Movie review - "Tombstone" (1993) ***

 Lots of people love this movie. Respect that. Feels cut down from a longer work, as indeed was the case - full of interesting people who don't get enough screen time. Looks fabulous. Some excellent performances. A solid movie.

Janet Leigh Top Ten

 1) Psycho (1960) - famous scene but also a genuinely nuanced performance as a frustrated woman who makes a bad decision - Vera Miles doesn't have what Leigh had

2) Touch of Evil (1958) - passive (kidnapped) but she has an inner steel

3) Living It Up (1954) - really fun Martin and Lewis movie and Leigh matches well with Dean 

4) Scaramouche (1952) - honestly her character is a ninny and not in Eleanor Parker's league I just love this flm 

5) Little Women (1949) - the most nothing role in the story but she's ideal - she fitted in well at MGM

6) The Manchurian Candidate (1962) a sex positive woman chasing after Frank, from Leigh's hot streak of classic movies

7) The Fog (1980) - she's fine rather than great I just love the movie

8) The Vikings (1958) - lovely and warm in a movie that needs it

9) Houdini (1953) - perhaps the best film she made with Tony Curtis, very winning

10) Harper (1966) - one of many stars.

Movie review - "The President's Lady" (1953) **

 The story of Andrew Jackson and his wife, best remembered for being bigamous.  Charlon Heston plays Jackson in his typical dogged, conscientous way. Ditto Susan Hayward as is lady love. Slavery and Indians are dealt with as you'd expect, i.e. mostly ignored - Hayward has a black maid.

The story constantly has Jackson going away, which isn't that interesting. Look, this is fine. Acting fine, treatment fine. Lacks fire.  I didn't care for the characters. Might be different for Americans with more of a connection to Jackson.

Movie review - "The Agony and the Ecstasy" (1965) **

 An attempt at making a literate blockbuster - the story of Michelangelo painting the Sinse Chapel focusing on his clashes with the Pope. Thing is it's not that interesting. He paints. They squabble. It feels better suited to a TV play or stage play.

It needed another subplot of more emotion. Someone in love with the Pope. Or a more compelling person into Michelangelo than Diane Cilento's noblewoman - nothing wrong with her performance, but there's no heart.

I liked the scene where Michelangelo wants to discuss the painting before the Pope goes into battle - that's fun. It comes alive. The movie doesn't have enough life.

Gorgeously shot, smart, literate, attempts to raise the bar... But dull. Didn't need to be an epic/road show.

Fine performances from all - Charlton Heston, Rex Harrison. Harrison slightly miscast in a role that needed someone macho, but he teams well with the more stoic Heston. 

Movie review - "The Awakening" (1980) **

 Nothing wrong with elevated horror but sometimes it's so elevated you don't have the required sex, suspense, violence. This is a version of Bram Stoker's Jewel of the Seven Stars. It takes too long to get going - should have started with the birth, Stephanie Zimablist is too nice and polite in a role that needs someone exotic and strange (and her character is introduced far too late - the story should be about her being possessed). Charlton Heston is fine. Susannah York isn't bad just feels under-utilised.

The story hints at themes not developed - incest, death, so on. I can see why Orion asked for it to be recut. The writers Chris Bryant and Allan Scott adapted Don't Look Now and what this needed was Nic Roeg not Mike Newell at the start of his career. 

Oh and you can tell moments where they've gone "make it more like The Omen." 

Movie review - "Major Dundee" (1965) ***

 A famous they-took-my-film-away-and-butchered-it movie, with Sam Peckinpah bleating loudly about the suits and critics dutifully taking his side. I think there's a lot of great things about this movie but it has an essential flaw. Oddly, fixing that flaw I think would've been easy and saved money but the studio wanted a Roadshow, and Peckinpah prepped for one, then the studio cut budget, and filming went haywire. I get why the studio wanted to cut the budget but if they did they should have junked the Roadshow idea and gotten Peckinpah to properly refigure it. It would've saved money.

The basic idea is very strong - North and South troops team up to chase Apaches into Mexico and clash with the French. There's a knock out cast. You could tell that story with ten people. It's a prison. There only needs to be a few guards.

