Movie review - "The Last Valley" (1971) **1/2

 Bid budget flop from ABC Pictures which essentially ended James Clavell's movie career - did he have any other chances, I wonder? I can see why it didn't do well although there is much to admire. It looks like a dream, gorgeous photography and Austrian locations, it's about the Thirty Years War so has lots of novelty, there's star power in the form of Michael Caine and Omar Sharif, it tries to handle some complexity of the time (Protestants, vs Catholics). The acting is very strong - Caine is excellent, Sharif good and Michael Gouthard brilliant as a nasty mercenary. It's a smart epic. It has theme. Interesting support characters. Beautiful John Barry score.

And yet...

It's confusing. The basic concept is simple - peaceful valley tries to avoid war.  Mercenaries come to valley. Try to hide out. War ensues. But Clavell - while writing complex support characters - can't quite nail the basic story. He doesn't really dramatise the mercenaries falling under the spell of the valley in the way say The Magnificent Seven did. For instance, the Caine romance with Florinda Bolkan is desultory. I think Sharif should have been at the valley to start off with. It's confusing to have him strolling through the waste lands and discover it at the same time as Caine does. Making Sharif more part of the valley would've been easier.

And the people in the valley aren't very nice. Nigel Davenport's village headman gives up his wife and waits to turn on Sharif once Caine leaves. There's a religious nutter priest who burns a woman at the stake.

I think American audiences were turned off by the foreign-ness of it despite Caine and Sharif. I know everyone was fake Russina in Zhivago but it would've been easier just to have Caine play a British mercenary captain. The accent is distracting. i mean good on him for putting in thought but the merc could've come from anywhere. 

The film didn't need to cost as much as it did. The battles are appreciated and the townsfolk dancing... but you just need a village, a valley, and wreckage. They could've done it cheaper. I think it would've been a better movie. Like, did we need that final siege battle outside the valley?

It's got a downer ending, Caine dies. Bolkan is burnt to death. Sharif gives up his woman. The valley is no good.

I appreciate this. Can understand people loving it.

Movie review - "Kidnapped" (1971) **

 Delbert Mann directed a series of classic novel adaptations for US TV and foreign theatrical markets - this was the last because it cost too much they had to sell to AIP to finish the movie. They still didn't have enough cash annoying even cuddly Michael Caine.

His performance as Alan Breck is the main reason to see this. Not an all time classic he's not quite comfortably cast - he's professional and charismatic, it's just a little odd to hear him talk in Scottish. Sorry Mike!

The script spanks through the events of the novel and Catrionna - Mann can't really get the excitement and adventure happening. It still has a television feel about it. The two leads are there. Who are they? Why do they fall in love? What purpose do they serve? 

The ending doesn't work - after traipsing over the hills everyone gets stuck in rooms. Ending has Alan turn himself in? Change of heart not really handled. All surface.

There is lovely Scots scenery and a terrific support cast including Donald Pleasance (creepy uncle), Gordon Jackson, voice dubbed Jack Hawkins.

Interesting to see Caine's Breck.

Book review - "Picturing Peter Bogdanovich: My Conversations with the New Hollywood Director" by Peter Tonguette (2020)

 Entertaining book. I know a lot about PB, more than healthy but this had stuff I didn't know - mpostly unmade films in the 70s that actually sounded great esp Bugsy and some Howard Sackler scripts. There's probably too much on Robert Graves but it doesn't overdose on old Hollywood directors and discusses more post Golden era projects eg TV stuff. What a career he had. I wish he'd had another late period hit though.

Book review - "The Rest of the Story: A Life Completed" by Arthur Laurents

 Fascinating memoir. Sequel to his autobiography Original Story By, the gossipy, harsh, entertaining sex obsessed account of his life. This was written right up to just before Laurents died. This prose is still fresh and vigorous,. Odd sort of book (understandably). It's mostly a love poem to Laurents' partner of fifty years, the great love of his life (they did have an open relationship but it worked - it helped too he made a fortune in real estate so Laurents always had cash). Sometimes it's like a primal scream of loneliness. Fascinating.

Also talks about friendships, including Sondheim (once devoted then strong). Mentions Mary Rodgers. Devotes a whole chapter to a hit piece on him - this one. Sections on directing revivals of Gypsy and West Side Story. No mention of Lin Manuel Miranda. Depictions of Jerry Robbins, Herbert Ross, Lena Horne, Streisand (who was going to do a film of Gypsy  - alas, still hasn't been done). Says he's less bitter more about love but the teeth are still there. Remarkable, odd work. I really enjoyed it.

Play review - "Merrily We Roll Along" by Kaufman and Hart (1934)

 Ballsy move from the team. A famous flop - but there's so many characters! Would've cost a fortune. Really interesting. Goes backwards. All about selling out.  This was a thing with all these 30s playwrights. Clifford Odets banged on about it. They all did sell out. But what is that? Good on the playwright hero for making a good living! That's hard`! He entertained people.

The real issue is that his central betrayal isn't enough. He shouldn't have gotten married so young after the war. If they'd done some other betrayal - like he's gay and tried to be straight, or ripped off someone. Great moment splashing iodine. Powerful drama. Real scope.

Odd this lives on via a musical. I guess no one remembers The American Way.

Movie review - "Unman, Wittering and Zigo" (1971) *** (warning: spoilers)

 I remember reading this at school. I think it gets assigned as a school text a lot being about a class of creeps who harass a teacher who has taken over and the previous teacher has died. It was a radio play and you can imagine it being very effective on that medium and on television. It's a solid film too - it helps that the director was good, John Mackenzie, adding tension, and the cast deliver. David Hemmings' sad eyes and weak nature are effective - he was starting to chunk up around this time - and the kids are great. Actually all the cast work. Carolyn Seymour has the one female role of note.

The film doesn't quite land its ending. After the kids attack Seymour - an effective sequence - and then he goes to help them... sorry that doesn't work. I think maybe Seymour should've died accidentally. For Hemmings to hear about this and then go looking for Wittering... I struggled to buy that. He's really, really weak. Also the ending they just stumble upon Wittering. They could've done more action... something.

Still worth a look. Make a good double bill with Child's Play.

TV review - "The Marvellous Mrs Maisel - Season Five" (2023) ****

 The addition of flash forwards give this a much needed jolt and sense of purpose. I loved the really time jumpy ones. This costs so much money. Very satisfying ending. Easily the second best season.

Book review - "Letters of Noel Coward" by Barry Day

 A lot of this was very familiar but there was some lovely fresh stuff - the letters from Coward feel well trodden ground but the ones to him are really fascinating: TE Lawrence, Shaw, Virginia Woolf, Edna Ferber. Coward really loved the "c" word. Loved Marlene Dietric writing letters about how Yul Brynner would love bomb her then gaslight her.

Very long book but rewarding. Good companion piece to Day's other works.

Movie review - "Zeppelin" (1971) **

 A curio - a big-ish budget World War One flyer movie that seemed to come and go. Presumably inspired by the success of The Blue Max it was financed by one of the Gettys who dabbled in film production. I'm sure there's a story to this. There was about the film, on which five people died while filming a stunt.

Michael York and Elke Sommer are the stars although you'll recognise Peter Carstens and Anton Diffring and Marius Goring. The plot has York go undercover as a traitor during World War One - his family had connections a la Leo in The Departed. The Germans accept him quite easily- the Brits just give him a little wound - and then he's off on a mission to steal, uh, the Magna Carta. Why not just have "plans" or have them kidnap people.

Sommer is the wife of Marius Goring. She's on board the zeppelin but I don't think she figures out York is a spy, does she? Did I miss something?

This should be a simple story - undercover on zeppelin, get thing, try to escape with thing on zeppelin. But it's confusing and we're never sure what Germans know about York.

The opening sequence is odd with York going to a party and sleeping with Alexandra Stewart. I don't mean to be rude but was she sleeping with someone? Because her part gets forgotten. They should've started with York in Germany to help sell the spy stuff more. A better maguffin. Clarify the relationships.

The zeppelin scenes are neat. Big boomy thing. We don't get it until half way through.

Movie review - "Murphy's War" (1971) **1/2 (warning: spoilers)

 Looks fantastic - shot in Venezuela (a nightmare location apparently, out in the jungle, living on a ferry that got stuck in mud), beautiful cinematography, splendid scenes involving planes, submarines and jungle, and quality acting. 

