Rex Harrison top ten

 1. My Fair Lady (1964)

2. Cleopatra (1963)

3. Anna and the King of Siam (1946)

4. The Ghost and Mrs Muir (1947)

5.  Blithe Spirit (1945)

6. Night Train to Munich (1940)

7. Dr Doolittle (1967)

8. Midnight Lace (1960)

9. Major Barbara (1941)

10. The Rake's Progress (1945) 

Movie review - "Pillow Talk" (1959) **** (rewatching)

 Really good script. Witty. Well structured. Maybe Thelma Ritter could've been used more (her suggestion to Rock is something Rock could've thought up). Risque - bathtub scene, jokes about Rock being gay and Rock having a baby. Rock is handsome and winnings. Doris terrific. But Tony Randall also superb. Everyone is terrific.

Saw this on the big screen. Stylish. Fun.

Movie review - "Lucky Me" (1954) **

 Bob Cummings appeared in a few musicals, usually playing light comedic leading man duties and not being involved in any singing or dancing. He plays a songwriter here so he has to warble a tune or two. -well, he's dubbed, not very well. Still he handles light comedy stuff as adept as always. Doris Day is the lead and she's very winning.

It's a dim story. It feels like one of those scripts that they kept putting writers on to work on it and never did much good since the central concept was weak. Doris and her mates (including Phil Silvers) are struggling performers, Cummings is a top composer. There's a scene where he pretends to be a mechanic to woo her - people were always faking their identity to romance Doris Day but it's not funny here.

Martha Hyer is the fake love interest.

Louis Jourdan Top Ten

 In honour of his birthday

1. Letter from an Unknown Woman (1948) - the perfect cad. I still think about this film.

2. Octopussy (1983) - never regarded as a top level Bond villain but I thought he was good.

3. Gigi (1958) - so dodgy. Yet a good performance.

4. The Paradine Case (1948) - Hitchcock wanted Robert Newton but I thought Jourdan was fine.

5. Dangerous Exile (1958) a very fanatical hero for a swashbuckler

6. Three Coins in the Fountain (1954) - The American public didn't like heroic Jourdan but liked him in roles like this.

7. The Best of Everything (1959) - career girl stuff, he works well as one of an ensemble.

8. Julie (1956) - a great abusive spouse

9. Fear No Evil (1969) - I've got a memory of this being good. Vague. But it's there.

10. Man in the Iron Mask (1977) - effective as D'artagnan.

Book review - "All That Heaven Allows: A Biography of Rock Hudson" by Mark Griffin

Hudson gets a decent biography with this well researched, even handed account. It tackles head on Hudson's sexuality - the thing that really distinguished him as a Hollywood star, especially the AIDS stuff - but does with compassion and footnotes, and also analyses his appeal and skill as an actor.

Hudson was one of the luckiest stars around - he was blessed with great looks, height and charm. With no training or even stage experience, after a few years of bit parts he was a leading man, and a few years after that he was one of the biggest stars in the world. He remained a star in TV until the early 80s and a leading man all his life.

His great gift was he could play a tough guy but be sensitive - he had a warmth lacking in, say, Jeff Chandler or Audie Murphy, other leading men at Universal. He was more accessible and had more charisma than say Dale Robertson or Rory Calhoun.

He was also lucky. Universal was a good studio to learn your trade at in the late 40s and early 50s - the standard of acting wasn't too high, they turned out a lot of potboilers. Ross Hunter came along at just the right time to put him in Magnificent Obsession then George Stevens put him in another league with Giant and Hunter and Day put him in Pillow Talk which led to half a decade of comedy hits. He was less popular in the late 60s - even sure fire stuff like teaming with John Wayne and doing an Alistair MacLean adaptation and Julie Andrews musical didn't work out - but he found new life doing McMillan and Wife. I was surprised how much theatre he did - including several musicals on the road.

It wasn't all luck. He worked very hard, was conscientious and a nice person. Everyone comments on how nice he was.