But there's too many characters. Charlton Heston (very good) leads a a big band and there's all these people whose stories need to be serviced. Richard Harris is the Southern officer, an Irishman (which makes historical sense), James Coburn is a scout, Warren Oates is a Confederate, Brock Peters is a black soldier, Michael Anderson is a bugler seeking revenge against the Apache, Santa Berger is an Austrian doctor's widow, Ben Johnson is a sergeant, there's a sort of peaceful reverend guy RG Armstrong, and there's a Mexican Mario Adorf, Jim Hutton is an officer (I think he's meant to be a scrounger character), there's also some other women, oh and there's Slim Pickens too. And LQ Jones as some Southern soldier who gets these close ups. Like Heston hooks up with Berger, and then has a relationship with another woman. Who cares?

It's impossible to serve all these characters especially when time is devoted to Heston's character having a mid life crsis - which is fine actually. He should be the focal point. And you need Harris' character. Peters' character had great potential and is junked. Oates has a terrific subplot being killed. They should've cut Anderson and Hutton entirely, merged Coburn's characer with Johnson and Adrof... made it  about a small bunch. Trim it right down to, let's say, Heston, Harris, Peters, that merged Coburn character and a few others. 

There's so much terrific stuff. I loved the novelty of them fighting the French at the end. Harris and Heston duking it out is fun. Heston gives one of his best performances and Harris has flair. The Peckinpah regulars are spot on. Actually all the acting is good and the Mexican locations are splendid as is the photography.

What a missed opportunity.

Charlton Heston Top Ten

 1. Ben Hur (1959)

2. Greatest Show on Earth (1952)

3. Ten Commandments (1956)

4. El Cid (1961)

5. Omega Man (1971)

6. Soylent Green (1972)

7. Naked Jungle (1954)

8. Three Musketeers (1973)

9. Planet of the Apes (1968)

10, Major Dundee (1965) - excellent performance

This was a really easy list to compile. Unlike many stars of his generation, Heston had a strong 70s.

Movie review - "Diamond Head" (1962) **1/2

 Entertaining early 60s melodrama which if made by Warner Bros would presumably have featured Troy Donahue and be directed by Delmer Daves. It has old school storytelling spiced up with location work in Hawaii, colour photography and miscegenation plus some stars, including Charlton Heston in a part meant for Clark Gable.

The work feels flawed - Heston should play Yvette Mimieux's father not brother, Elizabeth Allen should be his wife not sister in law (she has no stakes in the story and just appears to say racist things), Heston should be more villainous - he really should have killed James Darren in anger as opposed to it being an accident.

Frances Nyen does as well as she can in a hopeless role as Heston's ever loving, faithful, dutiful native mistress. George Chakiris ditto as the decent half-white (so it's okay) doctor who is there in reserve for Yvette Mimieux once she gets over the death of Darren.

For a while I enjoyed this - the colour, old time fun of it - but the last third runs out of puff, it throws away plots (Heston running for the senate, Heston having accidentally killed Darren) and just becomes about Heston learning not to be racist. Really he should've died at the end, killed by someone avenging Darren, but after some act of heroism during a storm. Or something. Mimieux is very good - it's one of her best performances.

Movie review - "Town & Country" (2001) *

It's a tribute to Warren Beatty's appeal to studio execs that he got this green lit at $50 million and to his ability as a procrastinator to get the cost up to $100 million. No stunts, present day setting, no action, a trifle about adulterous middle aged people. It's a French style comedy that amazingly cost so, so much money.

Beatty, to be fair, is quite animated, doing double takes and running around and dressing in a polar bear outfit. He seems to be more comfortable here than in Love Affair because the script has made more allowance for his age - he ha grown children (one of them Josh Hartnett) and he's married (Diane Keaton).

He's irresistible to the ladies still - Natassa Kinski is a cellist who plays nude for him, Goldie Hawn is the cuckolded wife of his best friend (Gary Shandling), Andie McDowell is an eccentric belle, Jenna Elfman is into him.

Maybe one star is too harsh - it's not awful. At least not the first half. It's pleasantly shot. There's good actors. I smiled once or twice. Charlton Heston has fun as McDowell's nutty dad.