It's sluggishly paced - or maybe that's also the lack of stakes: Peter O'Toole survives his ship being sunk by a U boat crew, who then machine gun other survivors, so he decides to get payback... even after the war is over... he succeeds but then he dies too.

In other words Peter Yates wanted to make something about the Futility of War... only World War Two wasn't futile, it was important. Okay yes this bit is futile but then what's the point of watching people doing futile things? Michael Deeley the producer wanted O'Toole to live at the end and that would've helped a little but the war was still over. We really had to hate those Germans. It's good the scene where the Germans kill the U boat survivor... but that survivor doesn't mean much or do the other random villagers. I think they needed to kill Sian Phillips (Quaker doctor) or Philippe Noiret (friendly local Frenchman, excellent) to give it real stakes.

Maybe that wouldn't have worked. Still, the public didn't go for it. A movie from Paramount under Bob Evans.

Robert Littman Head of MGM Europe 1970-71

 In 1970 or thereabouts appointed head of MGM inEurope

April 1971 MGM EMI formed - Nat Cohen in charge, LIttman beneath him

,Films - No Blade of Grass, Get Carter, The Last Run, The Boyfriend

That's a good record.

Gloomy Upheaval Dogs British Movie Industry

By Bernard Weinraub Special to The New York Times

March 30, 1970

March 30, 1970, Page 52Buy Reprints
LONDON—On a chilly London afternoon last No vember, the Metro‐Goldwyn Mayer Company abruptly canceled the multimillion dollar film “Man’s Fate.” The announcement was made while the director, Fred Zin neman, and the stars, David Niven and Peter Finch, were already in rehearsal at the Boreham Wood Studios here.

“It stunned the industry here,” said David Deutsch, a 44‐year‐old British producer, now engaged in filming “Joe Egg,” which is one of the few American‐backed pro ductions currently in Britain.

The cancellation of “Man’s Fate”—whose pre‐production expenditures reportedly ranged from $3‐million to $5‐ million—was one more sig nificant step that has left the British film industry in a gloomy upheaval for the last year and a half.

With 90 per cent of British films being produced with American money, the profit losses, proxy fights and ex ecutive reshufflings in Holly wood have clearly had a withering impact on movies here.

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At the peak of movie‐mak ing in 1966 and 1967, as many as 16 major American hacked films with interna tional casts were under pro duction at the Boreham Wood, Shepperton, Twicken ham and Bray studios.

At present, there are four major productions filming in studios here, together with about a half‐dozen smaller, British‐backed films. The four a we John Schlesinger’s “Bloody Sunday,” “Joe Egg,” a Colum bia production with Alan Bates, “Say Hello to Yesterday,” with Jean Simmons and “Scrooge,” a musical with Albert Finney and Sir Alec Guiness.

The decline in movie‐mak ing here and throughout Eu rope is underscored in nume rous ways, however — in the sudden cancellation of “Man’s Fate” and, more re cently, Richard Lester’s “Flashman,” in the overhaul of London‐based production personnel in United Artists. Paramount and M.G.M. and in the salary cuts that stars, directors and technicians are accepting in order to work.

Like other filmmakers in Britain, Mr. Lester attributes the decline in moviemaking here to two basic factors: the over‐all crisis in the movie industry and falling box‐of fice receipts.

“The failures in the past few years here have fright ened the studios,” he said.

In the mid‐sixties, some of the most successful films re leased were British—“Dar ling,” “Georgy Girl,” “Alfie,” “A Hard Day’s Night” and “Help.” Within the last few years, however, “Joanna,” “The Touchables,” and “Charge of the Light Bri gade” have floundered.•

“Fewer and fewer Euro pean films have been hit ting, not just here in Britain but the films made by Berg man, Debroca, Truffaut,” said Sandy Whitelaw, the European production chief for United Artists.

“It used to be certain European films could say and do things that American films couldn’t do,” said Mr. Whitelaw, whose company will produce about 12 films in Europe this year, a 50 per cent cutback over 1969.

Perhaps the studio in the midst of the stormiest changes, in Europe as well as the United States, is M.G.M, which has no Euro pean films in production now and has reorganized its over seas production staff under Robert Littman, a 32‐year‐old Briton, who was formerly a director of the William Mor ris Agency here.

“We’ve got to make more films for people, not directors,” said Mr. Littman, whose company recently laia off 300 carpenters and tech nicians from their local studio. “I want a variety of films and I want to make them commercial,” he said.

M.G.M. is now planning a number of low‐budget films in Britain, the first one a sci ence‐fiction drama, “No Blade of Grass,” produced and di rected by Corne Wilde.

In dealing with the cutback in American ‐ supported pro ductions, the British movie industry has begun to seek film support without Ameri can money. One of the most ambitious British projects is the Associated British Picture Corporation, which has an nounced a 15‐film program during the next two years.

The production outfit, whose managing director is Bryan Forbes, the director, has four films in various edit ing stages and three in pro duction.

“More and more people will have to go the independent way without studios,” said Mr. Lester. “People will have to make films and then sell them on their own to dis tributors.”

“It’s a very difficult time now,” he added with a shrug. “People have been out of work for a long time and no one really knows what they’re going to do.”

Movie review - "All Coppers Are..." (1972) **

 An odd film. One of four that Peter Rogers made for Rank around this time in addition to his Carry On movies, three from the team of Sidney Hayers and George H Brown of which this is one. I get what they were going for - 48 hours in the life of a cop. That's good. A new Blue Lamp. Great. The writer of Z Cars terrific.

Why not do a look at being a young cop in 1971? It's actually a great idea - a time of rising crime and protests, people spitting on you, protests, terrorism.

There's glimpses of this here - a sequence where Martin Potter (the star) waits with his fellow cops as protestors come down, shots of him doing humdrum patrols.

But he seems to have a lot of spare time. He's got a wife and baby. They go to a party, a wedding. He meets a chappie (Nicky Henson, good) and a woman (Julia Foster, also good). They hit it off, leave the party, his wife is annoyed, he says sorry, then he says he's going to a game, he meets up with Foster and roots her doesn't mention he's married, later goes to the pub, meets Henson and Foster who finds out he's married, does some first aid, is revealed to Henson and Foster to be a cop, then goes to sleep, kid gets sick, gets doctor, goes to protest, gets injured, does a final inspection of estate, runs into Foster and Henson.

It feels longer than 48 hours. Especially Henson and Foster's relationship, it's like they've been together for weeks.

There's odd detours. Foster's mother's boyfriend is sleazy with Foster. Henson's landlady flirts with him. Ian Hendy appears (very effective) as a head gangster and he has a gay underling (Kray homage?) 

It feels patchy. Rewritten. Unsatisfying. Has some interesting bits.

Movie review - "Revenge" (1971) *** (warning: spoilers)

 The team who made Assault reunited for this a much better movie. A family have lost a young girl to a murderer (we never see this scene or them finding out... we start the movie at the funeral). When the main suspect gets let off they decide to kidnap him.

James Booth is dad, Joan Collins his new wife, the sister resents the stepmum, there's  a brother. Aussie Ray Barrett is the father of another girl killed.

They keep the dude in the cellar and decide to torture him to confess, only he doesn't confess so they don't know whether to kill him or let him go. And it sends everyone nuts - Barrett takes off to another city to avoid responsibility, the son can't get it up for his girlfriend (Sinead Cusack) and is hot for stepmum Collins who seems to be into it then he rapes her while the captured guy watches then Booth finds out and smacks them both around so Collins takes off with the son and the daughter finds out and freaks out. And you're never sure until the very end whether the guy did it. 

They tried to sell this in the US as a horror film. It's not, it's a vigilante film and a good one - I really enjoyed it. I recognise the dodginess, especially that rape sequence, but the film has a cohesion and goes for it. Heightened melodrama. 

I'm not a big Booth fan in other movies but he's effective here - his intensity works.  Collins very good. I didn't recognise the son actor - he was fine. Cusack pretty. I liked the younger daughter. The captured guy was terrific. I got a little confused over whether there were two killers or one - there were two, yes?

I think the filmmakers made a mistake not showing the girl going missing/family finding the dead body. That would've been the big gut punch the film needed. I understand why they didn't want to show it.

