Movie review - "The King's Thief" (1955) **

 The theft of the crown jewels by Thomas Blood has the material for a fun swashbuckler. This one shoehorns that episode at the end uneasily to a tale about a highwayman in Charles II era fighting to defend the Crown against villainous noble David Niven.

The movie is mostly notable for George Sanders playing Charles II - if he'd depicted the hero or villain the movie might've been fun. Niven is hilariously miscast as the baddy - I'm not sure he would've suited the hero part either but he would've been better than Edmund Purdom.

The movie has all the excitement and humour sucked out of it. Purdom is dull but he has no character to play other than "brave". His group of men lack any individuality or character - they include Roger Moore, but just try telling them apart. 

Dore Schary oversaw so many badly made  "commercial" films in the 1950s. This is so bland. Dull script, doesn't dramatise things like the death of Ann Blyth's dad. Blyth does little. Just rips off Robin Hood.

Nice production values - it's an "A" picture. That's about it. 

Book review - "Chasing the Panther: Adventures and Misadventures of a Cinematic Life" by Carolyn Pfeiffer

 I read this because I was keen to read about Pfeiffer's adventures as a producer in the 80s with Alan Rudolph, Chris Blackwell, Shep Gordon etc but there is very little of that. This memoir is mostly about her time in Europe in the 60s - as a student, then working in Italy as Claudie Cardinale's assistant, meeting people like Burt Lancaster, Visconti, Delon and Fellini, then working for Delon (being raped by one of Delon's dodgy bodyguards), then Omar Sharif as an assistant (shagging Robert Bolt), being friends with Nathalie Delon and Geraldine Chaplin, becoming a publicisit then eventually working for Shep Gordon, hanging with Robert Altman, dope with Blake Edwards. 

It's pretty interesting stuff - having Sean Connery put his hand on her leg while Diane Cilento was there, a fling with photographer Terence Donovan etc. There is heart break - a daughter (son of an affair with a married man) dies as a child, she finds true love with a journalist who dies of a heart attack. I wish there had been more on her work as producer. But I enjoyed the book.

 

Movie review - "Around the World in 80 Days" (1956) ***

 Do people still watch this movie any more? It's fun. I mean, it's long, but it gave people their money's worth in 1956. Length! Colour! Widescreen! Stars!

David Niven is a lot of fun as Fogg (the film put him back on top) and Cantiflas engaging as Passporteu. The cameos range from fun - Noel Coward, John Gielgud - to "whatever" - Fernandel, Charles Boyer.

Capucine Top Ten

 1) North to Alaska (1960) - genuinely funny

2) The Pink Panter (1963) - terrific, holds her own against Sellers and Niven

3) What's Up Pussycat? (1965) - a third great comedy performance

4) The Seventh Dawn (1964) - flawed movie but she's excellent

5) The Exquisite Cadaver (1969) - stylish thriller and she's very well used

6) The Trail of the Pink Panther (1982) - film is terrible but it's fun to see her and Niven married

7) Fellini Satyricon (1969) - again she's well used 

8)  Walk on the Wild Side (1962) - ah look she's not great nor is the film but she and it are interesting

9) Fraulein Dockter (1969) - seducing Suzy Kendall

10) Red Sun (1971) - I'm starting to struggle to find credits by now... but the top five are strong! 

Movie review - "Bluebeard's Eighth Wife" (1938) **

 Early credit for the writing team of Brackett and Wilder had Ernst Lubitsch to direct plus Gary Cooper and Claudette Colbert to star so got off to a strong start. I'm not a massive Cooper fan but he's not bad here, ideally-ish cast as a stiff American millionaire who falls for Colbert after they both try to buy pajamas (the most famous scene in the film). I know it's more a Rex Harrison part but I bought Cooper in the part - it helps that Cooper was still young and attractive here as opposed to the ageing near death figure he was in Love in the Afternoon. And there's plenty of awkward womanising American millionaires eg Howard Hughes.