I think I was just offended so much money was spent on it. Maybe that's unfair, to review the budget rather than the film, but it's how I feel.

Also a lot of it is lame. The action takes place over months. It's not a nice, tight farce. The second half gets wonkier and wonkier and it finally ends.

Movie review - "The Four Musketeers" (1974) ***1/2 (warning: spoilers)

Part two has a sort of casual slapdash feel - one assumes due to it being turned into a stand alone movie- but it doesn't really matter since we know the story and it's full of stars.

D'Artagnan is a stud muffin in this one - he beds Faye Dunaway, and her maid, played by Nicole Calfan. This leads to revenge.

There's plenty of silliness - a submarine, more slapstick - but is has a darker spirit because Raquel Welch dies. The deaths of Welch, Dunaway and Simon Ward are handled very well, as is Dunaway converting her jailer into an assassin.

It felt a little ramshackle. I don't think  slicing the films into two entirely worked. This one doesn't have much camaraderie - the other musketeers disappear for too long. I was constantly having to jog my memory. The use of stars helped.

Oliver Reed is superb as the boozy, tormented Athos. Faye Dunaway and Charlton Heston are excellent, Michael York very good.

Movie review - "The Naked Jungle" (1954) ***1/2

 Fun film based on the classic short story about killer ants. Instead of padding that out, it provides around 30 minutes of story. The other hour - at the front - is sweaty melodrama with Eleanor Parker as a purchased bride for plantation owner Charlon Heston who gets his virginal knickers in a twist when he discovers she's been married before. He acts abusive and cruel without any of the softness that say Rock Hudson or Tyrone Power might have brought to it - I know this trope was considered Romantic at the time but now it's just watching an abuser.

Still the acting is strong and it gives Eleanor Parker something to play. She's a red head and thus is super beautiful - she always took on an extra dimension in red. Heston has swagger - this is one of his "macho American in a backlot third world" performances like Secret of the Incas.

William Conrad is a local. It could have done with more ants but that last third is exciting and the first two thirds quite entertaining and Parker is gorgeous.

Book review - "The Garner Files" by James Garner

I'm still not sure how I feel about James Garner. A TV giant absolutely - I was never a fan of Maverick or The Rockford Files but I recognise his skill in them and his status as a TV star... also in a series of high quality TV movies in the late 80s. His track record is a movie star is patchier - I agree with the critic who once said he seemed to make movies he was in seem like TV shows, but he appeared in a decent number of classics: The Great Escape, The Americanisation of Emily, Support Your Local Sherriff.

There's lots about him to admire - a marriage of over forty years (albeit with some separations - I did hear he had a fling with Lauren Bacall hence his appearance in The Fan) to a woman who had a daughter with polio to another man when they met, a strong work ethic, a respect for the script (he doesn't like going off book), a willingness to sue Warners over their harsh contracts and also Universal after ripping him off, a strong civil rights record (including taking part in the March on Washington).

He has a prickly side, a temper - he admits to punching out Tony Franciosca (on the set of A Man Could Get Killed), Glenn A Larson and someone who heckled him at golf. He can be pompous and up his own arse, and takes these swipes at Rog Huggins (was it Garner and not Huggins who added the humour in Maverick - really?)

In this books he also skims over stuff which would have been worth talking about in greater detail (or at least I would've liked to hear about it more) - doing cocaine with John Belushi, a fifty year marijuana habit (his life long smoking led to heart surgery). Instead we get long-winded chapters on his interest in golf, football and racing cars. I did like his chapter on how he approached acting. I would've liked to have heard more about his films and TV shows but appreciate the chapter at the back of the book where he goes through all of them.

Garner had a rough upbringing - his mother died when he was young (a botched abortion), he was passed around to various relatives, dad drank and one of his new wives was physically abusive, it was the depression. After school he bummed around from job to job and saw active service in Korea (proper service to - he took part in battles, shot at people, was injured - this is a good section of the book).

He was lucky, too - blessed with beauty (he earned some money modelling), and a childhood friend was Paul Gregory who he bumped in to and suggested Garner try acting. Gregory promptly put him in a stage production of The Caine Mutiny Court Martial which went to Broadway - Garner's role was only small but he was in a hit and got to watch Hank Fonda and Lloyd Nolan act. He learned lessons well and was signed to Warner Bros who eventually put him in Maverick.

