography and the music by Ennio Morricone. The opening sequence in Istanbul, disjointed and nightmarish, like a bad memory is especially good and does a great job of blending Morricone's work with that of German cinematographer Klaus Konig (the rest of the film was shot in a more typical, but effective, way by Roberto Gerardi and Ennio Guarnieri). The story is excellent but I think it could have been told better. The script is a little too talky and the structure of the story is quite jumbled, but the excellent idea still shines through. This is the kind of thriller in which characters continually spout out chunks of exposition. Some more inventiveness wouldn't have gone amiss. "End of the Game" is a smart, entertaining and memorable thriller with good cinematography (the scene in which someone breaks into Ritt's house is especially startling) and good performances but lacking somewhat in the script department. I really enjoyed it, though, and do recommend it, but only the longer, theatrical cut.
Theatrical Cut - 3/4
International Cut - 2/4 - DirectorKen AnnakinStarsStuart WhitmanSarah MilesJames FoxHoping to push Britain to the forefront of aviation, a London publisher organizes an international air race across the English Channel, but must contend with two entrants vying for his daughter, as well as national rivalries and cheating.29-01-2017
Here we have another one of those international romps involving stars, stunts and laughs in the vein of "Around the World in 80 Days" and "It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World". I've always had a soft spot for them, but I defy anyone to honestly say that they aren't fun, witty and immensely rewarding. Anything that has as much joy as these movies do can't be bad. As an excuse to gather a large cast and plunge them into silliness and insanity "Those Magnificent Men in Their Flying Machines" concerns itself with a race from London to Paris. Setting it in 1910 provides all kinds of jocular opportunities with the planes constantly breaking down and their pilots struggling to come up with a new brilliant solution to their problems. The cast is perhaps not as famous as that of its contemporaries but it is every bit as good. Of course, as always Terry-Thomas steals every scene he is in and a few he's not in. I found it very interesting how the writers managed to make each of the characters a total comedic stereotype but also make us care for them. I was charmed by the performances of the supporting cast and grew to love the motley crew. However, the thing that makes this film such a pleasure is the bright, positive, bubbling energy it has. One has only to listen to the brilliant soundtrack by Ron Goodwin to realise this. It had me grinning like a fool all the way through. But of course, with a production this size, one has to run into a few snags. It is a tad too long and the payoff (the actual flying) isn't as funny as it could have and should have been. Also, not enough is made of Terry-Thomas & Eric Sykes and their attempts to sabotage the race. The greatest disappointment of all comes when the film's romantic triangle ends up unsolved due to an intrusion by an obsolete flash forward ending. However, it is hard not to absolutely love a movie that is so much fun, so witty and so fast.
3.5/4 - DirectorKen AnnakinSam ItzkovitchStarsBourvilLando BuzzancaWalter ChiariAn international car rally across Europe is complicated by smuggling, cheating, love at first sight, etc. etc.29-01-2017
"Those Daring Young Men in Their Jaunty Jalopies" is a sequel to "Those Magnificent Men in Their Flying Machines" (replacing planes with cars) and though it seems to have improved on many of the original's mistakes, "Jalopies" fails to surpass it in the two of the most important areas: humour and spirit. First the improvements. The story is much better. Rather than just have the competitors be in it for the money they are all given good reasons to want to win the rally in question. Tony Curtis has a debt going with Terry-Thomas that whoever wins the rally gets to own the entire car factory Thomas' father lost to Curtis in a poker game. Gert Frobe is smuggling diamonds for a dangerous Russian count. And Peter Cook & Dudley Moore are in it to try out Cook's various wacky inventions. This leads to the characters being utilised more and in various ways and a less repetitive plot. Another improvement is the fact that after all the characters are introduced the race starts immediately and the rest of the film is the race. There are no test runs and pre-race scheming. This doesn't mean that Terry-Thomas has nothing to do, though. Unlike in "Flying Machines", Thomas is in most of the film and his machinations often land him in more trouble than Curtis, against whom they are directed. Another unexpected improvement in Ron Goodwin's score. It may just be my preference for smaller, more melodic orchestrations but I like his work here even more than in the first film. However, as mentioned earlier, the film lacks in the spirit