Movie review - "Assault" (1971) ** (warning: spoilers)

 Feels like an ep of a TV show. There's an attack on a girl (Lesley Ann Downe) which is a little exploitative but when police investigate (Frank Finlay) it's like the Finlay show, guest starring Suzy Kendall and James Laurenson. We have suspects - a creepy doctor (Laurenson who keeps trying to give Kendall pills), Laurenson's creepy boss, creepy woman who runs the school where Kendall taught and Downe attended, her creepy husband, creepy reporter, creepy other cop who is bodyguard for Kendall.

Kendall glimpses an attacker and says he looked Satanic in read light. Really he should've been Satanic. They probably wanted to make this film classy - not too trashy. But take away sex, nudity, violence (I think it should've been a slasher film instead of a random rape and occasionally kill film) and you just have a police procedural. I think if this had been a slasher/giallo it would've gone gangbusters.

Some decent acting. Kendall is pretty. Lacks Julie Christie X factor. Laurenson is fine. Acting good. Best is the creepy husband of the school owner - he feels up student in one scene (student doesn't seem to mind). Actor is terrific. There's some comatose rape victim acting a la Puppet on a Chain from Downe.

Made at Pinewood for Rank. Executive producer Peter Rogers who did the Carry Ons.  Same team went and did Revenge and All the Coppers Are...

David Essex has a small role.  Bad back projection for driving scenes. Goes bonkers at the end with Downe being drawn to power lines. Little bit feminisst in that Kendall saves down - then Laurenson saves Kendall. I know they did it for  red herring but his behaviour is such that he's a walking red flag.

It is professionally done. Just feels like a procedural with weird bits in it. Like at heart it wanted to be trashier and couldn't go through with it.

Movie review - "All the Right Noises" (1971) ** (warning: spoilers)

 Shot in 1969 but took some time to be released. Mid life crisis movie, with 30-something lighting director (!) (first time this profession in a lead role?) has a fling with an actress, despite him being married with two kids, then finds out she's 15, and keeps rooting her.

There's some complications, but not many - the actress thinks she's pregnant for a bit then she isn't. They break up amicably. The wife never finds out. There's no question of being a predator apparently - Olivia Hussey is young and gorgeous as the girl and clearly up for it, untraumatised, gentle, wistful. It's a middle aged man wet dream, really. He's also got a hot wife, Judy Carne, who he likes and has a decent sex life with, then this teen comes along and he bangs her, and it's not too hard to deal with, then she goes. Og he's got a ddad who hassles fr some money.

Tom Bell is good in the lead - they were trying to turn him into a star around this time. The film got financed because Nic Roeg was a mate of writer director Gerry O'Hara and recommended the script to a producer.

The movie just ends. It hints Carne might figure it out but... nope. Credits roll.

In the last five minutes there's a scene with Yootha Joyce as a whining actress and she's terrific and Lesley Ann Downe is a friend and she's pretty and you realise all the dramatic opportunities this film didn't take. No wife finding out, no gossips, no parents of Hussey or boyfriend of Hussey. It's an ad for sleeping with fifteen year old girls really.

Movie review - "A Passage to India" (1984) **1/2

 The British film industry rediscovered India in a big way in the 1980s - this, Gandhi, Octopussy, Staying On, The Far Pavillions, Jewel in the Crown. I've read E.M. Foster's novel, which was strong - vigorous prose helps. This isn't as good. It's a fake rape accusation movie - there were so many of them around back in the day. It's not a genre I like. Also there's so many white heroes whose superiority is emphasised - Peggy Ashcroft, Judy Davis and James Fox. Fox is especially irritating. Lean wanted Peter O'Toole for what part who would've been better.

Alec Guinnes pops up in brownface. Old habits, etc.

It's not as artfully shot as other Lean films - apparently he wanted widescreen but it had to be done in TV format (HBO picked up a lot of the budget). It's still visually stunning. Some gem performances: Peggy Ashcroft, Victor Banerjee (in what should've been a star making performance for Hollywood), Judy Davis. Others not so good. James Fox was so annoying. His performance, his character, walking around being smug. I did like seeing Lean's real life wife play Fox's wife at the end.

The film could be read as a gay love story. When Banerjee visits Fox, Fox is in the shower and Banerjee seems to perv on him. The two men are very devoted to each other and when Banejee finds out Fox is hanging around with Davis he gets jealous. I'm sure I'm not the first writer to notice this.

I remember when this came out. Lots of talk about epics and spectacle. I recall feeling proud that Judy Davis was in it. And the low hanging fruit of white leading characters being superior to racist white support characters.

It went too long. Too dull. I kept seeing bits that could be cut out. It's good when it goes to the caves, and the charges come in, but there's no tension because Banerjee is depicted as being so innocent and Davis is nice so you know she'll get good at the end and the bad Brits are capital B bad.

It's tasteful. Loos lush. Good acting aside from Fox. Worth watching. I didn't much like it.

David Lean Top Ten

 This is easy because he made so few films.

1. In Which We Serve

2. Brief Encounter

3. Oliver Twist

4. Great Expectations

5. Bridge on the River Kwai

6. Lawrence of Arabia

7. Dr Zhivago

8. Blithe Spirit

9. Ryan's Daughter

10. The Bounty films (unproduced) - I would've loved to have seen them. Not Nostromo I've read that it isn't very good.

Book review - "Love Life" by Rob Lowe

 Lowe's first book was a pleasant surprise, raising the bar for this second effort. It's well written with some interesting stuff - profiles of Bernie Brillstein, accounts of the flop shows he worked on (he blames the writing), doing A Few Good Men in London, some of his acting tips, an encounter with Warren Beatty. This is all fine. Other stuff was less interesting. Can be annoyingly chipper and you can sense the narcissist there (which to be fair Lowe cops). Frustratingly hinty about some gold - refers to a torrid sexual encounter with "a female Oscar winner" (Faye Dunaway? Sally Field? ) and being ripped off on a surprise hit (Wayne's World? Tommy Boy?). Not bad. Lowe's a good writer. I'll be honest - I was hoping for more encounters with the rich and famous, though.

Movie review - "Molly: The Real Thing" (2016) ***

 Joyous, loving tribute to the life of a beloved Aussie icon - a man who was good enough as a record producer to make it internationally but stayed local, and became one of the most admired people in the country with his brains and genuine love of music keeping him on the cutting edge. Very Melbournian in a way, which his dagginess, love of sport, family orientated, hanging out with Warnie and the Foxes (Lindsay moons at the end)  - the cocaine probs would have got him in Sydney.

Big array of talking heads. Some make more sense than most (Paul Hogan). Delta Goodrem's love for him is touching. No Molly, or his son, but his brother.

A number of the interviewees are now dead - Michael Gudinski, Shane Warne.

Richard Benjamin Top Ten

 In honour of his birthday

1. Love at First Sight - childhood fave. I love "a werewolf? Really?"

2. Quark - lovely Buck Henry series.

3. Westworld - nerd becomes king!

4. Goodbye Columbus - nerd gets Ali Macgraw!

5. Last of Sheila - nerd gets Raquel Welch!

6. House Calls - I remember this being really funny. Hope it still is.

7. Deconstructing Harry - he should act more

8. Catch 22 - perfect in his support role.

9. You People - was just so great to see him.

10. Sunshine Boys - I haven't seen Diary of a Mad Housewife so I'll put this here.

Movie review - "Ryan's Daughter" (1970) ***

 The visuals are beautiful even for a David Lean film - the cliffs, the wind, the coast, the town. The authenticity level is low. This didn't seem to matter for Lean's earlier movies but something about this one does - maybe it's because it's a 1970 movie, shot in Ireland, where there's heaps of good actors. None of the leads are Irish - Mitchum, Miles, Leo McKern, Trevor Howard, John Mills. Mills' village idiot performance now reeks of Simple Jack-ness.

Because the film takes so long for such a simple story the mind has a chance to wander and contemplate the casting.Robert Mitchum in the lead. Hmm... The producer thought Gregory Peck would've been better. Alec Guiness could've worked (he had an innate sexlessness - you'd understand his wife cheating). But as the film went on I warmed to Mitchum - he's big and lumbering and looks dopey, like a St Bernard. It's fine work.