He had an exotic personal life. While good friends George Nader and Michael Miller were married to all intents and purposes for years, Hudson had a revolving door of boyfriends, some okay, others a bit less suitable. He drank and smoke very heavily - even if AIDS hadn't have come along this could have knocked him off early anyway.

There's plenty of juicy stuff - stories which you'd assume were urban legends, like Hudson fathering a child after the war, and servicing a college football team, actually could have been true. His father shot through when Hudson was little. When he found out he had AIDS he informed ex lovers anonymously. His last few days were this weird combination of genuine friends paying call, Pat Boone and his wife bringing around the bible, Elizabeth Taylor getting in bed with him for a cuddle, and his friends arguing over memorial services and the estate.

Very good book. Depressing at the end - but Hudson had a pretty good life, a lot of success, and a lot of sex and good friends. He never had a great One True Love but I'm not sure he really wanted one. Like many actors he was probably most comfortable playing other people.

Doris Day - Top Eleven Abusive Spouse Roles

In preparing my earlier Doris list I was struck by the number of films that showed her being in abusive relationships: (warning - some SPOILERS for old Doris Day films)
1) Young Man with a Horn (1950) - Doris plays a singer who falls for a self centered musician (Kirk Douglas) who leaves her for a lesbian who is experimenting with being straight (Lauren Bacall) then takes Day back when he's broke and drunk
2) Tea for Two (1950) - Doris plays a socialite whose freeloading producer boyfriend (Billy de Wolfe) is cheating on her while using her money to produce a show
3) Storm Warning (1951) - Doris is a pregnant newly wed whose husband is an alcoholic and member of the KKK who tries to rape Doris' sister, and winds up being responsible for her death
4) The Winning Team (1952) - Doris plays the wife of some famous baseball player (Ronald Reagan) who got PTSD and a drinking problem in WW1
5) Young at Heart (1954) - Doris elopes with a depressed man (Frank Sinatra) who tries to kill himself to "set her free"
6) Love Me or Leave Me (1955) - Doris plays a singer who marries and abusive, violent gangster (Jimmy Cagney) out of gratitude for what he did for her career
7) The Man Who Knew Too Much (1956) - Doris plays a woman who had to give up a successful singing career to marry James Stewart
8) Julie (1956) - Doris is a stewardess whose husband (Louis Jourdan) tries to kill her
9) Midnight Lace (1960) - Doris' husband tries to drive her insane and then kill her
10) Send Me No Flowers (1964) - Rock Hudson doesn't tell wife Doris he thinks he is dying
11) Ballad of Josie (1967) - Doris has an abusive husband who she accidentally kills

Doris Day Obscure Top 5

In memory of Doris Day a top five of some more obscure works in her filmography:
1) Storm Warning (1951) - Doris plays a woman whose husband (Steve Cochran) is a member of the KKK - her sister (Ginger Rogers!) busts up the gang with the help of a crusading DA (Ronald Reagan!)
2) Julie (1956) - Doris is a stewardess with a psycho husband (Louis Jourdan) who she has to battle... leading to a climax where she lands a plane, perhaps the first stewardess landing the plane climax in film history. Go Doris!
3) Midnight Lace (1960) - Doris is stalked again, in a decent psycho thriller co written by Australia's own Ivan Goff
4) Caprice (1967) - Doris and Richard Harris as industrial spies who flirt and double cross each other in a film very, very much like the later Julia Roberts-Clive Owen film Duplicity
5) The Ballad of Josie (1968) - Doris shoots her abusive husband in the old west and sets up a suffrage film

Book revview - "Michael Curtiz" by Alan Rode

I just finished reading a biography of the director Michael Curtiz by Alan Rode and it struck me again how weird it was that someone who made one of the greatest gangster films of all time (Angels with Dirty Faces), one of the greatest melodramas of all time (Mildred Pierce), one of the greatest musicals of all time (Yankee Doodle Dandy), three of the greatest swashbucklers of all time (Captain Blood, Sea Hawk, Robin Hood), one of the greatest Elvis Presley films of all time (King Creole) and one of the greatest films of all time (Casablanca) never got the auterist love of Ford, Hawks, Hitchcock, Wilder, Losey, Corman or even Frank Tashlin... despite even having an identifiable visual style... Was he too much a company man? Too mainstream? Too rarely a writer? Didn't deal enough with "common themes" so auteurists could group his movies together? Went off the boil too much when baby boomer critics started to get into film? 