I guess the plot does have Cooper harassing Colbert, though it plays a little better because she seems to be having fun. David Niven is terrific as a friend of Colbert's who is hired by Cooper to work as a secretary. Also good is Edward Everett Horton and Francis Pangborn.  Coopre sings a song.

In fact it's done with such high spirits that it takes a while to sink in that the film doesn't have any story but once that happens the film becomes annoying and when Cooper goes all Petruchio on Colbert it's more than that because slapping and hitting is just not that funny. And then it becomes less funny and fun as it goes on with Cooper in the mental hospital and jokes about violence at the end. I'm sounding like a cranky old man aren't I? I just didn't find it funny. It got worse as it went on. The actors are fine. I mean, even Cooper commits. I just think there was no story.

Movie review - Pink Panther#8 - "Curse of the Pink Panther" (1983) *

Ted Wass had his moment in the sun, with this and Sheena. It was a rough ask for him to step into Sellers' shoes - Dudley Moore, who was offered it, would've been more ideal. Ditto Rowan Atkinson.

Wass tries. I think Blake Edwards was trying to turn him into Harold Lloyd. That's not a bad idea in theory.

But it's not a very good movie. You're always conscious of Sellers. It's hard for Wass. He doesn't get that much screen time.

Joanna Lumley plays a different role. I'm glad Herbert Lom got a paycheck as well as David Niven and Capucine. And Robert Wagner. Hilarious for Roger Moore at the end. It's all very retro - a throwback to the 60s with Lom and Burt Kwouk. Wass didn't really have a chance.

Movie review - Pink Panther#7 - "Trail of the Pink Panther" (1983) *1/2

 Jeez, Blake, did you need the money that badly?

It is nice to see outtakes from other Panther movies that we hadn't seen before - even if that would've been better suited for a doco. But when they start showing old clips the film got annoying.

Random plot lines like Joanna Lumley becoming important half way through, Robert Loggia as a mafia boss. I liked that David Niven and Capucine got married. Sad that Niven had to be dubbed.

I didn't mind this for the first bit but it was increasingly annoying as it went on. It's just so greedy.

Movie review - Pink Panther#1 - "The Pink Panther" (1963) ***1/2 (re-watching)

 Bright. Fun. Peter Sellers' part is a lot smaller than you think. Capucine is fabulous. David Niven fun. Claudia Cardinale gorgeous. Robert Wagner is fun too even if he's required to play a sex pest. There's breezy European locations - ski fields, small towns, etc.

It's a film of set pieces: shenanigans in a bedroom with Capucine trying to hide Niven and Wagner from Sellers, a long flirtation between Niven and Cadinale (he is too old for her but kind of gets away with it because it's Niven), the finale chase scene with men in gorilla outfits.

Credits and theme tune are deserved classics. Cardinale should've given her jewel back to the people.

Movie review - "Casino Royale" (1967) **

 It's not fun but it's like a colourful museum and every Bond fan should see it. And because there is so much happening with so many actors I like I got something out of it.

Where to start:

- Woody Allen has genuinely funny gags with the firing squad

- I liked Peter Sellars as a Bond type

- Orson Welles is a terrific Bond villain

- quite a few women have agency: Ursula Andress as Vesper, Barbara Bouchet as Miss Moneypenny, Joanna Pettet is the hero of her own segment

- Terence Cooper gets a big intro then disappears

- Deborah Kerr really really overacts

- I don't think David Niven was anything like Bond, in the books or movies

- Bouchet and Jackie Bisset should have been real Bond girls they are gorgeous

- there is a lot of genuine cleverness

- there is a lot more laziness

- it piles it on but then many 60s comedies did (The Great Race, It's a Mad Mad Mad Mad World)

- the music score is great - the theme and "The Look of Love"

- there's genuine emotional moments which could have (don't laugh) been more mined: Andress falling for Sellers, Pettet and dad Niven

Movie review - "Before Winter Comes" (1968) **

 Little remembered post war drama - set in the refugee camps of 1945 Austria, full of tension between Britain and Russia, with David Niven in charge of a camp, and Topol as a refugee who goes to work as an interpreter.

