Book review - "Junior Bonner: The Making of a Classic with Steve McQueen and Sam Peckinpah in the Summer of 1971" by Jeb Rosebrook

 Memoir by Rosebrook who wrote the script for Junior Bonner. The story of the making of this film actually isn't super interesting despite the involvement of drama magnets Steve McQueen and Sam Peckinpah - there was no recutting, no massive bust ups, it was so Major Dundee or coke riddled Convoy. McQueen liked the script, Peckinpah liked doing something non violent. Peckinpah did some mild (by his stands) bullying, firing people who didn't deserve it, McQueen was basically the boss, but people generally behaved.

Still it is an interesting book because of the director and star and also characters like Ida Lupino (whose role was intended for Susan Hayward who wanted to do it but they all got drunk and forgot to offer it to her and she got annoyed), Robert Preston (who as usual everyone loved), Barbara Leigh (an engaging unpretentious model who just had affairs with everyone from Elvis to McQueen to James Aubrey) and rodeo riders. Also the book acts as a memoir for Rosebrook's career which wasn't amazing but was entirely decent. He wrote a script for James Coburn, who sounds like a gentleman, and did a lot of TV. Rosebrook was a producer so has an engaging appreciation of below the line workers which a lot of writers don't.

Movie review - "Cross of Iron" (1977) ***

 Some good stuff here. Focusing on Germans in the Eastern front gives this a solid downbeat quality. Some excellent war scenes. James Coburn plays it straight, no joking, and it's a reminder that he can act. Max Schell and James Mason are on hand. It's long. Bad female roles again - rape victims, and Santa Berger as a hot nurse who roots Mason.

But Peckinpah resonated with material. Some good scenes. Much better than The Killer Elite I think being away from Hollywood helped him.

Movie review - "Convoy" (1978) **1/2

 Making of this was famously troubled, like so many Sam Peckinpah films, with the cocaine riddled director booted off the film. It has a lot of pleasures - gorgegous shots of trucks going through the desert, Kris Kristofferson looking handsome, a sense of camraderie around the truckers, a feeling of pace and speed (they're always in trucks).

It's got silly things like Ali Macgraw's perm. I always remember the trucker girl Kristofferson slept with and how sad faced and unhappy she looked and wondered if that was the original intent which was surely to show Kristofferson to be a stud.

Ernest Borgnine's racism against Ajaye is very effective dramatically. It's great there's a black female trucky too. Bognine works well as a villain even if the "top level government conspiracy to get Kristofferson" is confusing and dumb and probably the result of too many drugs. Macgraw isn't much in this - if only they'd given her straight hair - but she doesn't have much to do, her tan matches nicely with Kristofferson and she does serve as a non-trucking surrogate for the audience to identify with. (This may have helped the film become such a big hit.)

And that title track is catchy.

James Coburn directed second unit!

Movie review - "Death of a Soldier" (1986) **

 Philippe Mora is such a bright, engaging conversationalist I keep wishing his films were better but this isn't very well directed. A good true life story - a Yank soldier turned serial killer in WW2 in Melbourne - is done without any real atmosphere or tension, and over the top acting.

There's a lot of older actors in it, who capture the tone and mood of the war, but they're old and wars were fought by the young. The costumes and everything are there, but it feels like a re enactment.

James Coburn is an officer. Bill Hunter and Maurie Fields are cops. Michael Pate is a Yank. Everyone feels old even the soldiers. Reb Brown isn't bad as the killer.

But what's the point. The guy kills. He's caught. He's hung. There is a little outrage at the speed of it but he's killed three women.

What a disappointment.

James Coburn and Australia

 1) The Great Escape - mangled the accent, nailed the attitude

2) Death of a Soldier - Australian film with Coburn as the imported star

3) Payback - Coburn had a good support role in this film from Aussie-when-it-suits-us Mel Gibson - he and Gibson were also in Maverick together

4) Dead Heat on a Merry Go Round - Coburn impersonates an Aussie

5) Babe in th Woods - early TV play written by Aussie Sumner Locke Elliott starring Coburn

6) Major Dundee - Coburn and Aussie Michael Pate have support roles

7) Duck You Sucker - Cobun took a role originally offered to George Lazenby

I'm kind of stretching...