Maybe it's simply he died too soon - in the early 60s so wasn't around to give lots of interviews to adoring cineastes, like Ford and Hawks could.

Some random things I learned from the book:

* He was married to top screenwriter Bess Meredyth (who worked in Australia in 1919-20 writing films for Snowy Baker) who was responsible for the fact many of Curtiz's script notes were excellent - she supplanted his career to his, which was unfortunately typical of the time, but as she spent 20 odd years sitting in bed eating cream cakes all day in a house with heaps of servants giving the occasional script note I didn't feel too badly for her (I can think of at least a dozen writers off the top of my head who would leap at a job like this)
 
* He may have gone senile towards the end of his life... making St Francis of Assisi in 1960 he grew so frustrated with the progress of filming he pulled down his pants and did a shit during filming (I wondered what director might be driven to do something like that today and too my surprise I could think of about five... filmmaking can drive people mad)
 
* He got busted by Confidential magazine in a hotel room paying for two African Americans to have sex while he watched... I started wondering what other directors would have done that and actually came up with a fair few names rather quickly...


* He didn't realise how ill he was but his family did and elected not to tell him.
 
This is an excellent book - exhaustive but then there was lots to cover. I was familiar with the Errol Flynn stuff and the great Warners classics but not his early life in Hungary (he was friends with Korda, and was successful as a director almost immediately), or his early silent Hollywood films, or even the early 30s stuff. His star rose with Flynn. 

I also wasn't that familiar with his adventures in post war Warner Bros, when the studio declined after Hal Wallis left but Jack Warners' cost cutting kept it competitive. Curtiz made far less classics after the war but still did things like discover Doris Day, and turn out huge hits like White Christmas. It's a shame he never reunited with Flynn they could have used each other in the late 40s/50s.

A top ten is v easy to compile
1) Casablanca (1943)
2) Adventures of Robin Hood (1938)
3) The Sea Hawk (1940)
4) Captain Blood (1935)
5) Mildred Pierce (1945)
6) Angels with Dirty Faces (1938)
7) King Creole (1958)
8) Yankee Doodle Dandy (1943)
9) Dodge City (1939)
10) The Breaking Point (1950)

Book review - "This Terrible Business Has Been Good to Me" by Norman Jewison (2005)

A tale of one man's journey from success to success - Jewison was born into a relatively poor family but it was in Canada; he joined the navy and went to university and decided to go into showbiz. He moved to England and broke in there, then worked in the early days of Canadian TV then in New York. Handling Judy Garland for a TV special (he managed to sweet talk Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin into supporting her) got him a reputation as someone who could deal with stars - he received an offer from Tony Curtis to do Forty Pounds of Trouble which led to a contract with Universal: two comedies with Doris Day, one with Dick Van Dyke (his first flop), then changing gears with The Cincinnati Kid and hitting a golden streak: The Russians Are Coming, In the Heat of the Night, The Thomas Crown Affair, stumbling with Gaily Gaily but then doing Fiddler on the Roof, Jesus Christ Superstar, Rollerball and so on.

It was truly one of the great careers - plenty of critical acclaim and box office hits, lots of power. His personal life seems to have been tranquil - met a girl, married, had kids, kids turned up fine.  Had a little bit of tall poppy syndrome from Canada but not a lot; a few flops but not that many; no production disasters. He dealt with some temperamental stars and seemed to be able to cope with all of them, even Garland and Steve McQueen.

He reveals himself to be the director who dealt with a sobbing star who had inadvertently killed her dog via giving her a lamb chop - a tale told by William Goldman in his memoirs (not told particularly well here - Jewison is a solid rather than top level writer) - the star was Doris Day. (So was Doris Day having an affair at the time? Goldman said the star was.)