of the original. Whereas the first film flew by (pun intended) with rip-roaring energy and lightning-fast pace, "Jalopies" tends to drag. And quite often. They often say that comedy is brevity and yet here we have an example of a film which seems to be deliberately trying to stretch throwaway jokes into 5-minute segments. Take for instance the introduction scenes. Quick and witty in the first film (set entirely on single sets and rarely longer than two minutes) here they take up the first half hour (I checked) and are exceedingly complex. This tendency to drag jokes out continues throughout the film and as a result, it ends up feeling rambling. Though around 15 minutes shorter than the first film it feels at least twice that long. I also cared much less about the characters. This also, I believe, is the result of constantly dragging out their segments. The Italians are particularly tedious with their affected mannerisms and over-the-top verbose arguments. What is funny for 20 seconds can't always work for 5 minutes. The only segments that don't drag are those including Terry-Thomas and Cook & Moore. While Thomas' natural deviousness prevails over the largely repetitive material and saves it, Cook & Moore seem to have been blessed with the best writing in the film. Their portions are absolutely hilarious and almost worth sitting through the entire film. Cook's inventions are a brilliant gimmick and the two of them just have such a natural chemistry it is impossible not to laugh. It is particularly telling that not even the joint forces of the duo with Thomas, nine years later, managed to save the horrendous material that comprised "The Hound of the Baskervilles". One has to wonder at writing so bad that not even Thomas and Cook & Moore can save it. The rest of the cast is alright. Frobe is fine though not as funny as in "Flying Machines", Tony Curtis I didn't particularly care for. He seemed to try too hard to be zany in a film that requires a little bit more restrained due to it being zany enough on its own. His companion Susan Hampshire also got on my nerves but more due to the nature of her character. The two Italians, Lando Buzzanca and Walter Chiari, could have been great with less grating material. On the whole, not a bad effort, though a lot less loving and energetic than its predecessor. The racing scenes are much better and more exciting (though some obvious model work spoils some of them) and the Cook & Moore segments are definitely top class. Close, but no cigar.
2.5/4 - DirectorMel DamskiStarsGraham ChapmanPeter BoyleCheech MarinAfter serving two decades in prison, Yellowbeard (Graham Chapman) breaks out determined to recover the treasure that he buried so long ago, alongside his son, old crew, and the British Navy.30-01-2017
"Yellowbeard" is certainly uneven and it suffers from poor editing, a languorous pace and one of the worst endings in film history. However, much like "Wholly Moses" it made me laugh, and laugh a lot I did. With the pedigree of Graham Chapman and Peter Cook behind it, I expected a lot more from the script of "Yellowbeard" than the poorly structured mess it is. I cared about none of the characters, the three very distinct portions are paced very differently and have jarringly different tones. There is the dark and pacy opening in England which is definitely the best part of the film. It is also the part in which Graham Chapman as Yellowbeard is most represented and he is brilliant as the ruthless, murdering, thieving, raping and betraying pirate who escapes from prison after 20 years to reclaim his gold. Unfortunately, his wife (Madeline Kahn) has burned the map and copied it onto the head of her (and possibly Yellowbeard's) son. The son is played with stiff glee (as all young men in straight pirate films are from Bobby Driscoll to Orlando Bloom) by Martin Hewitt whom you may recognise but I don't. After a lot of shenanigans involving a deaf man (John Cleese in a hilarious bit part), some raping, and a lot of killing, Yellowbeard, Dan, Dan's real father (Peter Cook) and a doctor (Michael Hordern) set off to find the treasure followed in toe by two pirates who also want the gold (Peter Boyle and Marty Feldman) and two navy officers who also want the gold (Eric Idle and Nigel Planer). This part of the film works best not only because of Yellowbeard but because it gives everyone a clear purpose and everyone is equally represented. It is also done in the tone of a Monty Python film, dark and surreal. This is by far the funniest part of the film. The second portion of the film is set on a ship. The four travelers are kidnapped and made to work on the ship commanded by James Mason. But soon, Yellowbeard organises a mutiny and everyone sets sail for the treasure again. This part is done in the style of a Mel Brooks film. A lot of winking, nudging and aren't-we-clever spoofing ensues. It is also the least funny part of the film and Graham Chapman is barely in it. Yellowbeard is only hiding on the ship see and he appears in