Movie review - "Bite the Bullet" (1975) ** (warning: spoilers)

 Richard Brooks had a big hit with The Professionals and went back to the well with another macho, male driven Western in a slightly odd time period (1906 or something like that) with a rousing score. This has neat photography and an interesting cast but you're bound to wonder "why should we care". The Professionals had clear stakes - kidnapped woman, cash. This is about a cross country race. You can give stakes to a race but Brooks can't crack the problem here. 

There's two old mates Gene Hackman and James Coburn, and a callow kid (Jan Michael Vincent), and a hooker (Candice Bergen), a Brit (Ian Bannen), an old poke (Ben Johnson).

It needed more stakes. More character differential. There's some nice scenes and the actors are fine. The horses are pretty as is the scenery But I got lost what the race was about or why we should care or what was going on. Some robbers turn up and that perks things up because it's clear and clean what they want and the stakes are life and death.

At the end Hackman and Coburn cross the line together. It might mean more if we got a sense they were friends, or rivals, or brothers, or cared. Coburn's character could be removed. So could Johnson. Actually Johnson and Coburn could be merged.

Oh, I'm picking. I don't know. It was loud and pretty and kind of lifeless. Burt Reynolds and James Caan were going to be leads at one stage - they would've given the piece more urgency.

Movie review - "The Carey Treatment" (1972) **

 Blake Edwards whined that MGM cut this movie around and I'm sure Jim Aubrey and co did even though it co stars Aubrey's daughter but it's still long even at 100 minutes taking all this time to get going.

The strength of the novel was its fast pace and technical detail, both which aren't conveyed. The faults of the novel - its tropes - do survive. Like the book there's not enough compulsion for James Coburn to investigate - I think they should've made Jennifer O'Neill (who's pretty but whose part is pointless) be the doctor who got arrested and Coburn investigates it to free her because he loves her.

There's some effective bits and it's not a bad story. Coburn is a swinger and groovy but though he spouts the dialogue isn't entirely convincing as a dogged pathologist. Actually O'Nell would've been better in his role because as a woman she might have a reason to defend an abortionist. You know, Raquel Welch would've suited this.

Thereis a scene where Michael Blodgett gives James Coburn a massage that is very homoerotic. Blodgett is an effective villain and there are neat turns from people like John Hillerman.

But it doesn't have Edwards' patented style and gloss. Variety was right it feels like a TV movie. I think the only point to making these sort of films by the 70s was if you made it glossy and had stars in them.

Movie review - "In Like Flint" (1967) **

 Fox were so happy with Our Man Flint that got work started on a sequel before it came out - it did well, was a hit, and so the second one came. It did okay, less well, but Coburn refused to make a third. I think he should have because those two films were really the only ones he starred in that were hits.

This had great photography and that classic Jerry Goldsmith score and some pretty women. J Lee Cobb is in drag. The story isn't bad - clones and women wanting to take over the world. The sexual politics are dodgy AF with Coburn laughing at women wanting to throw over the patriarchy then leading them to fight off the men. I liked the women kicking some arse but it has the vibes of a film made by people going through a divorce.

This has more Matt Helm vibes.

Movie review - "Candy" (1968) **

 Cripes. The novel was popular, apparently. I don't think anyone reads it anymore. I haven't heard anything good about this movie so I was surprised to find myself enjoying it so much at first. It got off to a flying start with its groovy visuals and music and all star cast. Ewa Aulin isn't much of an actress but she's gorgeous - apparently Terry Southern wanted an All American type like Hayle Mills which would've been interesting but maybe too confronting.