He had/has solid liberal, humanistic beliefs which saw him make film like In the Heat of the Night and try to make Malcolm X before being booted off the latter to make way for Spike Lee.

Obviously a decent man, hardworking and talented, with great instincts for casting and story.

I was hoping for a little more gossip. Sylvester Stallone was a bit of an egomaniac on FIST and rewrote Joe Eszterhas. McQueen could be a baby but lobbied hard for the role in The Thomas Crown Affair. The screenwriter of Thomas Crown sounds like a character. But an enjoyable book.

Book review - "Charles Walters: The Director Who Made Hollywood Dance" by Brett Phillips

Charles Walters really should be better known - his CV includes several classic musicals (Easter Parade, High Society, Lil, Unsinkable Molly Brown) and a bunch of skilled comedies (Ask Any Girl, The Tender Trap). He probably doesn't get the credit he deserves.

I wonder why? A relatively skinny filmography? An unexciting name? A lack of films that touch on queer themes despite the director being queer? Being associated with MGM?

Walters was a dancer and actor who became a name on Broadway, eventually moving into choreography. He was a good looking guy who might've had a chance at being a movie star himself but stayed behind the camera, got a job at MGM as choreographer and dance director. He established himself as one of their best in part because he would look at dances in the context of the whole story and eventually became a director.

His directing career started with a bang: Good News, Easter Parade, The Barkleys of Broadway. He was one of the big directors at MGM, though interestingly lost some key assignments to George Sidney (another not very well known director). He found the going a little harder in the late 50s as musicals became less popular but segued neatly into comedies. He occasionally tried drama (eg Torch Song) but his heart didn't seem to be in it - he walked out on I'll Cry Tomorrow, for instance, and disliked Dore Schary. He hated Vera Ellen.

He had the chance to do a dream project with Billy Rose's Jumbo which lost a pile of money but bounced back with The Unsinkeable Molly Brown.

His career ended rather abruptly - he left MGM in the mid 60s and made the popular Walk Don't Run but that was about it, apart for some TV work for Lucille Ball. I think he was too much of a company man to make the adjustment to freelance life.

Walters lived a long life and hung on to a lot of his money. He had a long term relationship with one guy, an agent - and then later with a younger guy who he adopted (so he would inherit Walters' money). He lived as a gay man - discretely but he actually lived with someone. He worked with Garland on Easter Parade and Summer Stock but even he found her hard going and asked not to do it again. However he did direct her on Broadway.

This is an excellent book, well researched and written. Sometimes I did wish I could click on a switch to watch bits from the film that the writer describes. But a very good book.

A top ten for Walters:
1) High Society (1956) - his favourite film, a jaunty fun musical
2) Ask Any Girl (1959) - a film very much of it's time, with rape treated comically, but some excellent comic performances including Rod Taylor
3) Easter Parade (1948) - top line talent and then some
4) Billy Rose's Jumbo (1962) - I actually haven't seen it - but it's a passion project so I put it in
5) The Unsinkeable Molly Brown (1964) - Walters says his greatest achievement was directing Debbie Reynolds to an Oscar nom
6) Easy to Love (1953) - Esther Williams bagged a lot of directors in her memoirs but not Walters
7) Summer Stock (1951) - decent musical with the classic Garland "nervous breakdown" number "Get Happy"
8) The Tender Trap (1955) - classic swinging bachelor comedy
9) Lili (1953) - random fairytale film which became a big hit - Walters couldn't make lightning strike twice with The Glass Slipper
10) Don't Go Near the Water (1957) -amiable service comedy with Glenn Ford.

Movie review - "Caprice" (1967) **

Silly, over the top Bond spoof with Doris Day not entirely well cast in the lead - ditto Richard Harris as her love interest. I enjoy both actors and Frank Tashlin if in the mood - I'm not sure all three work together.