The main problem for me was that the piece never seemed to get its fix right. There's a new officer, played by John Hurt. There's a local innkeeper, Anna Karina. Karina sleeps with Topol and Niven and Hurt.

Is the film meant to be about Niven and Hurt? Niven and Topol? Karina and the men? I was never sure. At times I got the impression the film was distorted to give more time to Niven when it really should have been about Topol and Hurt. I could be wrong.

Everyone can act, the Austrian locations are spectacular, but the drama feels undercooked, the dialogue is on the nose. Why was this made?

Movie review - "Escape to Athena" (1978) **

Like other ITC action films such as The Eagle Has Landed and Green Ice this is frustrating because it could easily have been so much better if just tighter and more focused. There is a strong action movie inside here waiting to get out. But it's flabby.

Lew Grade pointed out the first eighty minutes were a mixture of genres and the last forty minutes were solid action and he was dead right. I wonder if that first half is that way in order to give actors bits to do.

The filmmakers aren't skilled enough to juggle all the protagonists - Roger Moore's good German, Telly Savalas' resistance leader, Elliot Gould's USO guy.

It lacks a clear goal. At least Eagle it was easy - trying to kidnap Hitler. Here all the goals collide - making money, POWS escaping, helping knock out a V2 rocket. It needed to be simple - just stealing the treasure.They could have had different motives but keep it focused on the one macguffin.

The action stuff is good - there's a superb motorbike chase through the back alleys - the scenery is gorgeous. The cast is full of actors I like and they felt well-ish cast - Gould is perhaps allowed to mug a bit too much as a USO performer, I went with Moore as a German and Savalas and Niven were definitely ideal. Claudia Cardinale is wasted. Stefanie Powers is a lot of fun as a flirt. The William Holden Stalag 17 cameo is funny. Sonny Bono and particularly Richard Roundtree felt wasted.

The movie lacks a strong villain when it needed one. It also doesn't have a strong sense of place - I mean the resistance seems to have it over the Germans far too easily. Too many characters with too many agendas.

Dammit, it's frustrating. Just keep it simple, guys.

Movie review - "Bachelor Mother" (1939) ****1/2

Enchanting romantic comedy, perhaps the best script Norman Krasna did, a true marvel of structure and affection for his characters. Garson Kanin directed it very well on the whole - the pacing of the early scenes is a little off.

It's the perfect Ginger Rogers movie and while David Niven isn't terribly convincing as an American or the son of Charles Coburn, and they probably would've been better off using Robert Cummings, he's most engaging - he and Rogers seem like nice people. Charles Coburn steals the show though as the tycoon desperate for a grandson.

I love this script. Every scene progresses the action - within five minutes Rogers has been fired, discovered the baby, tried to get rid of the baby, been assumed to be the mother. The complications mount - the adoption people go to Niven, who gives Rogers her job back, who realises she needs to keep up the pretense to keep her job. There's a guy keen on Rogers who wants to parlay his knowledge into a promotion, a girl keen on Niven. There are key sequences - an extended one where Niven tries to return a little duck which displays his lack of understanding of what goes on at the workplace and how Rogers can help, and one at New Years Eve where Rogers pretends to be from Hungary so Niven doesn't turn up dateless.

You get the sense Rogers and Niven like each other and feel their marriage might even work. And Coburn is lovely. It's a very good film.

Book review - "John Frankenheimer: A Conversation with Charles Champlin"

Frankenheimer had one of the all time hot streaks - both during the Golden Years of television where he was one of the stars, but also his early films. Young Savages, All Fall Down, The Manchurian Candidate, The Train, Seven Days in May, Seconds... Critics cooled on him from Grand Prix onwards after which his career seemed to wobble: The Extraordinary Seaman, The Fixer, The Gypsy Moths, I Walk the Line, The Horseman, Impossible Object, The Iceman Cometh, 99 and 44/100% Dead,. There were some "commercial" films - French Connection II, Black Sunday, The Prophecy - and a drinking problem. His career dipped in the 80s but he came back in the 90s with TV work. This book is before Ronin.