Candy has a series of encounters with men who all manhandle her. This isn't a film that's strong on consent. What it does have is a series of encounters with stars, and you find yourself marking the vignettes. Richard Burton is hilarious as a Dylan Thomas type poet - he really commits and goes all out. Ringo Starr is less fun as a lechy Mexican. John Astin (in probably the second biggest role) is Candy's dad. Walter Matthau is a funny as a general but as Pauline Kael pointed out this sort of character was old hat by then. James Coburn is very funny as a doctor, he plays it in the right spirit as does Anita Pallenberg (sexy nurse) and John Huston.

There's an unfunny sequence with some Italian actors playing gangsters and an even less funnier one with Charles Aznavour as a hunchback and I wasn't wild with Marlon Brando in brownface as a guru or the cimax where she has sex with her dad Astin.

Look, the film exists and it's got stars in it and is weird. Everyone disowned it but it did business.

Movie review - "Our Man Flint" (1966) ***

 Sometimes you have to be there. This was one of the many, many, many Bond spoofs but it was one of the first out of the gate - I think it just beat The Silencers to the punch though that was a big hit too. The casting of James Coburn was, in hindsight, a masterstroke - he had a laconic, suave, rugged look, not too imidiatingly pretty, a nice sense of humour. I mean, maybe it would've worked with someone else but who? Think about it - Paul Newman too earnest, Jack Lemmon too goofy. James Garner could've made it work.

Anyhow. It's very 60s. Lee J Cobb got on the nerves as did the gag about the phone. There's some funny bits and pretty girls. Edward Mulhare is suave but doesn't have much of a character to play apart from suave - why not someone more colourful.

I really liked the second half when Coburn went on the mission. That's when Flint worked for his money and girls and was more likable. The island is fun, Jerry Goldsmith's music is terrific, the whole wish fulfilment is hilarious.

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.

Movie review - "What Did You Do in the War Daddy?" (1966) ***

 A box office flop despite the fact it was from Blake Edwards and had James Coburn coming off Our Man Flint and a concept that would've seemed idea for the cynical sixties I'd have thought - a US unit in Italy comes across a town that wants to surrender after their wine festival, so the Yanks pretend to meet resistance, which brings in the Germans and US superiors. That's funny.

But maybe when you pick at it, it's not - World War Two was a Good War, so they are ducking out of important service. Also why can't they surrender and then do the wine festival? It doesn't make sense. It maybe would've worked if it was near the end of the war and they'd been sent to fight silly battles and there was a better reason to stop - like give the Americans a really villainous gneneral.

The movie falters in terms of characterisation. The leads are Dick Shawn and James Coburn but Coburn's role is sidelined. I think Shawn is meant to be uptight and Coburn laid back but Shawn gets un-uptight pretty quickly and Edwards can't seem to think of things for Coburn to do, or Aldo Ray who's also in there. Operation Petticoat had very defined characters - Cary Grant was uptight and by the book, the nurses called havoc, Tony Curtis was on the make... The characters here aren't as fixed. You could cut Coburn and Ray out of the film and made it about Shaw and Sergio Fantoni - actually that's what it should've been.

It looks gorgous, there's some funny bits, it was good to see Shawn in a lead role. I did sense Edwards would've been happier with Jack Lemmon and Tony Curtis. But also Edwards liked Coburn - he used him on Waterhole 3 and The Carey Treatment - why not give him more to do. The Italian female doesn't have much of a character, or does Sergio Fantoni (friendly Italian).

Movie review - "Harry in Your Pocket" (1973) **

 James Coburn stars in another film from a first time director, Bruce Geller - who worked on Mission Impossible and I think the writers worked on that show. It has a TV movie feel, lots of brown, Lalo Schifrin music. Coburn is a pickpocket working with veteran Walter Pigeon, they hook up with two newbies Michael Sarrazin and Trish Van Dere.

Sarrazin should have been Coburn's brother or son - would've given it more emotional kick. The slang about pick pocketing is interesting but not that interesting.

