Movie review - "The Parallax View" (1974) ****

 I'm still wrapping my head around Warren Beatty's career - it's so random. After Bonnie and Clyde he made a disaster (The Only Game in Town) and a film that seemed to disappear ($) then two of the cultiest movies of the seventies: McCabe and Mrs Miller and this.

It's an astonishingly shot movie - Gordon Willis does a sensational job with unusual framing, use of shadow and light, long shots. The film is constantly off kilter and unsettling. (Kudos to the art department as well).

Gorgeous "tinkle music" score. Very very strong cast - Beatty's shaggy haired reporter in over his head is actually in line with his most effective screen persona: man who is slightly hapless. He's still a stud muffin - Prentiss is his ex and he's got some woman staying over early on who is never seen again.

Paula Prentiss scores in her small role as does everyone else really: Hume Cronyn, Jim Davis (craggy, smoking senator), William Daniels, Kenneth Mars.

The car chase feels dumbly inserted. The ending is amazing. The plot makes no sense if looked at too closely. But it works.

Movie review - "Sheena" (1984) ***1/2

 This isn't a fashionable opinion but at least I share it with Pauline Kael: I like this movie. It looks gorgeous, was beautifully shot on location, has a wonderful score. The script flies along -Lorenzo Semple was skilled at this even though David Newman was the one who did the heavy lifting - and John Guillermin was still on it at this stage.

Tanya Roberts' method like intensity takes some getting used to but once you tune in she's great fun and has the body of an athlete. I think it was a mistake to show her breasts and bare backside - I think bare back and implied nudity would have been fine, breasts is too pervy.

Ted Wass is an engaging hero, handsome and a bit klutzy, but an ideal partner. They shouldn't have put him in that red towel at the end.

I'm aware it's problematic with its white saviours and all that. I will argue in the film's defence at least it's in present day Africa and there are a lot of positive black characters (the Obi Wan, the president, the tribal leader) it's just most of them are killed. The Donovan Scott character could have been black. There are several white villains.

Enjoyable action - I loved the jeep charge at the end, Sheena wielding her arrow and bow, the flamingo attack. This is fun. There doesn't seem to be a cult about it though.

Movie review - "King Kong" (1976) ****

 I was totally in the mood for this. It's tongue in cheek but the core relationship is serious i.e. Kong's love for Jessica Lange. Lange's character is self centred and dumb but at least is consistent; Lange is gorgeous. Jeff Bridges is very 70s hunky with his pro ecology status and long hair - the film gives him plenty of things to do.

The most pointlessly dopey aspect of the film comes at the end when Lange and Bridges are hiding out in NYC and Kong finds Lange. There was no need for that - it's dumb, and Kong could have just kidnapped Lange at the beginning of his rampage.

The sense of adventure is high; Charles Grodin is fun as the oil exec (very cleanly motivated); John Barry's score is lush; the animal suit antics are fine; Ed Lauter popped up. It's moving at the end with Kong's heartbeat stopping. I missed dinosaur island but at least there is a killer boa.

I think people will remember this fondly a lot longer than Peter Jackson's version which seems to have vanished in collective memory (even though I enjoyed that when watching it).

Book review - "Some Kind of Hero: The Remarkable HIstory of the James Bond Films" by Matthew Field and Ajay Chowhudry

Exhaustive, near definitive account of the making of the famous series, written with passion and enthusiasm but also scholarship. I admit I knew a lot of the first half, but I'm a die hard fan - I know less about the Dalton period onwards, and this illuminated that.

The most striking comment for me was something by Michael Wilson, who said that other producers may have done a better job but plenty of others also would have done a much worse job - and that for me is part of the secret why the series has lasted so long. It's been run by a family business who never made too many mistakes - they always pulled things back on track.

The series has stumbled several times - George Lazenby (who I love but also recognise could have hurt the series), the fights between Broccoli and Saltzman, the constant executive turn over, the bankruptcy of Saltzman, creative misfires, the changing world). But they always manage to pull it back... they find a Roger Moore, or a Pierce Brosnan in the 90s, or after Man with the Golden Gun pull out The Spy Who Loved Me, after Die Another Day do Casino Royale.  When Pierce demands $25 million they change bonds. They don't go with James Brolin or James Gavin. They remain true to Bond.

Screenwriters come and go. They and hired then replaced then brought back again. They don't pick the latest hot director but someone who will fit. They keep costs down. They try to keep up to date but don't slavishly follow trends. They promoted from within.

Some films prove to have been particularly tricky - Die Another Day, Never Say Never Again. Dalton was fired at the behest of the US studio, not of his own accord. Brosnan asked for too much money and was fired.

Exhausting, exhaustive, but very good.

Movie review - "Skullduggery" (1970) **

Reynolds turned down MASH to do this - I get it wasn't the lead (the Tom Skerritt part) and Altman wasn't Altman then but still... Burt!

Maybe he was swayed by dreams of Planet of the Apes which surely must have been on the minds of the makers - a smart adventure tale about the human condition. It's about a trip into New Guinea to find the missing link - they succeed and there's some philosophical questions.