Sara Miles in the lead... she can act, she's fine... I constantly got the sense though that they did this for Julie Christie. Maybe because I'd just seen Zhivago but that's what I felt. I can't criticse her performance. I just wish Julie Christie had played it.

Barry Foster is effective as an IRA man. It helps he has a juicy role, shooting policemen and importing guns, but he does have a great presence. So too does Christopher Jones. Too cool for school, yes, but he has a great look. His voice was dubbed but it doesn't matter. The townsfolk aren't really depicted with much nuance - the women are shrill harpies and the men yell.

I quite like this film. It was unduly criticised at the time. It looks gorgeous even on the small screen - that storm sequence! I'll have to see it on the big screen one day. Dramatically it's satisfactory, building to a good old head shaving of the town harlot.

The main flaw is a super simple story is dragged out far too long for characters who aren't complex. Old low sex drive man, hot for it wife, traumastised soldier... we've seen these before. There's none of the freshness of Kwai's Colonel Nicholson or TE Lawrence, or the subplots of those films or the epic sweep of Zhivago who goes through so much and those colorful characters. What's there is fine, but just do it at two hours, guys.

Movie review - "Searching for Sugarman" (2013) ****

 Lovely heart warming doco about the singer Rodriguez who was a cult singer in Australia in the 80s - I had his albums - and huge in South Africa, at least amongst the liberal white community. The rumour was he was dead but in fact he was working away in Detroit, in construction! 

It's hard not to be moved hearing his daughters talk about his life, realising how loved he was in South Africa. The 1998 concert is very moving. 

This is a Gen X movie in many ways - obsession with artists who mean so much, tracking them down, finding they're alive, cheering. Did I see Rodgriguez sign some woman's chest?

The director of this committed suicide in 2014.

TV review - "Dick Powell Show - A Time to Die" (1962) **

 Dick Powell, looking old, stars in an episode of his anthology series alongside his wife June Allyson and his two real life kids... who'd lose him within the year. And the show has Powell as a man who dies. 

Only it's a comedy, a Here Comes Mr Jordan style. His character dies and some angels will let him live if he finds someone else to doe for him. He has three choices - Tuesday Weld a suicidal girl in love with singer Andy Williams, Ricky Powell the invalid son of June Allyson, and crim John Saxon.

Aaron Spelling wrote this. The script is a little whiffy in places - I wonder if it tried to put in too much for a one hour. June Allyson's husband is dead... but she hasn't told her son, she's let him think he's been away for five years???

But it's charming to see Powell do scenes with his son, and also Allyson. John Saxon acts his arse off. Weld is terrific. Edgar Bergen is in this. Andy Williams isn't crash hot but still it's fun to see him.

Book review - "David Lean" by Kevin Brownlow (1996)

 Superb biography of the great director who for around thirty years was among the hottest directors in the world - as William Goldman wrote in 1982, there's always three hot directors and one of them is always David Lean - but who has become a little unfashionable now, I think. Probably due to boredom. How many times can you say Brief Encounter is good? And people got sick of boomers going on about Lawrence of Arabia.

Lean was a compelling figure - brilliant, cranky, hard to live with, charming, talented. Fabulous career. Great movies. Some duds. Book is excellently researched and illustrated.

Movie review - "Doctor Zhivago" (1965) ****

 A film that broke many rules for a blockbuster - it was set in Russia, about Russians, had a passive hero who just mopes around for three hours (compared to Lawrence, Ben Hur and company who got out and did stuff). Zhivago is always swept up in events - mum dies, World War One, Russian Revolution, bands of partisans. He's bailed out of trouble twice by Alec Guinness,  once by Rod Steiger, his wife and mistress seem to make decisions. The only decision he really makes is to cheat on his wife.

Of course it also had David Lean and his stunning compositions. And watching it again, Lara carries as much action as the real hero is Lara - she's the one who is loved by Tom Courtney's revolutionary, is raped by Rod Steiger, shoots Steiger, becomes a nurse, goes looking for Courtney.

And the film has real emotional sweep. I mean, it's full of nice people - Omar Sharif, Geraldine Chaplin, Julie Christie. Even tough Alec Guinness loves his half brother and tries to help him. Tom Courtney becomes ruthless but starts off idealistic. Rod Steiger is nasty, raping Christie, but saves her in the end.  Then there's this horrible war and revolution. The pettiness and meanness of the Bolshevieks is well depicted. You can't help feel sorry for Sharif being whisked away for two years by those partisans, and then separated from Christie, and dying of a heart attack calling out to her. Of course his life has compensations - doting wife and mistress, people looking out for him, a house to hide out with cool ice all over it.

Acting is consistently excellent - Guinness is terrific as a creepy commie, so too Courtney (I wish we'd seen his death scene instead of it being described), a restrained Rod Steiger, Geraldine Chaplin and Sharif moon. Klaus Kinski is electric in a brief appearance.

The X factor was Julie Christie - beautiful, smart, capable, fresh. Sharif's youthful romantic looks suit the part very well - he's better I think than original choice Peter O'Toole would have been. The Brits make good Russians.

It ticks the boxes of a successful epic. It has a simple storyline to follow - will Sharif root Julie Christie despite being married, will everyone avoid being killed - but all sorts of complexities around it. Plus cool stuff like the compositions - cavalry charges, cuddling in sleds, ice on the window, flowers.

Book review - "The Films of Oliver Reed" by Susan D. Cowie & Tom Johnson (2011)

 Wish this had been better. A lot of credit lists and synopses, and rehashing interviews from other books such as Denis Meikle's on Hammer and books about Reed. Some new interviews which is good but not enough. A lot of movies the authors go "we haven't seen". That's a little slack. One or two interesting judgements about the film.

Chris Lee did the introduction.

TV review - "DuPont Show of the Week - Legend of Lylah Clare" (1963) ***

 The origin of the 1968 Robert Aldrich film. Franklin Schaffner's direction is more restrained and less fun than Aldrich but the material is bonkers and Tuesday Weld stunningly good - she got madness and is perfect as the young starlet going mad. It's a silly story but everyone commits - Weld but also Alfred drake, Boss Hogg as the studio head.

TV review - "The Dick Powell Show - 'Run Til It's Dark' " (1962) **1/2 (warning: spoilers)

 Fabian made this after A Lion Walks Among Us - Dick Powell does the intro, not looking too well (he'd be dead within a few months) giving a nice introduction to Tuesday Weld and Fabian . He draws comparison between Fabian and another actor turned singer, I wonder what happened to him, etc. Didn't work out as well for Fabian.

He gives a solid performance as a young man who meets Tuesday Weld in a casino. Weld is electric in a showy part, a wild woman on the run from a mystery man. It's the sort of part where she encourages Fabian to drive fasted, standing up in the passenger seat. Fabian is lechy with her several times although she says she's not interested. She reacts strongly - but apparently that's her fault she doesn't know what's wrong with her.

It's a shame they had Fabian's character be so sleazy because otherwise it's a strong drama, and his sleaziness wasn't needed. Fabian believably falls in love and Weld is excellent. I was confused a little by the ending - the guy chases after Weld tries to strangle her, so it seemed to me... but she's still bad is that right?

Nat Cohen at EMI Films in 1973

 In May 1973 Cohen announced a slate of seven films worth £5 million:

• Here There Be Dragons starring Joseph Bottoms - which became The Dove
• Wet Stuff with Elliot Gould and Donald Sutherland
• Swallows and Amazons
• Murder on the Orient Express
• Alfie Darling
• Hot Property with Cliff Richard - this became Take Me High
• The Killer Elite produced by Arthur Lewis

What about this slate? Well it had a massive hit in Orient Express. I would've invested in The Dove - not the Gould/Sutherland film.

Swallows and Amazons - yes, a kids film. Alfie sequel - it sucked, I would've made it in 1970... they waited too long. Cliff Richard musical - sure worth a shot. Killer Elite, yes.

This slate was a little iffy but it had Orient Express.