about two minutes of this 30-minute portion. For the rest of it, we are left with a lot of filler. The biggest problem of the film is apparent here as most of the characters other than Dan and Peter Boyle have absolutely nothing to do. There is some business with Eric Idle and a pigeon, Madeline Kahn is being tortured and Peter Cook spends most of it drunk. I guess this is the point where the screenwriters regretted writing such a massive cast. The third part of the film is a total mess. It begins with a very, very long sequence of Cheech and Chong as... I honestly have no idea what they're supposed to be but Chong believes he's a god and Chong is his second in command and they live on the island where the treasure is. They go on and on about torturing and how great Chong is and Cheech resurrects the old joke of the lieutenant praising his superior in a weird way (your buffoonishness etc.). It gets very tedious very fast. Then everyone arrives and a lot of killing ensues but in such a way that you have no idea who's doing what, why and how until everything wraps up so quickly one is left entirely baffled. The ending is horrendous. Not only because it a) comes entirely out of left field, b) can't be explained in any way and c) makes no sense but also because it feels rushed. In fact, the entire film bar the first part feels improvised. Like they were making it up as they went along and then ran out of money and filmed the first thing that came to mind. This is the sort of script we're dealing with, but we also have a brilliant cast and they do manage to milk the material for a lot more than it's worth. Like I said I laughed a lot and the jokes contained within the mind-numbingly badly written script are great. They are not as smart as those in Monty Python films, in fact, they are not smart at all, but they are funny as all hell. So you see, this leaves me in a bit of a proverbial pickle. The film is absolutely hilarious with great performances but it is so badly written that it genuinely hurts. It is a huge missed opportunity. "Yellowbeard" is "The Hound of the Baskervilles" if it were funny. If you want a good laugh, see it definitely, you'll hardly find a better one, but for anything else avoid "Yellowbeard" like the plague.
2.5/4 - DirectorTerry JohnsonStarsRhys IfansAidan McArdleJodie RimmerThis affectionate documentary examines the turbulent partnership of Peter Cook and Dudley Moore, the double act that re-defined the comedy genre. It follows their beginnings in London's West End through their rise to stardom which won them accolades but forced a wedge between them.30-01-2017
All biopics inevitably fall into the trap of simplifying a lifetime of genius and then having to shoehorn it into two hours of eventful drama. Some succeed, most don't. The ones that do however either hang their hook on some particular event like "Trumbo" did with the blacklisting or just outright fictionalise everything and capture the spirit of the person into an imaginary story ("Amadeus"). "Not Only But Always", a biopic on the genius duo of Peter Cook and Dudley Moore attempts to tell the whole story and fails to do so. I shan't dabble into minor squabbles with the film's accuracy ("Ad Nauseum" was recorded before "10" was shot etc.) because the most important thing this film needed to get right it got absolutely wrong. It takes the complex, energetic and endlessly fruitful relationship between Cook & Moore and simplifies it into a series of rows. Not a hint of their mutual love and respect is seen, not a hint of their chemistry or that magic they had together. Watching this film one gets the sense of hatred and contempt between the two men never the love that must have been there. This isn't simply my view. The hate-filled energy emanating from the duo has been contested by numerous biographies and people who knew them. Even Peter Cook's first wife has spoken out against this production. The heart of it is not missing it's wrong, which is far, far worse. This is not the fault of the film's two stars. Rhys Ifans and Aidan McArdle are spot-on as Pete & Dud, respectively, and the framing story (which involves Pete & Dud, the characters, watching the life story of Pete & Dud, the comedians) is the best part of the film as they manage to portray the duo so uncannily that I found myself unable to tell real footage from the recreation. The fault lies squarely on the shoulders of writer/director Terry Johnson who seems content to simply sensationalise a 30-year partnership. Watching this film I got the same feeling I get when I read a tabloid. All rows, no depth, no insight. This truly surprises me because his play "Insignificance" (later brilliantly filmed by Nicolas Roeg) is absolutely the perfect biopic of not one, but four people. Taking an event that never happened, draping it in the soft gauze of surrealism, Johnson managed to capture the essence of Albert Einstein, Marylin Monroe, Joe DiMaggio and Joseph McCarthy. The essence of Peter Cook & Dudley Moore has evaded him.