It's nice that Pigeon had a juicy role - old thief who snorts coke - but watching it I couldn't help think "a lot of other old stars would've been better in this like Bette Davis or someone".

The film doesn't work. It doesn't lean into its love triangle until too late. There's no enough history between Coburn and Sarrazin. More needed to be made of their rivalry.

Or else the film could've been a three girls movie.

Pickpockets arent that interesting. A lot of bumping into people.

Movie review - "Dead Heat on a Merry Go Round" (1966) **

 One of those films inspired by Charade - all groovy, with twists. It's a bit annoying. A lot rests on the shoulders of James Coburn, who gets out of prison and plans a heist. Thing is it takes half the film for him to raise money for the heist, which involves him romancing people - the shrink to get him out of prison, a maid (Nina Grey who is terrible), a socialite (Rose Marie) another cleaner (Camilla Sparv). Most of these actresses are gorgeous and dressed gorgeously but they're swept off their feet by Coburn - who is attractive but not that hot. Even Cary Grant would struggle to have sold it. But it's all so patchy and stop start.

Coburn also imitates various people including an Australian cop! (He was an Aussie in The Great Escape.)

The film gets much better once the heist kicks in and there's some pace.

It looks terrific in that late 60s way. Harrison Ford pops up to deliver a telegram. I struggled to tell the male support cast apart.

Movie review - "Duffy" (1968) ** (warning: spoilers)

 This movie has a good central idea-  some spoilt kids (James Fox, John Alderton) of a rich man (James Mason) decide to rob dad, and hire a tough American (James Coburn), who winds up sleeping with the girl (Susannah York) of one of them.

It has gorgeous photography, neat  location work, fab costumes, and is very groovy. It's all played for comedy though. -I think that was a mistake. It needed to have real stakes - Mason should've been really dangerous, ditto Fox. People should've died.

Also I think there needed to be more difference between Coburn and the Brits. Fox is such a great decadent aristocrat, York an ideal smashing bird and Alderton a good idiot - Coburn should be this gruff, tough Yank but he's a hippy (looking handsome it has to be said).

There's a final twist where York is in cahoots with Mason but it's not much of a twist. Everyone needed a twist.

Movie review - "The Honkers" (1972) ** (warning: spoilers)

 James Coburn backed new talent - this was the first studio film from character actor Steve Ihnat - who died of a heart attack aged 37 at Cannes as this film was being released. It's an actor-y piece with Coburn as a rodeo rider - he's good at his job but is irresonsible, has an ex (Lois Nettleton) he still sleeps with because he's a stud, has a hot young hippy (Anne Archer) who wants him because he's a stud, clashes with locals, has an old mate (Slim Pickens), walks aound a town.

I'm surprised this got greenlit - Coburn wasn't that a big star by 1971 or whenever it was made... but I gues The Last Picture Show made studios go "quick we need our own modern day Western about lost people having sex.

The one outstanding bit is the end sequence when Slim Pickens dies in an accident. Everything else feels too light too dissolute, like minor Larry McMurtry. Coburn is fine but the piece would have been stronger had he been given stronger actors to play off against.

Movie review - "Waterhole #3" (1967) **

 Blake Edwards produced this but did not direct - that job went to William Graham who had a solid TV career. It's a lighthearted Western about the search for gold. There's a balladeer Cat Ballou style and a plot where James Coburn comically rapes Margaret Blye.

I was in the mood of a comic Western and Coburn is really well cast and it's gorgeously shot. But the film started slowly, grew more annoying and I ended up hating it.

Three main issues with this film. First the comic depiction of rape - the film really commits to this plot, Blye complains and keeps complaining and everyone laughs and dismisses it and then she falls for Coburn with no motivating scene. Why not just make her horny and try to seduce him? Was rape really funny in 1967? Was it hilariously trangressive or something? They don't even establish Cobun's a good lover.

Second the storyline is unconvincing. It's about the search for gold but there's no really memorable scenes.