Nat Cohen slate at EMI in 1975

In July 1975 Nat Cohen announced he would make a slate of eleven movies worth £6 million.  Let's look at them:

* Aces High - Journey's End in planes

* Evil Under the Sun from novel by Agatha Christie

* Sergeant Steiner (later Cross of Iron) from Sam Peckinpah

*Seven Days in Japan

* To the Devil a Daughter from Hammer

* The Sweeney

* The Likely Lads

* a remake of Kind Hearts and Coronets with Dick Emery (never made)

* The Nat King Cole Story (never made)

* Spanish Fly 

* All Things Bright and Beautiful (later It Shouldn’t Happen to a Vet)

My thoughts on this... good solid slate. TV spin offs yes. Ditto All Creatures sequel - Nat King Cole Story (if you got music and right star) - yes. Spanish Fly yes. Hammer horror film yes. Peckinpah war film - yes.

Remake of Kind Hearts... hmmm.... maybe. Risky. Not sure that should be remade. Another Dick Emery film, sure. Maybe not remake it. Not enough reason.

Seven Days in Japan... well... yeah I would've backed Lewis Gilbert. Very good track record. I would've been wrong there.

Aces High... hmm... I actually think not. Journey End in planes... not a great idea. Just do Journey's End in the trenches. Needed bigger stars for an expensive film. American stars.

He didn't have a break out hit. The Agatha Christie didn't happen for a few years later - became Death on the Nile.

Book review - "Leave the Gun, Take the Cannoli: The Epic Story of the Making of The Godfather " by Mark Seal

 I knew all the stories but it was fun to read anyway because the making of this film is a classic story, full of colorful characters (Bob Evans, Coppola, Charlie Bludhorn, Puzo, Brando, Caan, various mafiosos - Al Ruddy is among the least colourful) and genuine conflict (mafia opposition, Evans vs Coppola). The sections on dealing with cinematographers and designers are particularly strong.

Movie review - "The Bridge on the River Kwai" (1957) ****

 Beyond iconic - at heart it's some old friends, the escape from prison film and the guys on a mission to blow something up movie. It's elevated via the battle of wits between Alec Guiness' stuffy British officer and Sessue Hayakwa's Japanese officer, and the beautiful handling of Lean. I saw this recently on my computer - but I've seen it in the cinema and know that that's the way to see it, so you can appreciate the beauty of Lean's direction.

Random observations:

- William Holden deserved his massive pay packet. No one else combined cynicism and heroism as well, at least not then. And he's fantastic at the end scowling at Guiness as he dies.

- Geoffrey Horne's part is interesting. A former accountant, Canadian, heart throb, with a weirdly clunky "arrc" about whether he'd be able to stab someone (he says he's not sure and he's allowed to go on the mission... would they want him after he'd admitted that?) What happened to Horne? He gets a lot of screentime. I mean he gets to kill Hayakawa and has this fantastic scene where he can't kill Guiness even though he should.

- Jack Hawkins is great. Rugged idealist. Overlooked in the praise because he plays the least neurotic but he's good.

- Terrifically suspenseful finale with Horne, Holden  and Hawkins ready to blow up the bridge but separated, and Guiness figuring out something's going on, and the train on its way.

- Lovely moment where Sessue Hayakawa cries.

- The guys on a misison have a trio of hot Thai women with them to wash their hair and shave them. Did this ever happen? But it does give the film a female presence at the end.

- The studio note to have a white woman in the film was a good one I think  - the scene is entertaining (Holden romancing a nurse), it gives Western female audiences an access point.

- That training commando school scene is a lot of fun and surely influenced the Bond movies.

Movie review - "Summertime" (1955) ***

From a subgenre of 50s Broadway plays - gay writers telling stories about spinster, dreamy women who "unlock their love" via encounter with a hot stud. Here it's middle aged Katherine Hepburn (Shirley Booth played the role on Broadway - very different!), going to Venice, having a fling with Rossano Brazzi.

It's a very simple story - they meet, they root, she dumps him rather than the other way around, she leaves. Nice views of Venice. Beautifully shot like all Lean movies. Admires of Hepburn and Brazzi will enjoy it.

Book review - "Born Standing Up, a Comic's LIfe" by Steve Martin

 Wonderful book one of the best comic memoirs I've read. Martin is talented but that's a small part of it - he worked so, so hard, as a writer and then performer, travelling everywhere, doing several shows a night, trying new things, being smart, applying philosophy. He became a rock star comic but it's easy to see why he's sustained his career since. Very very impressive.

Book review - "Abyss The Cuban Missile Crisis" by Max Hastings

 Not one of Hastings' masterpieces-  he's better on epic sweeps intercut with small little vignettes. This is a tighter time frame. Still worth a read. Scary in terms of the nutty generals and Cubans and bombastic Russians who caused this for no reason. And nutty Americans who freaked out over Cuban when the missiles didn't make much of a difference.

He's a bit pick nicky about the Kevin Costner character in Thirteen Days.

Movie review - "Elvis" (2022) ***

The unique vision of Baz Luhrmann/Catherine Martin adapts well to the Elvis story, with its low rent, tin pan origins (carnivals, appropriated culture, hayrides), and high rent kitsch (Vegas). Austin Butler does fine in an  impossible role. He mimics Elvis as well as I guess anyone can - but he's not the real thing and isn't as charismatic. But then no one can.

Tom Hanks' make up takes getting used to. I never did. He's always a cartoon. Richard Roxbrough and Helen Thompson score strongly as Elvis' parents.

The research felt wikipedia deep in terms of script - not in production design. It kind of is about the Colonel and Elvis but then the Colonel takes a step back for slabs of running time and it becomes about the beauty of Dacre Montgomery - and then Luke Bracey gets all these close ups as one of Elvis' gang (though he doesn't do anything). Priscilla is in there, worried, and that's it - no cheating on Elvis with the karate instructor in this one, but I know they needed .

Bright, bubbly, a spectacle. It got wearying after a while. This needed an intermission more than Australia did.

Movie review - "Hobson's Choice" (1954) ***

 David Lean wasn't known as a comedy director but his touch was spot on here. I guess it wasn't a comedy per se... more a romantic comedy? Light northern family comedy. 

Charles Laughton is excellent as the blustering shop owned - one of his northern businessmen he played from time to time. Brenda de Banzie is excellent as his daughter - very non-sell out casting. She's handsome looking, but not movie pretty - most directors would've cast an ingenue. John Mills (a last minute replacement for Robert Donat) is effective too.

Laughton's drunk antics maybe aren't as funny as the film thinks it is (eg the scene with the puddle) but when he's not drunk he's very good.  De Banzie has one of the best British female roles of the 1950s - she's smart, determined, drives the action, bullies Mills into marriage.

Like all Lean films, it looks wonderful. Main problem - the film pretty quickly has no where to go. She bullies Mills into marriage, they set up shop, it works, Laughton comes back begging... felt like it needed another twist, like a rival for Mills or de Banzie or the sisters to interfere or something. Because it clocks in at nearly two hours.

Still, a bright, enjoyable movie.

Book review - "Shy: The Alarmingly Outspoken Memoirs of Mary Rodgers" by Mary Rodgers and Jesse Green (2022)

 I didn't know a lot about Rodgers - had heard the name and the title of Once Upon a Mattress and Freaky Friday - didn't put it all together. She's Richard Rogers' daughter but had her own successful career.

This is like Marvelous Mrs Maisel only her first husband was gay, dad a top composer, her BFF was Steven Sondheim (they contemplated getting married even knowing he was gay), and she's trying to make it as a composer rather than a comedian. But the milieu is the same, as is the fact she farms out her kids to nannies, and has an action packed sex life (dating Bill Goldman, Harold Prince). She worked on TV specials with Woody Allen.

Very honest. Funny. Moving. She can get wearying at times, then recovers with a great observation.

A child died. Had six kids. Gay husband hit her. Bad health towards end of life. Found things to whinge about. Kids turned out well. Smart. 

No other book quite like it.

Movie review - "The Sound Barrier" (1952) ***

 After two flops with Ann Todd, David Lean restored his commercial record with this flyer tale. Todd's in this too but it's a 'girl' part so she can't do too much damage - I'm being mean about Todd but she wasn't very good, one of the least lively British female stars of her era. She's the daughter of Ralph Richardson, a northern plane manufacturer developing jets. Her husband is a test pilot, played by Nigel Patrick - who briefly became a sort of star (Kenneth More soon cornered the market in cocky pilots but he hadn't broken through yet). Denholm Elliot (very effective) is Todd's weak brother - he and More were going to play pilots Alcock and Brown in a film that got pulled when Korda went bankrupt.