Obviously a smart guy - lucky in how he got into tv, but you make your own luck, developing material, taking chances, taking risks. Strong work ethic - he managed to kick the booze. He whinges a bit about studios and like all people in their memoirs blames other people for his films that flopped but in fairness takes some brickbats too.

The film is full of interesting bits like his sometimes prickly relationship with Burt Lancaster, saying James Garner was only effective when playing "a shit", his hopes for The Horseman (the Afghan government offered him free land), Gordon Stulberg of Fox agreed to finance 99 and 44/100% Dead if Richard Harris was cast, Don Johnson was a pain on Dead Bang.

An entertaining book, I just wish it included some of his later career.

Movie review - "Force 10 from Navarone" (1978) ** (warning: spoilers)

A real mess of a film - you can feel all the different hands in it. It sort of starts off paying homage to the original, showing clips from it, and the early scenes have banter between Robert Shaw, playing Gregory Peck, and Edward Fox, playing David Niven. It's really awful banter though both being stiff upper lip jolly good types, which is inconsistent with the original.

Then the film kind of forgets Fox and becomes about Shaw and Harrison Ford. Shaw and Fox are sent on a mission to kill a traitor in Yugoslavia, Ford is on a mission to blow up a bridge. There's some double cross and twists but none of it that interesting.

Carl Weathers comes along and characters comment on him being black, and he has an awful scene where he sooks because he's left out of the loop. You could cut his character. You could cut Fox's character too. Ford has the odd good moment but wasn't comfortable enough as a star to play himself. Shaw is okay - but character work is weak.

We know Franco Nero is bad so his betrayal is not a surprise. Barbara Bach livens things up with a bit of nudity - the film could have done with more of it. And more females. Guns had two - two romances. We don't even get one romance. It's very boys own. They should have made Carl Weathers a girl, maybe.

There's the occasional good bit - shooting Nero in a van, the final raid on the dam. But it's an underwhelming mess. George MacDonald Fraser did uncredited work on the script. I'm sure it was a hard gig, but he didn't save the day.

Movie review - "The Guns of Navarone" (1961) ***

I love guys on a mission film but this one is not among my  favourites. It's too long and too flabby lacks a twist or two.

The things I liked:
* the fact it features three genuine stars, Peck, Niven and Quinn, and the support cast is super strong Irene Pappas, Stanley Baker, James Darren, Gia Scala)
* the location filming in Greece
*the photography
* the storm scenes
* the bits with the team climbing up the cliff
* the basic set up
*Papas killing Gia Scala
*the relationship between Peck and Quinn
*the music.

The things I remembered that jarred:
* Niven's miscasting as someone who refuses to be an officer
*Niven's weird attachment to Anthony Quayle
* the editing of the ending - what should be exciting was dragged out.

The things I forgot which jarred:
* James Darren singing a song in Greek
* the nobility of German Walter Gotel

Needed a lot of fat stripped off. Still fun though.

David Niven Top Ten

1) The Dawn Patrol (1938) - Errol Flynn is top billed but really its Niven's film
2) The Way Ahead (1944) - Niven typifies British officers of the war - well meaning, enthusiastic, slightly insecure
3) Bachelor Mother (1939) - maybe Niven is miscast but it's a great comedy
4) Appointment with Venus (1950) - there's something about his performance in this movie which really nails that British officer type, once more
5) Separate Tables (1958) - Niven is a bit actor-y but it is a good performance
6) The Pink Panther (1964) - its often forgotten Niven played the title role - it's great fun, with ski fields, Peter Sellers and European beauties
7) The Elusive Pimpernel (1950) - regarded as a flop but I really like it
8) Death on the Nile (1978) - Niven is a sidekick but its great fun
9) A Matter of Life and Death (1946) - probably his best work
10) Around the World in 80 Days (1956) -I guess so!