2/4 - DirectorJohn BadhamStarsMichael J. FoxJames WoodsStephen LangAn action movie star researching a role is allowed to tag along with a hardboiled New York City policeman, who finds him superficial and irritating.30-01-2017
Imagine "48 Hrs." with an actor instead of a prisoner and you've got "The Hard Way". James Woods is the cop and there's no one better for the part. Energetic, intense and selling every line he proves, in every shot, that he's the best actor around. Michael J. Fox is the actor and he's great as well. Likable but annoying enough for us to understand why Woods can't stand him. And there you've got the film's biggest problem. Why do these two guys have to hate each other? Why can't they get along? It would have been a much, much, much better film had the two of them become friends. The constant squabbling, the arguments, the scene where he handcuffs him to the sofa. That's all old material. I'm sure there's a 1930s film somewhere out there whose writers have a good case of plagiarism. Everything from their relationship, the car chases, the scene in the ghetto to the fate of the girlfriend, the seemingly empty car and the climax is predictable. Either I'm clairvoyant or there's nothing original in "The Hard Way" at all. There is a moment, late in the film when something happens to Fox's character. I won't say what, but it is pretty major. And Woods sticks up for him. Finally, I thought, something new, something fresh. I thought the film was gonna make them friends, make Woods care for Fox. Then it all fell apart. The film went back on itself. It was all a ruse, a joke. Another cliche. Even the serial killer they're hunting seems like stock footage. Stephen Lang is excellent in the part but the blond Aryan killer with a hero complex... I really hoped for something more original than that. Thankfully the screenplay manages to make the material fun. Woods and Fox are fantastic in the leads and have great chemistry. I could watch them in three more movies. Both of them manage to make cliche characters believable. If it had come first, "The Hard Way" would have brilliant, but we can't pretend like "48 Hrs." never happened. We also can't pretend all those hundreds of other movies this one borrows from didn't happen either. Fun, but in a few weeks I won't be able to tell whether something happened in this film or some other similar one.
3/4 - DirectorRichard RushStarsAlan ArkinJames CaanLoretta SwitSan Francisco police detectives Freebie and Bean are determined to bust local crime boss Red Meyers at any cost, even if this means destroying the whole city in the process.31-01-2017
The center of this film are two car chases and three shootouts (two really, since one is more of an execution) which are excellent. Director Richard Rush has a way of editing them in such a way that we always know who's who and who's where while at the same time giving them a pace which never lets off the tension. All the money and thinking power behind the film went into these and they really are marvelous. Then someone pointed out to them that they have around 50 more minutes to fill and that's when problems arose. At least, that's the impression this movie gives you since everything not involving shooting or car stunts is half-arsed and lackluster. "Freebie and the Bean" came out a few months after "Busting", what is for my money the best buddy-cop movie of all times, they were filmed at the same time but "Freebie" feels like a rip-off of "Busting". Or it's younger brother. The plots are virtually the same: two cowboy cops (James Caan and Alan Arkin) are looking for a way to take down a powerful gangster singlehanded. Even the gangster's heart problems are the same in both movies. However, while "Busting" took a dark, smart, edgy approach to the story, "Freebie" opts for a light, comical touch but with a lot more violence and explosions. In short "Freebie" is to "Busting" what "Independence Day" is to "The Andromeda Strain". Caan and Arkin are great in the leads but they have nothing to do. Their arguing and bickering is funny but leads nowhere and is not enough to fill out half a movie and becomes a little tiresome after 20 minutes. There is no substance here. Now, I'm not criticising the film simply on the grounds that it is lighter and fluffier than some similar film. "Big Trouble" was the darker version of the light and fluffy "The In-Laws" but it was terrible. I'm criticising the fact that all the thought went into the action scenes and none in the script which results in a series of great, fun scenes surrounded by a black hole of incomprehensible plot and mumbled, unfunny one-liners. With a good story, this could have been brilliant. Look at how great "Running Scared" turned out which is in many ways the lighter remake of "Busting", anyway. Or look at the best example of a light action/comedy buddy-cop movie "Lethal Weapon". It obviously can be done, but the creators of "Freebie and the Bean" didn't make it.