The book has a few digs and claps for Steve McQueen (a neighbour in the Hollywood Hills for a time), a strong dislike of Charles Bronson and Charlton Heston. There's a dull chapter where Garner's family and friends talk about how great he is. I have a lot of respect for Garner but after this, I get the feeling that I don't like him. I'm sure he wouldn't care a toss!

Movie review - "The Three Musketeers" (1973) ***1/2

Entertaining reboot of the famous tale which does feel a little thin focusing on the affair of the Queen's Diamond necklace. For me it lacked the sense of camaraderie you get in longer versions of this tale - the one involving Milady and Porthos.

But there's lots to admire. The cast is top notch. I'm not a massive Michael York fan but he's a perfect d'Artagnan, young, keen and a believable country boy - most versions of the story don't emphasise this but York really seems like a rube out of place. Joss Ackland pops up as his dad - I wish we'd seen him again.

Oliver Reed is superb as Porthos, ditto Richard Chamberlain as Aramis, Faye Dunaway as Milady, Charlton Heston as Richelieu. Spike Milligan and Roy Kinnear are fun though perhaps too broad - they pull the movie in a different direction. Raquel Welch is fun as Constance - to be honest, she's trying too hard, like the hot girl at a drama school determined to play comedy, but she's endearing in that way. And it's great Constance has a bit more dimension, being a clutz and married to Milligan.

It feels very authentic - the George MacDonald Fraser touch, no doubt - without losing the sense of adventure of fun. But it is 1973 - royalty are dumb, D'Artagnan has sex with Constance. Sword fights are done well - decent strokeplay but also rough house antics.

Book review - "Empire of Dreams: The Epic Life of Cecil B De Mille" (2010) by Scott Eyman

Scott Eyman's written a bunch of fantastic books but it's hard to see how he can top this one, an exhaustive and brilliant account of the life of one of the most famous directors of all time.

De Mille wasn't just a director, he was a celebrity (hosting his own radio show), and he was a genre. He was also hated by baby boomer film critics who dominated film criticism from the late 60s onwards and ensured his reputation went into eclipse while those of Hawks, Hitchcock, Nicholas Ray, etc shot up. This was in part because De Mille died in 1959 so wasn't around to do self promoting interviews to the boomers in the 60s like the others. But also because he was a right winger.

I started to re-appreciate the director after reading George MacDonald Fraser write about him so well in Hollywood History of the World. (Eyman quotes Fraser here). And rewatching his films you see there's lots more to De Mille than was commonly accepted in film buff circles.

His shoddy treatment by cineastes made me angry because reading this De Mille was such an influential figure in Hollywood - he helped create the place, shooting The Squaw Man, was clearly a gun director in his prime and artistically bold, especially in the 1920s (I've never seen these films but have read this from numerous sources). He enjoyed great success but had a dip in the late 20s and early 30s, before backing himself and recovering with The Sign of the Cross. Thereafter he became more a brand name and producer than top flight director, but the films are consistently strong. He was famous for spectacle but always understood the human story needed to be paramount.

Eyman points out that the main reason his reputation suffered was his anti-communism, particularly the famous DGA fight where he tried to kick out Joseph Mankiewicz. This story has been inflated - Eyman pulls it back into focus.

De Mille was a flawed man certainly - bit of a hypocrite, a bit rabid during the Cold War, while personally generous he loved to keep his income tax rates down. He was very nineteenth century - he had several long running mistresses but never left his wife, he was influenced by the theatre of David Belasco. He was skilled with publicity, story, acting and producing - he learnt his trade on the theatre circuit. He was a paterfamilias - running his movie company like an actor manager.

Eyman had access to De Mille's papers and there is superb insight into the man - notably his relationships with his brother William (smarter but less skilled) and mother (pushy and a spendthrift), his mistresses, his wife (Eyman's account of De Mille's final moments, holding his wife's hand - she had Alzheimer's and couldn't remember him - is very moving), his son in law Tony Quinn, his niece Agnes, his staff.