But it has the charm of a period piece. It's very groovy, with skirts and boots and spies trying to kill each other while skiing, and script has plenty of twists and turns with characters being one thing and then another - it's a lot like Charade. There's Edward Mulhaire and Jack Kruschen as tycoons, Ray Walston as a mad scientist, lots of bright colours and heavy handed satire of the fashion industry. It is fun to see Day in something so different.

The movie was clearly an influence on Duplicity, with its two stars constantly turning on each other, working for two tycoons and industrial espionage background - indeed, at times I began to wonder if the latter film was a remake.

Movie review - "My Dream is Yours" (1949) **1/2

Doris Day's second starring vehicle has a simpler, stronger plot than Romance on the High Seas: agent Jack Carson is fired by singer/radio star Lee Bowman because apparently Bowman's gotten a big head (although maybe Bowman was capable of negotiating a better deal on his own behalf and Carson is a crap agent) so Carson sets about trying to find a replacement star... and duly stumbles across Doris Day.

That's a decent set up for a movie and this is helped by strong support from Adolphe Menjou, and Eve Arden, as Carson's wise cracking friend. I'm not a massive fan of Carson has a romantic comedy lead - he's too big, too effective in unsympathetic parts for me, and I never believed Day was that into him. Day is pretty and perky as ever and there's novelty factor in that she's a war widow with a young kid. Bowman is an effective false love interest - I liked him in Buck Privates and he was a handsome, engaging actor, especially with a pencil moustache (he doesn't have one here), but never quite made the grade as a star.

There is a sequence where Day sings with animated characters including Bugs Bunny.

Movie review - "Romance on the High Seas" (1948) **

No slowly-working-your-way-up-the-cinematic-food-chain for Doris Day - like Errol Flynn before her, her first Hollywood film was a well-funded, specifically-crafted starring vehicle (though one I assume was devised for another star) and a hit, launching her straight away. And why not - she sings like an angel, is perky and pretty, full of good humour. 

The film isn't much, despite some superb colour - the plot was really confusing, with married Janis Paige getting Day to take a trip pretending to be Paigein order to find out if Paige's husband Don de Fore is cheating on her, and de Fore getting private Jack Carson to go on the trip as de Fore to find out if Paige is cheating on him. Therefore there are no stakes because you know one honest chat will clear everything up - it's like the weaker Astaire-Rogers musical plots; like those movies there's a lively support actor, Oscar Levant, as piano player in love with Day.

De Fore and Paige are pretty uninspiring, I got Carson and De fore mixed up at times and Caron is an odd person to have in a musical - he sings a song and tries, but just felt weird. Levant was fun even if he too looked similar to de Fore and Carson. Day is a delight, bubby and fun and gets to sing some nice tunes. 

There is some Hollywood backlot recreation of Caribbean ports including one number "The Tourist Trade". Day sings "It's Magic" which became a hit for her. Day fans will want to catch this; others not so much.

Movie review – “Midnight Lace” (1960) **1/2

Who is gaslighting poor old Doris Day in a fog bound London? Is it the handsome construction worker doing stuff next door (John Gavin, bravely tackling an English actor and coming off badly)? Her businessman husband (Rex Harrison)? Wacky aunt (Myrna Loy)? The maid’s dodgy son (Roddy McDowall)? Elderly associate (Herbert Marshall)?

The appearance of John Williams as a cop and Anthony Dawson as a sleeze reminds one of Dial M for Murder. This isn’t in that class, and the opening scene of a high pitched voice terrorising Doris in the fog doesn’t scare me as much as it did when I was a kid, but it’s enjoyable in it’s own way. The cast is terrific fun – even Gavin’s badness (he has to convey post war battle trauma in one scene) has it’s own rewards.

The script was written by Ivan Goff and Ben Roberts, who also wrote another thriller for Ross Hunter released that year, Portrait in Black. Like that, it starred a glamorous middle aged female who was lusted after by various cast members, had a glittering support cast, slightly exotic setting, and a finale which involved someone getting up on a high place. This is probably better of the two, if only because the lead is more sympathetic.