There are some good ideas - it's not a stock jungle film- but it's fatally compromised in several ways: filming in Jamaica instead of New Guinea (I get that it was logistically tricky... they just should have relocated it, because it loses too much reality), lack of a cohesive vision (director Richard Wilson was fired early into the shoot), crap make up for the apes, a confusing storyline, punches being pulled when it comes to humans falling for the apes (there is human ape sex!) and a deux ex machina with Reynolds on trial being saved by a convenient death.

Aussies will get a kick out of a cricket match being played by New Guinean/Jamaican locals and Chips Rafferty as a missionary.

Reynolds has solid chemistry with Susan Clark, who is very good as one of the expedition.

Apparently Lorenzo Semple worked on the script (according to a Reynolds interview) but he isn't credited.

Movie review - "Life After Flash" (2018) ***

Fun documentary which focuses on the life of Sam Jones, in particular his Flash Gordon experience.Tricky up bringing (dad was a boozer, and they often tend to be for movie stars), he grew into a good looking dude which got him work in films, lept to fame with Flash Gordon, grew a big head which meant he went on strike (to make sure he got paid, he says, as if he shouldn't have been willing to do a film like this for nothing), got re-voiced, went into a career dip, bounced back (The Highwayman years), then dipped again, lost his way, had a problem with money, women and his temper.

Eventually found a good marriage, moved to the more psychologically healthy city of San Diego, and got a new career doing security - so he gets to be a he man and act in a way. Loves doing conventions - I enjoyed footage seeing him boss around the volunteers, and also praying to himself that he wouldn't lose his temper.

The running time is flashed out with people talking about the film and its impact on them - two comics are the most fun, perhaps too much time is devoted to random actors who had short roles in the movie. People like Robert Rodriguez talk as well as hard core collectors of things from the film.

I really enjoyed seeing Peter Wyngarde (as bitchily funny as you'd expect, though he seems to be sick... and indeed died not long after - it's funny to hear him talk about demanding his character live so he could be in sequels), Topol, Rafella de Laurentiis, Brian May, Melody Anderson (who seems a lovely person) and especially Brain Blessed, who is everything you'd imagine him to be - loud, boisterous, a bit naughty. Great fun.

Movie review - "Flash Gordon" (1980) **** (re-viewing)

Saw it at the Egyptian with Sam Jones and Melody Anderson there. Both are nice. This is a fun movie, with that fantastic music and set design and tongue in cheek. Everyone is in good form - Jones, even though dubbed, is big and dope and likeable and well matchd by Anderson despite her 1980 travel agent outfit... they're two naive kids who find each other.

Topol is great fun, better than Warren Oates would've been - Max Von Sydow, Patrick Wyngarde, Brian Blessed, Tim Dalton, Ornella Muti... they're all fantastic. Some of the effects now creak but it has a magic about it. I liked the serious stuff too like Dalton going to Flash "where you lead I follow". Guy cry!

Script review - "Flash Gordon" by Lorenzo Semple First Draft (1979)

Much was changed in terms of dialogue and also tone - Flash and Dale are a bit more raunchy, whereas in the film they were more sweet. But the basic structure is the same - crashing the plane, meeting Zarkov, going up, meeting Ming, only surviving because Aura wants Flash, Flash vs Barin, Dale vs Ming, the hawkman helping at the end.

It's a fun read and there's some things I wish had been in the film like Amazon Warriors. Tiger Man has a big role as an ally of Flash but he doesn't do that much.

Movie review - "Fathom" (1967) **

Raquel Welch was one of the last film stars created by a studio - kind of. Under contract to 20th Century Fox, her PR pictures were getting a lot of attention so they were considering putting her in Our Man Flint as The Girl before deciding to cast her in a support role in Fantastic Voyage (as The Girl). She was borrowed by Hammer to appear in One Million Years BC where the famous still of her in a fur bikini made her a star, at least in PR terms. Enthused, Fox decided to give her her own vehicle, this spy spoof.

James Bond movies and their rip offs were hugely popular in the mid 60s - so much so that there was a sub genre of female spy movies: Modesty Blaise, Caprice, this. Welch is a sky diver who is hired by a mysterious agent (Ronald Fraser) and his offsider (Richard Briers) to find a maguffin, a nuclear triggering mechanism.

Some not particularly colourful or well budgeted adventures follow, with Welch coming up against a mysterious American (Tony Franciosa), comic Armenian (Clive Reville) and brooding Tom Adams (briefly the star of his own spy series). There's also a Chinese Secret Service agent, Greta Chi and Australia's own Reg Lye.

The film was written by Lorenzo Semple Jnr, whose work I often like, including the film of Batman; that was directed by Leslie Martinson, who also directed this. This has a similar campy tone with Revill's performance being particularly over the top. It could have done with more gags - or excitement. Or logic really.

The film is seems most inspired by is Charade with an adventurous heroine who is continually rescued by a handsome leading man who may be good or bad.

