Saturday, February 12, 2022

Movie review - "Single Room Furnished" (1966) *1/2

 Last starring vehicle for Jayne Mansfield. It's her biggest challenge - she plays three roles. The film was directed by one of her husbands, Matt Cimber.

The film starts with a wise old janitor telling a rebellious daughter three stories: Mansfield plays a different character in each story. This was based on a play and that sort of device always works better in theatre than in film. Actually to be fair her third and second characters are meant to be the same person just with different names (was this added in post production?) But they feel like different peopole.

Story one has Mansfield as the pregnant wife of Martin Horsey, who is far too young - or rather Mansfield is too old for her part, especially in the scenes that flashback to when they met and she's meant to be just out of school. And she isn't very good. Sorry. She could've been protected by aging up the character at least.

Story two Mansfield plays another pregnant woman to an unseen man. She tells an older guy, Fabian Dean,about it. There's too much Acting from Dean and another older lady who is his friend.

Story three has Mansfield as a hooker in an abusing relationship with Walter Gregg. This one isn't bad and made me wish they'd just fleshed this one out. 

It could have done with trashier elements like sex, violence and nudity to liven things up. As it is too often this is like watching bad amateur theatre from recent graduates.

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