This benefits from a decent script from Terence Rattigan (who knew plans having served in the RAF). It's beautifully shot like all Lean films - carefully composed shots, lots of love and care. There's plenty of stiff upper lip as Richardson loses his son and Todd loses Patrick (who is a bit of an annoying twit - I can see why he didn't stay a big star), and they worry as John Justin (who was a real pilot) takes up the charge via some third act "lets cross the streams" science dodginess.

So you can mock it, the Brits being noble and middle class, for all Richardson's northern accent (it is quite touching at the end when he indirectly asks Todd to stick around). . There's a white haired engineer inventor type who seems to be waiting for Alistair Sim to play him.

Todd is annoying but she gets the film's best scene: visiting the crash site where her husband crashed and seeing them scrape out what's left of him. Almost two hours long so be warned.

Book review - "The Cannon Film Guide: Volume I, 1980–1984" by Mike McPadden

 Lovingly done. Some great interviews. I wish it had been more thorough. Lots of credit listings and plot synopses, like a pre internet book. I wish he'd done some more research on production of films. This touches on early Cannon films - the Ninjas, breakdancing, Bronsons, Norrises, some of the classy stuff (eg Love Streams).

Movie review - "Air" (2023) ***

 A film for Dads. Made by, for, and about Generation X. I actually liked this more than I thought. It didn't sound like a good idea. But watching it, I was hooked - because it's a sports movie, the team being Nike and they need to recruit players who are going to be stars to win their comp, i.e. sales. They are meant to pick three up and comers but instead Matt Damon gambles the house on Michael Jordan.

It works out of course - so many times it doesn't though. Often businesses seek the magic bullet. This time it worked out. I'm sure there's countless times when it didn't.

Viola Davis has incredible gravitas as Jordan's mum. Affleck is a very amiable tycoon. There's some mention of factories in Taiwan but none of sweatshops.

It's an inherently cheap movie - a few people in a room, 80s soundtrack... but somehow this cost $90 million. I guess it was the stars, who also include Chris Tucker (old but still doing his thing) and Jason Bateman.

Movie review - "The Lost City" (2022) **

 I love the concept and the stars and the support cast, was in the mood for a Romancing the Stone throwback but the film didn't quite seem tow woek. Do cover models really go on tour with authors? It feels like there were studio notes to introduce everyone early - Dan Radcliffe, Channing Tatum, Brad Pitt. So there's no time to get to know characters.

Sandra Bullock, an all time great star, has no character to play - what's her angle? Bitter? Romantic? Tired of love? Warm? Her plastic surgery is annoying and she has nil chemistry with Tatum who also has no character to play. A bit snaggy, bit dumb... Why not just make it simple - have her sick of love, cynical about it, have him as a romantic. Or something else. Pick a lane!

Radcliffe is fine. The film lacks a Danny de Vito. People try. Underwhelming action sequences too much CGI. No life, no energy. Some pretty scenery and clever treasure twists. But it misses.

Play review - "Point Valaine" by Noel Coward (1934)

 One of several unsuccessful attempts from Coward to find a follow up vehicle for The Lunts after Design for Living worked so well. This was his go at Somesert Maugham style sex in the tropics with whites behaving badly - the play is dedicated to Maugham.

There's a bit of padding and the device of the Maugham/Coward like writer who visits and commentates on the action was surely tired then - although when he talks of his philosophy towards the end of love you go "oh is this Noel Coward talking", about not getting too involved in people.

It's not a great Lunt vehicle as it's not a two hander - there's four roles, the Maugham guy, an ageing woman, her Russian lover, and a young man who falls for the older woman. So there's a lot of gay writer tropes at the time - ageing horny woman, beautiful young man who adores her, rough trade who is mean to her. Alfred Lunt played the rough trade - I was surprised until I read the confrontation.

The drama's not bad, it's a solid love triangle, with people making out in the rain, and gossiping whites in the background. I'm surprised this was never filmed by Hollywood. It's a play I could imagine good pulp screenwriters actually improving, giving the lead to a Joan Crawford type. Or you could flip the sexes around and have it about a guy loved by a younger woman and older mysterious woman. Maybe it lacks the big pay off too - the rough trade kills himself, the young man goes his own way... Really rough trade should have killed the woman. It would've been more satisfying dramatically.

Louis Hayward played the young man on Broadway - makes sense.

Movie review - "Madeleine" (1950) **

 The Madeleine Smith trial titillated the British forever, with its young woman possibly murdering an ex lover to get rid of him. All good ripe stuff that you can imagine Gainsborough doing in their heyday with Lockwood and Granger. But this was Cineguild, who were too cool for school - one of their several "lets show Gainsborough how it's done" movies (Passionate Friends, Blanche Fury).

It's beautifully shot, skilfully directed. Looks a dream. Gorgeous. David Lean was  great director.

But there's no point of view. No heart. No passion. No decent stars. Ann Todd is dull. Competent but no fire. There's non entities in the other roles. Todd is the centre of it but then loses touch as the focus comes about the trial.

It's a beautiful shell of a film.

Movie review - "Catherine Called Birdy" (2022) ***

 I love how out of all the Game of Thones alumni Bella Ramsey is getting the choice roles. This is a fun, loving account of a novel thought it feels like an account of a novel. Watching it I was always going "this is probably better as a book, you can really get inside her head, and get all the detail".

There's a decent budget and the cast can't be faulted. Lena Durham does a good job as director. I do love the way the father loves his daughter down deep that was touching. It had resonance the rest doesn't but I recognise that could be because I'm a dad and I don't relate to the 14 year old girl stuff as much.

Movie review - "Passionate Friends" (1949) **

 So beautifully shot and directed it can't be a bad movie but it's not a very good one, as a simple story is stuffed. You might enjoy it more if you're an Add Todd fan - she leaves me cold, only succeeded in one film, The Seventh Veil where she had James Mason. Here she's bland and strikes no sparks against Trevor Howard who is dull. His dullness worked in Brief Encounter because he was a repressed dull doctor and had Celia Johnson. These characters jet about - they live in Italty, they're sophisticated. It's hard to care. These people should be able to work it out.

The film lacks passion, and/or actors able to convey passion. It's not interesting and I cared less as it went on. Rains is professional. Maybe a juicy fourth lead could've spiced things up.

Gainsborough did this stuff much, much better.

Movie review - "Bitter Sweet" (1940) **

 Noel Coward disliked this version of his operetta and it's not hard to see why - but also I'm sympathetic to MGM, who needed a film for MacDonald and Eddy. It removes the opening device of the old heroine telling a young couple about her life in flashback because it was used in an earlier film Maytime. Btut that robs the piece of its point. Also the two stars are too old.

It's overproduced, the colour seems pointless somehow, there's lots of hammy support actors - George Sanders goes fuel Teutonic as the nasty noble after MacDonald. She's okay, Eddy's stiff.

Some of the songs were well done particularly the last number. But this film was annoying. They didn't even give Eddy a chance to put up a decent fight in the duel with Sanders - Sanders just skewers him (which to be fair is realistic but it de-balls him). MacDonald doesn't even seem to care. The actors were probably over each other by now.

I'd forgotten I'd seen a bunch of MacDonald-Eddy movies. They didn't linger in my memory.

