alanmarsden Reviews

Cannon for Cordoba (1970)

Birth of the A-Team!

[3/10 · 15 April 2024]

George Peppard stars in this western, which reminded me of his role in the A-Team tv series. In most scenes he is seen with a cigar in his mouth. As in the A-Team he leads a small team of 4. Is it a coincidence that his character in the A-Team is called "Hannibal" and one of his team in this film, Pete Duel is best remembered for his role as "Hannibal Hayes" in the Alias Smith and Jones tv series. In this film they play undisciplined U. S.soldiers who go undercover to capture a Mexican rebel General and destroy some stolen cannons. Instead of the A-Team van, this quartet are on horseback. Add in numerous explosions, escapes and shoot outs and you have an extended episode of the A-Team but set in the wild west of a Spain based Mexico.

I saw this on Talking Pictures TV and I don't know if some scenes were cut or badly edited, but the story meandered a bit -did the scene involving the rancher add anything to the plot other than giving George the opportunity to be in bed with a beautiful woman? Another strange scene was when the Mexican lieutenant is given a flare gun to set parts of the fortress on fire and then fires it at places that were already aflame! There were several other scenes that didn't make sense, which spoilt the film for me, but if you enjoyed the A-Team, you may like this.

Delayed Flight (1964)

Ridiculous story

[2/10 · 5 April 2023]

This film was made in 1964 and whilst procedures for dealing with a contagious disease have improved, one would hope they were not as lax as the first scene in this movie. Conveniently, there are only 3 passengers from the plane brought to the airport manager's office all of which have urgent reasons not to comply with isolation measures (4 other passengers and the infected passenger having been taken to "first aid"- no mention of the cabin crew). Whilst the airport manager and his assistant are explaining the situation, the female passenger manages to climb unobserved through a window in the same room, then conveniently finds the air stewardess's changing room to swop clothes in and safely walks past the obligatory elderly security officer on the main gate. (Why she needed to do this, when the American passenger escapes the airport through a loose paling fence, where an obliging van driver gives him a lift).

By this time, I thought the film was a comedy, particularly after the fake police reached into his pocket and pulled out a conveniently folded roll of money to bribe an airport employee and then the American passenger pulled out a similar roll of money to bribe the same employee! As for the secret agent passenger, his death scene was straight out of a comedy sketch, where he just has time to explain how to unlock the security chain attached to his briefcase and who to take the enclosed documents to, before dying (why he could not just phone his superior to come and collect the secret document would have shortened the film considerably!)

There are many more comedic moments in this short film (fire exit via a small window; the female hiding openly behind a wicker basket; the fake policeman twice showing his gun hand to the American hiding round the corner; the convenient blow torch to be thrown at the leaking oil drums). In fact if this had been billed as a comedy , I would have given this a much higher rating.

Coincidentally, I watched another Hugh McDermott film, "Johnny on the Spot" (1954) in which he used the same trick of pulling the rug from under the baddies feet as he did in this film, 10 years later.

DI Ray (2022– )

Predictable.

[5/10 · 6 May 2022]

In Line of duty, part of the enjoyment was guessing who was "H"? In D I Ray when you cast a fairly well known actor, Jamie Bamber, in a "minor" role as the fiancé of the title character, you know he is more involved in the case. This factor for me, overrides the racism agenda. Additionally, after an attempt on her life, wouldn't she receive some sort of police protection? There are several other plot holes, which spoil what could have been a good police drama.

The Secret Invasion (1964)

Poor script, nice location.

[3/10 · 23 February 2021]

Saw this on Sony movies channel one afternoon so can only assume some of the more graphic scenes another reviewer mentioned were cut and could explain why William Campbell's character disappeared without explanation. One scene that did stay in was Henry Silva's character accidentally suffocating a baby to stop the baby's crying being heard by the Germans. Now, this is wartime and it was a life or death situation, but not only did the mother accept this without a tear in her eye, she actually felt sorry for Silva! There were other scenes that didn't make sense: did Mickey Rooney, the Irish(!!!) explosive expert, not realise throwing a couple of grenades into the toolbox whilst standing on top of it was dangerous?; what happened to all the partisans attacking the pillbox after it was destroyed? The next scene just had a whole lot more Germans chasing the team, without a partisan in sight! How did Raf Vallone's character's finger clicking help the team's escape? How long would it take for the team to dig a tunnel from the graveyard to the castle's tunnels? And why so many shots of the Germans running along the castle tunnels, before just emerging in time to shoot at the team after they are through the castle gates? With a better script and believable characters this could have been a good film. The "Dirty Dozen" which came out 3 years later must have benefited from the faults in this film.

