An odd one in the career trajectory for star Joan Collins and director Ralph Thomas, this is an adaptation of a John Wyndham story about a physicist (Tom Bell) who is transported to a parallel universe where he is not a single, hardworking scientist, but a dissolute, boozy, womanising best selling novelist who is married to Joan Collins. At which point you might go "lucky me!" especially when Bell falls for Collins. But then Collins dies of a terminal illness. Bell finds himself back in his original work trying to track down the "other" Collins.
This was an odd sort of movie. The budget is low-ish, and it's very early 70s British cinema - garish clothes, ugly photography, a hero with angular features and long hair, a cast including Joan Collins and Denholm Elliot. I kept thinking "this is TV this is TV". The Twilight Zone did this sort of thing all the time. The possibilities inherent in the concept aren't deal with - Bell has no fun as his alter ego, there are no real subplots, no exploration of character, it just focuses on a love story.
But you know as a love story it's not bad. Collins falls for Bell and he for her, and it's sad when she dies. The last act consists of a lot of running around with Bell trying to track down Collins, which is dull. Collins is sweet in an atypical role from her early 70s British film industry period (Revenge, Fear in the Night, Dark Places).
No comments:
Post a Comment