Noel Coward Top Ten (Plays)

 1. Still Life (1936) aka the play that was turned into Brief Encounter (1945). .Easily the best of Coward’s Tonight at 8:30 works, it’s the sort of drama that is easy to mock from a distance but retains great empathy and understanding. The film is very faithful but accentuates everything and Celia Johnson delivers perhaps the greatest “acting with eyes” performance in history.
2. Peace in Our Time (1947). This flopped and is rarely revived but I really enjoyed it - an account of what Britain might’ve been liked had they lost the war. A serious drama. The fact the baddies were Nazis make Coward’s reactionary politics, which can be hard to swallow (eg Cavalcade, This Happy Breed, South Sea Bubble, Relative Values) more palatable. This would’ve made a good film.
3. Nude without Violin (1957) - Coward’s post war plays aren’t as revived as his output 1925-45 because, to be frank, they aren’t as good but this is a fun satire albeit of some low hanging fruit, the modern art world. (Waiting in the Wings has a fabulous idea but is far too serious.)
4. Song at Twilight (1966) - Coward’s last produced play and a deserved success because it’s a post war work with a bit of guts and honesty behind it.
5. Blithe Spirit (1941) - this play is pretty perfect. Director-proof.
6. Present Laughter (1939) - we are getting into obvious choices here, this is great fun, and I can’t believe it was never filmed.
7. Private Lives (1929) - obvious choice. The jokes about domestic violence maybe haven’t aged too well.
8. Design for Living (1932) - again, obvious choice, very ahead of the curve with its kinky domestic arrangements.
9. The Vortex (1924) - I could’ve gone with Easy Virtue, Hay Fever, Fallen Angels... Coward’s 20s output was pretty strong (I didn’t mind Sirocco) but went for this because of its drama and the drug stuff is still fresh
10. Bitter Sweet (1932) - I don’t like the music but the book of this is a very good example of how to write the book of a musical (well, operetta) - simple, logical, different characters, romantic, emotional

Movie review - "Blithe Spirit" (1945) ***1/2

 Noel Coward's lovely play isn't tampered with - he whinged about the ending apparently but I didn't mind it. The colour photography is lovely but probably wasn't worth getting for a film about people in a room. Indeed, it might've been better had they not done it because they might've avoided the worst mistake of the film - painting Kay Hammond all green.

Rex Harrison and Margaret Rutherford are divine in their roles - Harrison did Coward better than Coward, more focused (and I can say it with authority  because I've seen the TV version). Cummings and Hammond are fine - it's not Hammond's' fault she's green - but I kept wishing for proper stars. Elvira at least should've been a star - imagine Vivien Leigh or someone.

Movie review - "Confess Fletch" (2022) **1/2

 I love how John Hamm, for all his success on Mad Men, just wants to be a comedy star and he's done excellently in some films. It took me a while to get used to him as Fletch - yes the Chevy Chase factor but also this film feels as though it was written for a Chevy type wisecracker. I think Hamm has a more laid back persona. When he's playing laid back against more manic guest stars he's more effective. I also wonder if maybe he should've used voice over. Maybe I'm too hung up on the Chevy Chase factor.

I think people didn't go see this because it feels like an episode of a TV show. It's fun, a decent mystery, some funny bits - but it lacks the all star cast factor of the Ken Branagh Agatha Christies, or Knives Out. Have bigger stars and some more glamour then it could've worked. 

The actors are all fine - familiar types like John Slattery, Annie Mumolo, Roy Moore, etc.

Play review - "Post Mortem" by Noel Coward (1931)

 Coward never went to uni but this is the sort of play you write at uni/drama school - full of passion, and prentention without knowledge of life but it has its own integrity. It's not like anything else I've read of his. It consists of eight scenes - the first is in the trenches, a guy dies, then comes back as a ghost in 1930 to visit his mum, dad, ex, mates, etc. there's a lot of solioquies and it's written with passion and sincerity. I preferred it to the smugness of his keep the classes down works but can see why it's not often performed.

Movie review - "The Scoundrel" (1935) **1/2

Noel Coward had lots of offers to star in films but only took this in the 1930s. At least it was a unique thing - Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur, legendary journos, playwrights and screenwriters, were given funds to direct as well for a brief experiment.

It's good to see Coward at his handsome peak - slim and youthful (the first scene has him getting out of a bath shirtless!). He speaks in that clipped, not terribly engaged way - like he's slightly bored and taking the piss. I think Coward could be a good actor but get the impression he coasted a lot. Mind you he does step things up at the end when he talks to God.

There's lots of awkward pacing, flowery dialogue. It's interesting more than entertaining. Alexander Woolcott is in this. And Lionel Stander.

I heard this was about Coward trying to find a person who wept for him, which it is - but that doesn't happen until about an hour in. Maybe this would've worked better on stage. 

But still, it captures Coward at his leading man peak and is different.

Tyrone Power Top Ten

 For his birthday

1. Witness for the Prosecution - look, anyone could've played that role if sufficiently handsome but he's very good in a terrific film.

2. Nightmare Alley - splendid noir and Power is excellent. Deserved cult classic.

3. The Razor's Edge - Power very good in an incredibly hard role to play. All the critics are going to roll over for Clifton Webb, Anne Baxter and Gene Tierney but Power centers it.

4. The Eddy Duchin Story. Classy material.

5. The Captain from Castille. Power was stuck in a lot of these Fox spectaculars. This is one of the best of those.

6. Mark of Zorro. Power has a decent part - a man with a dual identity - and has a lot of fun.

7. Thin Ice. Fun, silly Sonja Henie stuff.

8. The Rains Came. Yes, in brown face. A very good performance though.

9. The Black Swan. He wears growth, scowls and abducts Maureen O'Hara but he's still a very nice pirate.

10. Jesse James. Same as The Black Swan.

Movie review - "Our Man in Havana" (1959) **1/2

 Graham Greene's funny novel about a British vacuum cleaner salesman who becomes a spy had the idea director Carol Reed and star Alec Guinness and isn't bad but isn't that interesting. Jo Morrow is dreadful as Guinness's daughter. Noel Coward terrific as a secret service man - ditto Ralph Richardson as Coward's boss.

Maureen O'Hara is alright as Guiness's secretary. Ernie Kovacs is funny as a local head of police. Burl Ives is, well, Burl Ives as a German.

I went with this for a while but then it got annoying. It's smart but there's no emotion - no sense that Guiness is really in danger even though he is, or that O"Hara and he fall in love even though they do, or that he loves his daughter, or that he feels sad when Ives is killed and wants revenge. I wish Hitchcock had made it (he wanted to but the rights were too expensive.)

Musical review - "Bitter Sweet" by Noel Coward (1933)

 It's a musical, but the book was published in an early collection of plays so I gave it a read. I'm not wild about Coward's music - too foreign. But the book is lovely and simple. Reminded me of the Barry Manilow song 'Copacabana'. A young couple are in love, he's a poor song writer she has a rich guy who wants to marry her, a rich old dame talks about her life being in love with a poor song writer, running off, but he gets upset seeing her dance with a count and dies in a duel. Which makes him a wanker but it gives the piece weight because she never gets over him.

It's a very simple effective book - contrasting timelines, sad love story, bookended with a happy one a la The Man in Grey.

Book review - "Happy Go Lucky" by Kenneth More (1959)

 More wrote a very likeable memoir in the late 70s, More or Less, which got him sued by Danny Angel. Thing is he already wrote a book about his life back in 1959 which was premature I guess, written at his peak, but he had packed in. And because it was fresher off the press if there's less bitching there's more detail about his life and early films - he does take a swipe at Scott of the Antarctic. I assume More wrote this himself - he's a lively writer, smart too.

I read this an unusual way - it was serialised in a newspaper and I read bits in the newspaper.

Movie review - "Bitter Springs" (1950) ***

 After stumbling with Eureka Stockade Ealing tried to repeat the success of The Overlanders by copying that film more closely. It's a trek across the outback once more, again headed by Chips Rafferty, with a comic relief Englishman (Tommy Trinder, who is top billed), another shy Englishman (well, Scot - Gordon Jackson) who has a romance with a spirited beautiful blonde woman with long hair (Nonie Piper), plus a cute kid (Nicky Yardley), a pioneering couple (here Rafferty is one), a bad egg (Charles Tingwell), Henry Murdock as an Aboriginal stockman.

The opening repeats Overlander sequences - rolling rocks down mountains, sheep instead of cattle, wagons getting stuck, Pommy migrants joining the trek, etc

Then it becomes a pioneer family trying to make a farm story. And the rest of mostly clashes with Aboriginals, with a little bit of romance.

There is a lot of good stuff here. The photography is beautiful. It seems to have been mostly shot on location. Location work very good. The acting is excellent. Rafferty gets to play a tougher character and is effective. Jackson is amiable. Piper doesn't have much to do (she cocks a gun in one sequence) but is pretty enough. Superb stuff involving Aboriginals. Trinder is engaging - he gets to do the bulk of the heroic stuff rescuing Yardley. He copped criticism for the part but I liked him, felt he was well integrated. The mum makes some speech.

The ending is a siege - Aboriginals attacking a homestead. Very very briefly. So briefly you sense Ralph Smart  Then Michael Pate leads a cavalry to the rescue (called by Tommy Trinder).