2/4 - DirectorBlake EdwardsStarsTony CurtisNatalie WoodJack LemmonIn the early 20th century, two rivals, the heroic Leslie and the despicable Professor Fate, engage in an epic automobile race from New York to Paris.31-01-2017
Wacky, cartoony, bright and on the whole delightful, "The Great Race" has its flaws but ultimately meets the mark in a more than satisfactory manner. Released only 15 days after "Those Magnificient Men in Their Flying Machines" which it has often been negatively compared to, but in my mind, it is a very close call as to which one's better. The two films are really only similar in that they're comedies about international races. While "Magnificent Men" is a gag-driven film which doesn't concern itself about plot or characters, "The Great Race" goes out of its way to charm us with its characters and entertain us with its plot. The main characters are long-standing rivals. The Great Leslie (Tony Curtis) is the good guy, dressed all in white and Professor Fate (Jack Lemmon) is the bad guy, envious and dressed all in black. With their respective sidekicks Hezekiah (Keenan Wynn) and Max (Peter Falk), they set off on a New York to Paris race. Of course, though, there's a dame involved. This time it's Natalie Wood as a double-crossing, scheming suffragette. All of the characters are lovable and absolutely hilarious (except for Tony Curtis who is only lovable). If we are to parallel this film to "Magnificent Men" then Tony Curtis would be Stuart Whitman's gallant pilot and Jack Lemmon would (without a doubt) be Terry-Thomas. Lemmon channels Thomas so well that at times I wondered whom I was watching on screen. The one thing "The Great Race" understands that "Magnificent Men" didn't is that the villains are far more entertaining than the good guys so we get a lot more of Lemmon and Falk and their shenanigans than we got of Thomas in "Magnificent Men". But enough comparison. I honestly enjoyed both films immensely and honestly. They are great, clean fun. That wild, positive energy is present in both. While "Magnificent Men" is the wackier and funnier picture, "The Great Race" is the smarter and deeper one. There is some very good satire here not only on the cartoon tropes but on feminism and the time it is set in. But don't worry it's not too deep. The film is dedicated to Laurel & Hardy, but I think it should have been dedicated to Daffy Duck & Bugs Bunny because here we have the most cartoonish live-action film ever made. Complete with explosions turning people's faces black and hanging in the air until you look down. The one problem I had with the film was the choice of director. While he certainly had his run of wacky comedies, I've always found Blake Edwards to be too slow and ponderous for true cartoonish slapstick. His forte are smart, thoughtful, dialogue-driven comedies like "10" and "Micki and Maude". This sort of material is right up the alley of someone like Billy Wilder. His film "One, Two, Three" is the most delightfully fast and silly, yet very clever comedy of the period. Edwards, I'm afraid sets a slightly slower pace then is required. The film is overlong. Running 160 minutes (146 without the overture and intermission) is too much, it needed a much faster pace and a lot of cutting. There is a very long segment set in a Russia-like land involving Jack Lemmon's double who is about to be crowned king that leads nowhere and is the film's weakest part. Without that and with some more cuts along the way a good running time of about 120 minutes would have been established. Never-the-less I have to say that "The Great Race" is magnificent fun from start to finish and needs to be seen (and heard because Henry Mancini's score is a real delight) to be believed.
3.5/4 - DirectorAnthony AsquithStarsLeslie BanksAlastair SimJeanne De CasalisAllied spies and Nazi Agents insinuate themselves at a Scottish cottage (converted to a wartime hospital) with interests on an inventor's nearly perfected bomb sight.31-01-2017
A classic of British wartime moviemaking "Cottage to Let" is a charming, witty film about evacuees, the war effort, the upper classes and quite a lot of other things with a complex, clever thriller machine to boot. The main plot concerns a hunt for a spy in the household of an eager-to-help, Spoonerisms-prone woman (Jeanne De Casalis). The spy is after the plans of her absent-minded scientist husband John Barrington (Leslie Banks), an individualist working for the British government. His refusal to move to London has left him an easy target for thieves. The suspects include the butler (Wally Patch) who isn't what he says he is, the cook (Muriel George) who quits suddenly one morning, the handsome young pilot (John Mills) recuperating in the cottage, his nemesis for the affections of Barrington's daughter (Carla Lehmann) who is also the scientists assistant (Michael Wilding) and a mysterious, nosey Scotsman (Alastair Sim) whose reason for being there is more than suspicious. As if the cast isn't colourful enough, our detective is Ronald (George Cole in his film debut), a Cockney teenage evacuee from London in what is probably the first film with a kid sleuth. Now, if you've ever seen a thriller in your life you're probably going to be able to work out the plot in the first 30 minutes, but don't worry, this is only one part of a much larger puzzle. No, there isn't a large conspiracy at work, what I mean to say is that "Cottage to Let" is a delightful, funny film with a lot more to it than just a mystery. All the performances are wonderful and all the characters are quirky and lovable. George Cole is excellent as the Sherlock Holmes-obsessed kid and Alastair Sim is, of course, brilliant in the role of a lanky, suspicious character snooping around. He is best at being shady. Anthony Asquith directs the film in an elegant, pacy manner and the script by J.O.C. Orton and Anatole de Grunwald based on Geoffrey Kerr's play doesn't have a dull moment in it. A terrific film.
3.5/4