The Devil's Jest (1954)

Castle Sinister (1948) re-visited!!!!!

[1/10 · 4 November 2020]

Mara Russell-Tavernan starred in Castle Sinister 6 years earlier, which had virtually the same plot! The only difference really was the Devil's Jest had an actor I had heard of, namely, Valentine Dyall, who had 3rd billing, but only appeared in 2 scenes! The storyline is laughable: a German spy is suspected of operating from the Enderby estate after 2 army officers die soon after dining there. A policeman also is killed after supposedly seeing the face of the "phantom" (although we can only assume this is done off camera as the phantom is only seen to grab the policeman from behind). Lady Enderby is threatened by Seton with torture by the Gestapo and a cigarette burn and in the next scene she is expressing her love for him! I don't know if it was the poor quality of the film or make up errors, but it seemed that the duelling scar on Seton's face became more prominent in some scenes than others. The acting is stilted, a laughable fight between Seton and Victor, scenes poorly edited, especially the last scene, where, Lady Enderby having being shot in the back, managed to crawl hundreds of yards to die next to Seton, before anybody else has arrived. Give it a miss.

Fighting Coast Guard (1951)

Unconvincing romance and little action

[2/10 · 19 July 2020]

If this film was supposed to promote the work of the U.S. Coastguard in WW2 it failed miserably. This was largely due to the film spending far too much time on the unconvincing romantic triangle between Forrest Tucker, Ella Raines and Brian Donleavy. Stock footage of WW2 action cannot make up for a very weak storyline.

Film Stars Don't Die in Liverpool (2017)

Harry Enfield's Scouser wig!

[7/10 · 21 March 2020]

I liked the story and acting of Bening and Bell, but as another reviewer, little songbird commented, that curly black wig worn by Stephen Grahame reminded me so much of the Harry Enfield comedy sketch of Scousers it put me off a little. That said, the scene where Bell dampens Benings lips with a cloth will probably resonate with people who have been in that position caring for loved ones in the final stage of cancer.

Manchester by the Sea (2016)

Surprisingly good

[8/10 · 2 March 2020]

I can understand some of the low reviews for this film. It is not an action/adventure film or a comedy film. It is a film, for want of a better word,about grief. For the first 45 minutes of this film you are wondering what is going on, why the rave reviews by the critics, but then it slowly all makes sense. If you have experienced loss, you may understand the reluctance/ numbness by Casey Affleck to start new relationships. For me, the scene where Casey is packing up his things and comes to wrapping up 3 photo frames speaks volumes. Re-connecting with his nephew at the end left you with the hope of him healing a little.

Miss Marple: They Do It with Mirrors (1991 TV Movie)

Not a good adaptation

[5/10 · 23 December 2019]

I watched this after watching the Julia McKenzie adaptation and to be honest was disappointed with both adaptations. I read the book about 40 years ago so couldn't remember much of the plot. The McKenzie version altered a lot of the characters and situations. Walter for example was portrayed as a bit of a wimp in the McKenzie version, but a more believable pragmatic man in the Hickson version. No explanation was given as to why Rasterick arrived late and went straight to his room in the Hickson version on the night of the first murder.. My main complaint however was that in both versions, Edgar and a middle aged Lewis can outrun presumably fairly fit policemen to the lake and end up drowning. Obviously, nowadays the police would have to do a health and safety assessment before entering the water, but would this have been the case in the 1950s????

Wunderland (2018)

If only they had waited for real snow!

[1/10 · 21 February 2019]

If they had changed the title to reflect the actual incident on the first day of the battle of the bulge where a platoon of 18 US soldiers held off 500 Germans this could have been a good movie! If they could have filmed it with real snow on the ground, really cold temperatures, real overcast conditions which prevented allied planes being in the air. If only they had given Tom Berenger more to do in the film to earn his salary rather than to con people-sorry I mean sell the movie. If only they had shown the Germans as veterans of 5 years of war, who knew how to fight. If only they had given the actors better lines (Did Sergeant Rocky really expect a medic to appear to tend to his fallen comrade when they were separated from their unit?). If only....!

Dave Allen at Peace (2018 TV Movie)

Little Finger!

[6/10 · 8 April 2018]

I'm sure Dave Allen would have approved of the humour of Aiden "Littlefinger" Gillen playing him, but unfortunately Aiden didn't quite manage to portray his mischievous humour, but then who could? The film showed his childhood influences, but seemed to skip quickly through his early days, not mentioning his early days in Australia and his marriages and children. A good attempt, but could have delved deeper!