A fascinating combination of audience pleasing stuff - cute kid, scenery, an attempt at a happy ending with Rafferty and an Aboriginal shearing. The film veers away from other things which might have made it more popular - the romance is really really short, scenes like Trinder and Murdock getting help aren't even shown, there's little suspense in the siege. Tingwell's character should die dramatically but he doesn't.

Some of it is depressingly realistic. Pate's matter of fact acceptance when Tingwell kills a black. The fact the authorities simply support Rafferty's claim.

How to make this work? I think there needed to be a proper white villain who whipped up trouble and died. Yes less realisstic but ti would've ended the piece with some catharsis. You've got Tingwell who is racist and bad but redeems himself with a brave waterhole dash and is allowed to live. Tingwell should've played another farmer, a really racist one - play out love triangle with Piper and Jackson. Have the family consist of two daughters, so one can hook up with Trinder. 

Look a fascinating movie. Thought provoking.

Movie review - "The Cat and the Canary" (1978) **

 Straight old timey chiller from porn filmmaker Radley Metzger, who does a solid job. I like the genre - will readers and people who have to survive until dawn. There's not a lot of humour in it or that much suspense, but it's fine. Baddie conveniently waits a long time to kill heroine so enable male lead to come to rescue.

Cast is B/C list, I guess except Wendy Hiller who is a the housekeeper. Wilfid Hyde White is the deceased (in a video) and Carol Lynley bad, all awkward and dull, as the female lead. Michael Callan gets a decent later film role as her paramour who may or may not be bad. There's people like Daniel Massey and Peter McEnery who you'll vaguely recognise and others like Honor Blackman and Olivia Hussey (who probs should've played the lead she does "scared" very well) who you will recognise.

Play review - "Look After Lulu" by Noel Coward (1959)

 Look, this was okay and you imagine could be a fun night out. Coward adapts Feydeau so it's set in Paris in 1908 with mistresses, maids, soldiers, Russian counts, misunderstanding. Lulu is a courtesan/mistress/dream part for ageing star whose boyfriend goes away for a few weeks. She fake marries his bestie for cash, which is risky, the boyfriend finds out and ensures it's a real marriage. 

The plotting is a still watery which surprises me - they don't really do much with the character of the horny Russian prince who wants Lulu, or use the girl who loves Lulu's fake fiance.

It's bright enough. There's some fourth wall breaking eg making gags "you wouldn't believe it if it was on stage" and recaps on the plot - which are dicey when the work isn't that good.

Vivien Leigh played this in London.

TV Review - "The Marvelous Mrs Maisel - Season 4" (2022) **

 They've fallen in love with production design and tracking shots rather than scripts. There's one really good episode when Jane Lynch makes a comeback and the some bright moments throughout (a funny Jackie Kennedy gag, the guy who plays Lenny Bruce is really good) but there's no soul to it, just production design, which is admittedly superb.

Play review - "Quadrille" by Noel Coward (1952)

 Coward famously collaborated with the Lunts on Design for Living but could never get the magic back though he tried. Maybe if you liked the Lunts and saw it this was fun. It's not great to read. For some reason it's set in the nineteenth century as if to hide the fact the story is a version of Private Lives - a couple married to other people run off together and their partners, the heroes, set off in pursuit and they fall in love.

It was a drag to read. The characters weren't funny not terrible individual (one liked trains another was an industrialist). I didn't like these people and the action felt padded. Maybe as a one act play this would've worked.

Movie review - "Empire Records" (1995) **

 I missed the cult of this but it has its charms especially as a period piece - Gen X, floppy hair, flannos, boots, the "day in the life of a [insert thing]" structure, the music, record stores. The record store seems very big and the casting director had a great day - Ethan Embry, Liv Tyler, Rene Zellweger, Robin Tunney. Rory Cochrane is fun and a skinny Antony La Paglia has floppy hair.

It's not High Fidelity but it's its own thing. There is camraderie and mugging. I didn't like that lack of reality - it never felt like a real record store and no one seemed to do any work. Would an indie store have a day devoted to a fading 80s idol (Maxwell Caulfield having a ball)? Liv Tyler throws herself at him, rips off her clothes to get in her underwear... he asks for oral sex... and then Liv feels cheap? Then Rene Zellweger goes and sleeps with him and that's bad because...? 

There's some young floppy haired boy and La Paglia's older floppy haired guy who doesn't get a "staff with crush on him" story. The stories are a mixture of cartoons and heavy drama (neglected kid, Liv Tyler's hooked on bennies, Robin Tunney shaved her head and... something).

Look the actors are pretty and have charisma. I can see why no one wen to see it when it came out.

Movie review - "The Stowaway" (1958) **

 Odd. So odd. Why did Lee Robinson/ make it? I know Walk into Paradise worked well but that was an Australian story... this is a French story. I think he was dazzled by stars and the nous of his production partners. I get it. Why did he invest in it though? 

The story is wonky. Simple Macguffin - search for the heir to missions. People after it - lawyer (Reg Lye), another lawyer (Roger Livesey), crook (Serge Reggiani), hooker ex of man (Martine Carol), man who's in love with her (Karl Boehm).  That's a decent Warner Bros style gang.

But... who's our hero? Carol's top billed... sure, fine. She gets involved, gets Boehm to help her. But then... falls in love with Boehm for real, I think, wants to go straight, then blabs to Reggiani about Livesey for some reason, then sort of becomes passive. Needed to be a proper Carol vehicle. I wasn't sure what she wanted. Money to start off with. But then...? The romance with Boehm is half baked.

Why did Robinson think a film with so much dubbed English dialogue would work? Why not cast Chips Rafferty in the Roger Livesey part? He would've been great. A different variation but more charismatic. I wonder if it was floated. I bet Rafferty thought he could do it.

There's some nice location work but so much of it is inside and there's a lot of chat. Too much. It feels studio bound. A lot is set on a boat. Doesn't play to Robinson's strengths.

I was confused at the end. What was Reggiani trying to do? Who was on his side? Boehm's side? What's the role of the crew? They don't find the heir!It just ends!

Acting pretty good. Carol an odd star - she looks like a Gold Coast cougar, with her deep tan and peroxide blonde hair. Boehm was solid. Livesey and Lye are fine. James Condon has a few lines as ship's purser. Doris Fitton has like one line.

Credits of film different on Australian and French versions. French version ran ten minutes longer to the one I saw and fleshed out more - more Carol, and Carol-Boehm. Felt more logical even if I couldn't understand what was going on.

This film reminds me of late 50s Rank attempts to storm the world market eg Whirlpool with its colour, foreign locations and cosmopolitan casts.

Movie review - "It Isn't Done" (1937) ***1/2 (warning: spoilers)

 The film that marked a new dawn at Cinesound - the Frank Harvey era, when he started writing scripts. There were other elements too but basically the whole studio became much more professional.

It's a little creaky, the pacing is off sometimes, but it's a warm affectionate movie. Cecil Kellaway is a lovely star - affable family man, slyly comic, fond of a drink, a little ditzy but not dumb. I enjoyed his impression of a koala bear. The vehicle adjusts around his persona - a Bert Bailey or George Wallace version of this would be far broader.

The film pokes gentle fun at the culture clash - Kellaway struggling to deal with a butler (Harvey Adams), getting drunk in the manor. Nellie Ferguson doesn't have much to do as Kellaway's wife. Shirley Ann Richards is green but lovely as Kellaway's daughter - photogenic, looks pretty, has a lovely warm relationship with her dad.

John Longden is a little too old for the love interest but at least he can act. He's a writer hero (Frank Harvey's influence? Carl Dudley's?)

There's impressive spectacle with a fox hunt and a ball. The film is actually best in its dramatic moments - the snobbery encountered by the family, whether the meanness from Frank Harvey's lord (shoving them in a library during a dinner party when they realise who they've invited - this is well done), the casual snobbishness of Aussies abroad (Campbell Copelin and his mother are tremendous fun), Harvey and Kellaway realising their sons died in the same day (lovely moment with a little lonely lady also putting down a wreath - she's not attached to the story, it's just lovely flavour) and bonding. Harvey Adams is funny as the butler and its great he goes to Australia at the end.