Movie review - "The Glass Bottom Boat" (1966) ***

A cheerful comedy where scientist Rod Taylor literally fishes Doris Day out of the water - they banter for a bit and fall in love, but things are complicated when Rod (who works for a government organisation) thinks that Doris is a spy. Frank Tashlin directs energetically, sending up the spy genre still had freshness in 1966, and every actor on the film gets into the spirit. Rod Taylor and Doris Day work well together - she's quite sexy here, wearing a mata hari outfit, and there's even a scene where she flat out tries to seduce Rod (he thinks she's a spy by then so doesn't go through with it but she's up for it, not question).

The title song is catchy, and there are some excellent performances from the support cast, including a young Dom de Luise. Amazingly, it would be the last time Rod made an out-and-out comedy for almost twenty years – a ridiculous waste considering the skill he had for the genre.

Movie review - "Do Not Disturb" (1965) **

A silly inconsequential comedy in which the two stars work well together but whose story is so slight and tired the film has a great deal of trouble holding the audience’s interest. For example, the first twenty minutes of the film is devoted to gags about Doris Day having arranged to live in the country instead of the city like Rod Taylor wanted - and that’s it. There is no real reason for this film to exist except for greed; Day’s popularity had turned 20th Century-Fox into being lazy and complacent.

Movie review - "Pillow Talk" (1959) ***1/2

The screenplay for this glossy Universal comedy won an Oscar, a fact often held up for derision, but this holds up over the years as a bright, sharp comedy which has dated surprisingly little. Yes, Doris Day is determined to hang on to her virtue: but only to a point. Once she thinks Rock Hudson might be gay she's up for it, even without a wedding ring. And she's a liberated woman who won't marry Tony Randall despite his money, who has a career and isn't determined to be used. 

Doris and Rock have a real chemistry and Rock is in good form as a likable heel who clashes with Doris' sensible mum-ness. Tony Randall is a laugh, too- though it's a bit uneasy the way the film portrays Thelma Ritter's acute alcoholism as cute.

Movie review - Errol #34a - "It's a Great Feeling" (1949) **1/2

Bright, breezy musical with colour and energy and is perhaps best seen on a Saturday afternoon on television. It stars Jack Carson and Dennis Morgan, whom few remember today but who were used by Warners as their equivalent to Bob Hope and Bing Crosby (Carson played an girl-crazy egomaniac, Morgan the smooth crooner, both were pals but also rivals who double crossed each other); it also stars Doris Day who most know about - she's very bright, chirpy and girl-next-door-ish, no wonder she became a star so quickly (this was one of her earliest movies) - though the character she plays isn't very nice, a bit too mercenary-ish and whiny about wanting to be a star. She plays a character but Carson and Morgan play themselves - Carson's directing a movie and Day is the girl who is going to be in it.

This film has a lovely in-jokey quality - even those unfamiliar with Carson and Morgan (which I admit I was to a great degree) soon "get" their rapport, and there are heaps of cameos: Michael Curtiz, Raoul Walsh, King Vidor, and David Butler (NB I can understand Curtiz and Walsh and even Vidor - but did anyone really want to see a David Butler cameo? I guess you can do that when you direct the film), as well as stars such as Gary Cooper (very funny), Joan Crawford (funnier still, spoofing her image, spouting some typical Joan Crawford dialogue), Jane Wyman, Eleanor Parker, Ronald Reagan (always fun to see him - his and Wyman's daughter Maureen is also in it), Sydney Greenstreet, Edward G Robinson.

It has the feeling of a revue, with stars doing "turns" (something Warners helped pioneer with Stage Door Canteen - two years later that studio released one of the last of that genre, Starlift) - there is some poignance knowing that Warners would soon have to let most of them go. It does wear out its welcome after a while; Day's character isn't very likeable and the ending unsatisfying, with her returning home. This results in a strong gag - this is a spoiler but it's the reason I watched the film: at the very end Day marries Errol Flynn (shot through soft focus, looking handsome but a bit weary). The film makes the joke of Carson and Morgan going "life's going to be boring with this bloke" then they cut to Errol Flynn - but watching it you can't help think "hmmm... marriage to Errol would probably be a bit too interesting, you'd be better off being a movie star". (NB is the film endorsing marriage over career?)