Oh I love Guns of Navarone but Niven is really miscast.

TV review - "Four Star Playhouse: The Witness" - Season 2 Ep 5 (1953) **

Four Star Playhouse was an anthology run by Dick Powell, David Niven, Frank Lovejoy and Charles Boyer. Apparently Powell did the bulk of the work behind the scenes! He's in this one, and produced it. He plays a lawyer defending a young Charles Bronson, when he was called Buchwinki. Strother Martin is in it as well.

The most interesting thing about it is that it was directed by Robert Aldrich - it's hard to discern his personal touch, though it's a workmanlike job - and that Powell's lawyer character uses delaying tactics to get his way. The ending where the guy confesses is far too abrupt. This felt like it was better suited to one hour instead of half.

Movie review - "Rough Cut" (1980) **

Burt Reynolds channelled Cary Grant a few times in his career - in this one he even imitates him at the beginning, and Lesley Anne Downe is given the funny rejoinder that he sounds like Tony Curtis imitating Cary Grant. More of this sort of jokiness would have made this a better movie.

Mind you for the first hour this was a lot of fun - Reynolds and Downe being attractive and flirting with each other as they plan a heist, and crossing back to David Niven. Downe may be the poor man's Jacqueline Bisset/Audrey Hepburn but she's attractive and she and Reynolds seem to like each other.

But in the second half the plot kicks in and things get confusing and murky - the film's troubled production history becomes apparent. They introduce Reynolds' heist crew far too late in the day and you don't really care about them. I wish David Niven and Reynolds had more scenes together.

Book review - "Last Man Standing" by Roger Moore

Moore tries to ape his pal David Niven with a second book of memoirs, a collection of stories about famous people he has known. But its a disappointing read - he doesn't have Niven's eye or knack for a good story. You'd think he would but he doesn't.

There are some funny stories, mostly about drunken British stage actors (I love how all Brit actors seemed to know each other and they all seemed to guest star on The Saint) - Robert Newton etc. There's some tales from Rape of the Sabine Women and Lana Turner teaching him how to kiss.  Tony Curtis livens up things.

But surely Moore had more stories in his arsenal. Far too many stories pop up in other people's memoirs, such as Tom Mankiewicz on the set of The Comancheroes. And I didn't like how he didn't mention his second wife by name at all.

Book review - "The World and Its Double: The Life and Work of Otto Preminger" by Chris Fujiawara

To say Preminger has a variable reputation is putting it mildly - before I'd seen any of his movies I was familiar with several stories: a harsh bully on set, a brave fighter of censorship, capable of making classics and an inability to direct comedy.

All the stories turned out to be true. There were many fine things about Preminger: the man had guts; he was a fighter; he had some admirable progressive politics (I stress the word "some" - Robert Mitchum called him a "Jewish Nazi"); he took on the censor board; he made some great movies; he had a surprisingly large amount of success on Broadway; he was a decent actor.

Other things were less admirable - he was a horrid bully - not for the benefit of the work, he clearly did it for his own sadistic enjoyment, especially to tyro actors (Jean Seberg, Tom Tyron, John Philip Law); he couldn't direct comedy; his last batch of movies were stinkers; he was possibly a better producer than director.

He's a flawed, fascinating figure and he gets a very good book from Chris Fujiwara. It focuses on Preminger's art as director - there's lots of discussion how scenes are framed and camera movement and so on which to be honest I wasn't that interested in; I was more into the biographical stuff.

I didn't realise how many financially unsuccessful films Preminger made at Fox - Zanuck seemed to like him though (he'd fired him earlier but rehired him and enjoyed success with Laura); he was the ing of the noirs for a while but his great days were from the early 50s to early 60s where he seemed to hit the zeitgeist: The Moon is Blue was just sexy enough, The Man with the Golden Arm was just gritty enough, Advise and Consent just political enough, Anatomy of a Murder was just legal enough etc etc. He tried to keep up with changing times but ultimately didn't get the new liberation - also he was old.

Interesting bloke, interesting book.