Welch isn't very good but she does look great - wearing a series of sky diving outfits, low cut outfits and bikinis, plus large hair. Annoying her character is saved a lot by Franciosa (in a bull ring, on a plane), who is a better actor but not as strong a personality - the role required someone more charming. And he calls her "poppet" too often, it gets on the nerves. I enjoyed Welch more than Franciosa and the two don't have much chemistry.

Fraser and Briers give the support cast some class.

Movie review - "The Honeymoon Machine" (1961) ***

Steve McQueen became known for playing Mr Cool but he's a lot of fun - if admittedly not entirely comfortably cast - in this breezy service comedy, an enormously popular genre in the1950s (when the great bulk of the male population had spent time in uniform) which faded out in the 1960s.

It helps that this has a decent plot, based on a play by Lorenzo Semple Jnr - McQueen and some mates (Jim Hutton, Jack Mullaley) pinch a top navy computer in order to help them win at the casino. While there McQueen romances Brigid Bazlen (not a familiar face - she was Salome in King of Kings - but bright and pretty), who is the daughter of admiral Dean Jagger; Hutton hooks up with his ex, Paula Prentiss, and they all set out to make a lot of money.

I wish they'd given Mullaley a girl to have a romance with and our lead characters are far too passive at the end - I also didn't like how Bazlen gott McQueen out of trouble simply by saying "I love him", and I wish more had been done with the Russians. But it's energetic and colourful, Jagger is a strong antagonist and I loved the camaraderie that exists between the four leads. Prentiss is a stand out as the short sighted heiress determined to nab Hutton come what may (she reminded me of Alison Janney) - they do steal the film from McQueen and Bazlen, but those two are no slouches either.

Movie review - "Pretty Poison" (1968) *** (warning: spoilers)

A highly regarded cult film didn't blow me away as much as it's reputation - I think this would be different if I'd stumbled upon it as, say, Pauline Kael seemed to do. Anthony Perkins and especially Tuesday Weld are very good in the lead roles - Perkins is doing a variation of his Norman Bates, but that's always fun, and it's still a performance not a hammy excess. He probably was getting a bit too old, as was Weld (imagine them both eight or so years earlier) but she's very pretty and engaging sociopathic.

The gimmick of the piece is that Perkins starts off as the weird one - prone to arson and making up lies about his CIA connections - but he's soon outmatched by Weld, who kills a nightwatchman then (in the best scene) her own mother. It's a strong gimmick, which has been used much in the past 20 years, especially in the VHS/DVD era.

It's badly directed, like an episode of a 60s TV show, with an ugly look to match. Also some of it's clunky and not as original as it once was. Still, worth checking out especially if you are interested in Tuesday Weld.

Movie review – “Flash Gordon” (1980) ****

I’ve always loved this movie ever since I saw it as a kid and even allowing for viewing it through nostalgic-coloured glasses, I really think it holds up. It’s bold, comic book colours and expressionistic production design have aged very well. The script is tight and fairly races along, full of vivid characters, played by a very strong cast. Innocent eyed Sam Jones and Melody Anderson didn’t have the greatest careers but they are terrific as Flash and Dale, two innocents abroad in outer space – you totally understand why they fall in love pretty much during the first conversation, although both aren’t immune to the charms of other people. There was never a better mad scientist than Topol, a more imposing emperor than Max von Sydow, a sexier princess than Ornella Muti (you totally buy she’d defy her father for a bit of crumpet), a more dashing second heroic lead than Timothy Dalton, a more engaging general and leader than Brian Blessed (in the archetypal Brian Blessed role).

There’s so many bits about this movie I love: the opening comic book credits; the acid rain at the beginning; “Monson” running away from Zarkov; Queen’s beautiful score; the football game sequence; that buzzer thing that zaps people in Ming’s kingdom; the relationship between Muti and Von Sydow (both highly sexed and ruthless); Timothy Dalton kissing Muti and calling her a lying bitch with admiration; the scene on the tree planet where people put their hands into an old log; the way Flash seems to make friends with everyone straight away including that guy in the swamp prison; the duel between Dalton and Jones; Dalton becoming a passionate admirer of Jones in about five seconds ("where you go, I will follow..." - talk about bromance); the bit where Flash flies through the clouds and the hawk men are waiting; Dalton running around corridors shooting henchmen with a gun (when I was a kid I would have given anything to run around corridors shooting henchmen with a gun); Flash proposing to Dale; Dale dressed as a concubine; all the propaganda about how wonderful humans are; the memorable deaths of the baddies. Great, imaginative fun. I can't believe it wasn't a bigger hit at the time - maybe it was too campy.

NB Mike Hodges got the directing gig because he was friends with Nic Roeg, who was originally going to direct - and Dino de Laurentiis wanted to talk to Hodges to do the sequel. I think Roeg would have made a marvellous film - but it's still one of Hodges' best.

Movie review - "King Kong" (1976) ** ½

Big budget remake of the classic doesn’t have the same sense of adventure and wonder. Jessica Lange is gorgeous but her character a bit of a ninny to really care about – Jeff Bridges’ hunky eco-friendly photographer could do better. Charles Grodin needed to chew the scenery more. The ape at times looks half believable other times very fake. Some funny moments and the story is still good – but Kong finding Lange at random in New York. Touching finale.