Article - They pulled the plug

Recently the papers were full of stories concerning the demise of the film Eucalyptus. Theories abounded: was it the script? Was it Rusty? Was it some ancient aboriginal curse? Any film getting made is a miracle – and even the fact that a film has been greenlighted and has started shooting is no guarantee it will make it to release. Stephen Vagg looks at some famous cinematic chokes

Arrive Alive

This action-comedy script by Mitch Glazer and legendary Saturday Night Live writer Michael O’Donoghue had been kicking around Hollywood for a number of years. Producer Art Linson finally got the film greenlighted at Paramount in the late 1980s with Willem Defoe (coming off Platoon) to star and Jeremiah Chechik (coming off National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation) to direct. As the rushes came in, Linson and the studio began to realise that Defoe was miscast and the film unfunny. They pulled the plug during shooting.

Bezhin Meadow

The first sound film from Sergei Eisenstein, which the great director made during the mid 1930s in Russia after his trip to America and the debacle of Que Viva Mexico (also uncompleted). Eisenstein worked on the film for two years before the government stepped in and stopped filming just as it was nearing completion. The plot was about a young boy helping his village defeat a group of saboteurs out to destroy the harvest of the collective farm. The sole surviving print of the film was destroyed (allegedly by a bombing raid during the war; others thought the government had done it). A half hour version exists today, a reconstruction of the film made with some surviving footage, titles and slides.

Bogart Slept Here

By the mid 1970s it was hard to find a more potent, commercial filmmaking team than Neil Simon and Mike Nichols. Simon had an idea for a film about an actor (loosely based on Dustin Hoffman) whose marriage falters when he reaches stardom. They cast Robert de Niro and started filming. It soon became apparent that de Niro (who’d just done Taxi Driver) wasn’t getting the laughs expected from a Neil Simon script and the studio agreed to pull the plug. Perhaps not coincidentally, Mike Nichols did not direct a feature film for a number of years. Simon reworked his script into a happier story, a kind of prequel which ends when Bogart Slept Here began: The Goodbye Girl was a big success that won Richard Dreyfuss a best actor Oscar.

The Day the Clown Cried

In 1972 Jerry Lewis starred in this independently-financed film as a German clown who does some entertaining at the concentration camps – all this years before Life is Beautiful. The film ran out of money towards the end and there has been some disputes over rights. Lewis didn’t make another film for a number of years.

The Deep

Charles Williams’ novel ‘Dead Calm’ was filmed by Orson Welles during the late 60s, starring Welles, Jeanne Moreau and Laurence Harvey. An attempt by Welles to make a more commercially appealing type of film, it was never completed due to problems involving weather, finance and actor availability. The rights to the novel were obtained by Australia’s Kennedy Miller who reduced the story’s original five characters to three and released their own version in 1989 – launching Nickers into Tom Cruise’s bed and on to international fame.

Don Quixote

Orson Welles started filming his version of the famous novel in the 1955. He’d managed to shoot Othello successfully on an on-again-off-again fashion over the years, so why not try it again? His luck didn’t hold for this one and the film remains uncompleted (Welles joked towards the end of his life that he would eventually call the film When Are You Going to Finish ‘Don Quixote’?) Some existing footage was cobbled together after Welles’ death and released in 1992.

The Dreamers

Made on and off during the early 1980s, this unfinished Orson Welles film was based on two Isak Dinesen stories starring Oja Kodar, Welles’ companion in later years. Around 25 minutes of film were apparently shot, excluding retakes. Again, lack of finance prevented completion before Welles’ death in 1985.