The book is excellent. It's thorough, well written, has true epic sweep but doesn't get lost. It's funny too - especially with De Mille's exasperation with Victor Mature on Samson and Delilah. It's surprising - Paulette Goddard kept trying to be cast in his films.

A fantastic book.

Book review - "The Studio" by John Gregory Dunne

Re-reading this observational classic which holds up very well. I read a whiny snobby New York Times review which found the whole thing shocking and alarming but having worked in the industry it seems to be just a bunch of smart people trying to do their job well.

Arthur Jacobs has had a nightmare making Dr Doolittle and is desperately trying to hype the film into being a success by any means necessary - and he's also trying to make Planet of the Apes which was a risk, non-sexy proposition. Richard Zanuck is trying to come up with successful films - he turns down Joe Pasternak's pitch of a film with Bob Buckner which doesn't sound that great. Some execs talk tough with the agent of Wayne Maunder, star of Custer.  Darryl Zanuck points out his son was given the job in part to stop him being knifed in the back. Ed Anhalt talks budgeted with Richard Fleischer for The Boston Strangler. Pasternak is impatient with the not very good director of The Sweet Ride. Actors are annoying (Heston is keen on Apes because he wants to say something meaningful, Bob Denver pitches music for Sweet Ride). Irwin Allen tries to make shows on budget.

Sure sometimes people come across as dicks - Darryl Zanuck goes out drinking with his son and their girlfriends and reminisces about the old days including Dick Zanuck's football career; Paul Monash talks about helping black people at Watts and all his therapy. But they're not evil, just human beings.

It's a great book.

Movie review - "Lucy Gallant" (1955) **1/2

Jane Wyman was a sensible no-nonsense actress who had a long career, and a decent run as a genuine box office star whose appeal was playing sensible types who have adventures.

This is one such movie, and as such it's kind of weird it was the last one Pine-Thomas made for paramount - it's got a decent budget, stars, is in VistaVision and colour, and is a woman's picture.

To be fair there is some two fisted stuff with Charlton Heston being an oil man who loves Wyman, who rocks up in her town to set up a department store. That's actually a pretty good idea for a film - the adventures of a fashion magnate in rough-tough Texas - and you wish they'd done more with it.

There's some stock adventures - World War Two spirits Heston away, Wyman becomes partners with a brothel madam (Claire Trevor, whose role is disappointingly small).

Heston and Wyman make a good team - two solid pros. Heston suits playing the male lead in women's pictures, with his swagger, height and virility. I'm not a massive Wyman fan. I really enjoyed how these two admired each other's drive and spunk - though to be honest he seems more into her and she's into him. I wasn't that wild about him insisting she give up her career; I know they needed a third act, and this is me looking at it through a modern prism, but I wish they'd found something else. He bails her out, she needs help, then seems to throw business away... is that it?

Dramatically the film operates at half throttle. There's a bit of war and Heston flirts with a French girl and there's a brothel and Wyman's father kills himself in the backstory but it's all low key. No bankruptcies, no pregnancies/miscarriages/dead partners, no on screen suicide, no deaths even (despite old Thelma Ritter and William Demarest hanging around). It's all very polite.

TV review - "Playhouse 90 - Forbidden Area" (1956) **1/2

The first episode of the legendary Playhouse 90 has some heavyweight talent - adapted by Rod Serling (pre Twilight Zone but still famous for Patterns), directed by John Frankenheimer, starring Charlton Heston, Diana Lynn, Vincent Price, Charles Bickford, Victor Jory, and Tab Hunter.

Hunter was known as a pretty boy star at the time but is very effective as a Russian sleeper agent. It's about a Russian invasion of the US.

There's probably a bit too much going on here... it's a whole invasion of the US, with Hunter just a part of it. It would've been better off just focusing on Hunter trying to fit in. He provides the best moments, killing a fellow soldier, and also the final confrontation with Heston.

The romance between Heston and Lynn isn't very good - he molests her, she falls in love. He looks impressively bad ass though with that eye patch (it's tied in with the story - means he can't fly). Vincent Price is a little oddly cast as a Pentagon boffin but Charles Bickford perfect as a tough type.