Third Carol O'Connor is undercast. This part needed to have more star charisma to match Coburn - like a genuine star, someone old enough to have a daughter, such as, I don't know, Edward G Robinson or someone.

Movie review - "Hard Contract" (1969) **

 Hitman who has lost zest for life and only sleeps with hookers is given a job which he hopes will fun his retirement but he falls in love... that feels like a very familiar plot and I was expecting a familar film.

But this is a very arty, sixties effort - close in tone to the George Lazenby Bond follow up Universal Soldier in a way. There's a little bit of assassinating but not a lot. Mostly it's chat in European locations.

James Coburn is more effective when chatty but here plays a stoic Alain Delon type - the film feels very influenced by the French. He hooks up with Lee Remick thinking she's a hooker but actually she's a bored housewife. He won't kiss but the film makes sure we know he's great in bed. (Karen Black pops up as another hooker). Lili Palmer is Remick's friend.

The film was written and directed by S Pogostian who was a TV writer and this has the soul of a television play. Lots of chat, mostly dialogues. It would work fine on the small screen. It's directed that way too. Jazzy angles - the John Boorman Point Blank treatment - would have worked. Less bad back projection.

To be fair I think there's also miscasting. Coburn isn't the same as Lee Marvin - far more effusive. He doesn't have chemistry with Lee Remick who is beautiful but aloof, not in a good way. The film is slightly off. The sex isn't that sexy. Imagine, I don't know, Lee Marvin and Angie Dickinson in this. More interesting, yes? Actually Sterling Hayden, who plays an ageing hit man, would've been better in Coburn's part.

No real action. I feel sorry for Fox they would've expected some bang bang as well as philosophy but they just got philosophy.

But look film gets points for trying to be different. Coburn spent his stardom on interesting projects - this, Presidents Analyst, Last of the Mobile Hot Shots, etc.

Movie review - "Ride Lonesome" (1959) ***1/2

 James Coburn's film debut and Randolph Scott's third last. Scott plays a bounty hunter tracking James Best. They come across a duo - enigmatic Pernell Roberts and gangly grinning James Coburn, both of whom are superb. Lee Van Cleef adds tang as Best's dodgy brother. Best is great fun.

The dialogue is tangy, the photography beautiful, the plot full of twists. It's low budget but that doesn't matter. Karen Steele is a little silly with her peroxide blonde hair but her performance isn't bad. She's outshone by the men but they do have better roles.

Book review - "Dervish Dust: The Life and Words of James Coburn" by Robyn Coburn (2022)

 Robyn Coburn is an Aussie, married to James Coburn, son of the actor, so this book has an excellent inside track - close to its source but not too close. Certain it''s open about Coburn (I'll use the star's surname more) being a crap father, absent and not interested, and a grumpy old opinionated man. But a fine actor, superb speaking voice, some excellent performances. The book benefits from his letters, thoughts and interviews - as a member of the family the writer has superb access.

Coburn had a fascinating life and career. Tall, deep voiced, silver haired. He got professional work quite quickly. Benefited from being able to study under the GI Bill (he was drafted in the early 1950s but was in Europe not the Korean War). He always seemed to be able to support himself via advertisements - when starting out and later on. When he began getting TV work the jobs came thick and fast - he was ideal as villains in Westerns and played a lot of them. His film career was respectable quickly too - Ride Lonesome then The Magnificent Seven. He had a great run as a second lead. The Flint films turned him into a star but his actual period as a top level name above the star wasn't long. But 1980 there were no more film leading roles, and TV didn't give him that much longer either. But he always had his voice and cameos.

A genuine hippy. Managed to link to popular culture in odd ways - a mate of Bruce Lee's, in the Band on the Run photo, a rejected Cosmo nude centerfold (the one before Burt Reynolds), a big car importer, in some films edited badly by Jim Aubrey. 

He had a great 60s and pretty good 70s. Things went south in late 70s and took a while to bounce back. Won an Oscar with Affliction but that didn't so much for his career. Managed to appear in some iconic films though. Made a LOT of flops.