Game of Death

Bruce Lee had just made it big on an international scale with Enter the Dragon so Golden Harvest prepared a similar big-budget karate epic with foreign names. One of them was going to be Australia’s George Lazenby; he was set to have dinner with Lee one night when Lee died. Lee’s fans knew he had already shot some great fight scenes for a new film called Game of Death. Enterprising filmmakers tried to cash in with a number of films hinting at some connection with this footage: Goodbye Bruce Lee His Last Game of Death, The New Game of Death, The True Game of Death, Enter the Game of Death (this all was part of the creepy “Brucesploitation” genre of kung fu films in the 70s with Bruce Lee look-alikes). Golden Harvest used original real footage and shot some new one stuff using stand ins and clips from old Bruce Lee films; Game of Death was released in 1978.

Gone in 60 Seconds 2

The original Gone in 60 Seconds was directed by HB “Toby” Halicki, the “car crash king”, who went on to make The Junkman and Deadline Auto Theft. While making this sequel in 1989 he was killed when a pole fell of him during filming. Footage from the film is available on special edition DVDs.

I, Claudius

Robert Graves’ novel brought life in Ancient Rome to life as few others have, and during the 1930s a dream team assembled to turn it into a film: Alexander Korda as producer, Josef Von Sternberg director, with Charles Laughton to star as Claudius and Merle Oberon as Messalina. Filming proceeded at a slow pace, and when Oberon was hospitalised followed a near fatal car crash Korda pulled the plug. Exiting footage was featured in the 1965 documentary, The Epic That Never Was.

It’s All True

During the early 1940s Orson Welles was sent to South America to make a documentary as part of Roosevelt’s “Good Neighbour” policy during World War Two. During filming there was a change in administration of his studio RKO; advance word on The Magnificent Ambersons was not good and Welles became on the nose. He was called back to the USA and the film was not completed. A version was cut together and released in the early 1990s.

Man’s Fate

Adaptation of Andre Malraux’s book set in 1920’’s China was all set for big budget treatment in 1969, starring David Niven and to be directed by Fred Zinneman. MGM then had a change of ownership and the new president James Aubrey pulled the plug on the film only days before filming, claiming they couldn’t afford it. Lawsuits resulted and the film remains unmade.

The Man Who Killed Don Quixote

The curse of ‘Don Quixote’ strikes again! Terry Gilliam had a go at his version of the story in the 1990s. His mega-tight budget and schedule were unable to stand up to unfriendly weather and the strain of having his Don Quixote (Jean Rochefort) suffer a heart attack. It did result in the tremendous documentary Lost in La Mancha.

The Other Side of the Wind

Orson Welles’ other great unfinished film was shot during the 1970s, starring John Huston as a film director trying to get finance for a film. Peter Bogdanovich was involved behind and in front of the cameras. Financial problems again intervened and the film was not finished. Footage available to the general public shows Welles was just as innovative and experimental as ever.

Queen Kelly

During the late 1920s, film star Gloria Swanson had moved into independent production and teamed with the legendary director Eric Von Stroheim to make this epic (originally intended to run five hours). Swanson’s lover Joe Kennedy (father of John F. Kennedy) helped provide money. Von Stroheim’s filming techniques saw the film fall behind schedule and with sound coming in it seemed the film would lack a market. Swanson fired Von Stroheim and shut down production. A replacement was bought in but eventually filming was called off altogether. A version was cobbled together released with production stills and photographs. Footage was used in Sunset Boulevard, which starred Swanson and Von Stroheim.

Sheepmates

An outback story from a novel by William Hatfield which started filming in 1934 under director F W Thring. Some scenes were shot on location but the film was never completed.

Something’s Gotta Give

During the early 1960s Marilyn Monroe agreed to star in what seemed to be a sure-fire commercial success: a remake of the romantic comedy My Favourite Wife, co-starring Dean Martin and directed by George Cukor. Marilyn was late on set a couple of times; the studio, 20th Century Fox, were having a horrible time with costs on Cleopatra and decided they weren’t going to take it – they sacked her. She was later rehired by Marilyn died soon after. The film was later remade with Doris Day as Move Over, Darling and was a big success. An excellent documentary exists of the making of the film, Marilyn Monroe: The Final Days, including culled-together footage of her final film – Marilyn gives an excellent performance (playing an intelligent person, which is kind of weird), and takes a nude swim.