It's overly ambitious - and not quite believable this is how Russia would attack the US. Smaller and more focused on Hunter and Heston would've worked better. John Frankenheimer directed.

Book review - "Charlton Heston: Hollywood's Last Icon" by Matc Eliot (2017)

A disappointing book. Heston is a fascinating star - big, tall, stiff, capable of good work, a really wide variety of movies. He had a genuine sense of duty which prompted him to do sterling work for the AFI, SAG, the government (visiting troops in Vietnam), the Civil Rights movement, and, unfortunately (to me at any rate), the NRA.

Eliot's book is very strong on the later phase of Heston's life - his family life, the difficulties in his marriage (with a firey woman who at times resented him and suffered migranes... it's clear ole Chuck was whipped), his battles with Alzheimers (very moving), his dealings with the NRA (which seem to have been prompted by a desire for attention and something to do as much as anything). He's helped by talking to Heston's kids and NRA people - who credit Heston with helping make them more powerful, which is a horrible legacy.

It's also pretty good on Heston's upbringing - he was devastated by his parent's divorce, his mother didn't want him to see his father, his mother had an affair and married the bloke who tried to bond with Charlton. He was solitary and awkward, but was tall, commanding and good act.

The film is weak on Heston's career. It sort of rehashes what's in his diaries, skims his TV and theatre work, doesn't really analyse the acting. There are irritating factual errors and the writing is uninspired. Heston deserved a better book.

Movie review – “Secret of the Incas” (1954) **

 One of those films you want to be better than it is – and it was probably fondly remembered by Spielberg and Lucas, who used elements of it in Indiana Jones. You’ve got Charlton Heston as a swaggering fortune hunter, wearing a leather jacket and fedora, hanging around in South America, who goes off to find some ancient treasure.

All the elements of an exciting action film are here – a beautiful mysterious woman (Nicole Maurey),a villain (Thomas Mitchell), a rival (Robert Young), exotic locations and locals.

But its slow and talky. It takes 40 minutes – 40! – for the trip to start. There’s far too much chat and not enough intrigue. Robert Young’s character is completely wasted – is he good? Is he bad?

The drama is flat. Heston wants the treasure.Then realises stealing treasure is bad – and hands it back. Dud 50s liberalism. I don't mind 50s liberalism if it's dramatised correctly like in Broken Arrow - where James Stewart fell in love with an Indian, say. But that's not here. It's focused on the whites and the locals swoop in to tut-tut. There's so many singing numbers from this Peruvian artist.

A genuine disappointment.

James T Aubrey MGM Top Ten

James T Aubrey's regime at MGM is one of the most notorious of modern day Hollywood history - he cancelled a bunch of projects from major directors, sold off the backlot and props, cut up films, helped MGM leave distribution, and greenlit a lot of schlock.

So for sheer fun here's a list of the top ten films made at MGM under his time
1) Shaft (1971) - the film that saved the studio? It certainly kicked off the blaxploitation cycle. It's actually not a very good movie.
2) Skyjacked (1972) - genuinely good, understated thriller
3) Soylent Green (1973) - another solid MGM effort from Charlton Heston
4) Kansas City Bomber (1972) - flawed but easily one of Raquel Welch's best roles
5) Pretty Maids All in a Row (1971) - pervy insane movie from Roger Vadim
6) Hit Man (1972) black remake of Get Carter
7) The Man Who Loved Cat Dancing (1973) -never actually seen this but any movie where there was a murder investigation is automatically interesting
8) Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid (1973) - a divisive film, cut about by MGM but still worth watching
9) Westworld (1973) - made when Dan Melnick came in who almost turned the studio around
10) The Outfit (1973) - lesser known Westlake adaptation waiting for rediscovery
 
A special subsection - the top 5 made by MGM Britain
1) Villain (1971) - tough Brit violence
2) Get Carter (1971) - Michael Caine at his best
3) Sitting Target (1972) - Oliver Reed/Alex Jacobs toughness
4) The Go-Between (1972) - how did MGM get involved in this?
5) Percy (1971) - smutty British sex comedy at it's best

A lot of these movies have cults. I feel Aubrey would be remembered if he'd made/financed them through a brand new studio instead of MGM - like an MGM spin off.