Movie review - "Hell to Eternity" (1961) ***

 Some theatre owners looked at the money coined by To Hell and Back and hopped on the bandwagon with another true life WW2 story. It has the edge in that it's about a man raised by a Japanese family so it tackles the treatment of Japanese. Jeffrey Hunter plays that role. David Janssen is a sergeant.

The film takes it's time, over two hours. This makes for an effective first act where Hunter grows up we get to know the family. Act two is terrible - Hunter and his mates on leave, dancing with some women. This is slightly bizarre. Act three is the Battle of Saipan - epic and well done.  Karlson has a gift for violent scenes it's full of memorable moments.

Movie review - "A Time for Killing" (1967) **

 I only watched this because Roger Corman was fired as director shortly into filming. I wonder why he wanted to make it - to do a bigger budgeted Western I suppose. It's unremarkable, really - Phil Karlson took over - although it has some good actors. George Hamilton is good as a Confederate officer who leads an escape from a POW camp right at the end of the war and tries to escape with his troops into Mexico. Hamilton is a bit of a fantatic. He's pursued by Glenn Ford, looking constipated as he was want to do. Inger Stevens is a girl of Ford's who is taken by Hamilton, who then rapes her to keep Ford angry at him and his men to keep the war going.

The cast is interesting. People pop up like Timothy Crey, Kenneth Tobey, a young Harrison Ford, Dick Miller, Max Baer, Harry Deean Stanton (billed as "Dean Stanton").

Ford can be good but phones this in. Stevens is competent. Hamilton presses. Nicely shot although the occasional obivous studio-for-location work jars. It's a downer of a movie. Everyone dies so pointlessly.

Apparently Robert Towne worked on the script. And that work impressed Warren Beatty who read the script (he was offered the lead, turned it down)

Movie review - "The Brothers Rico" (1957) *** (warning: spoilers)

 Phil Karlson noir about which I knew nothing which was the way to see it. Based on a George Simeneon story, which I haven't read, but it's a good basic plot: Richard Conte is a former mob accountant, now successful businessman, who is lured back into the Family by the fact two of his brothers work there. His former boss grew up with them so Conte assumes it will all be sweet, as the boss assumes - but they're actually out to kill one of the brothers.

James Darren is effective as the youngest brother, married to Kathryn Grant. Conte is okay. Paul Picerni is good as the middle brother. 

Larry Gates is very good as the mob boss - it's a scary organisation as the brothers won't talk and wouldn't ever talk but Gates doesn't care. Harry Bellaver as an associated crime boss is also superb.

The happy ending doesn't really work - two brothers are killed, really Conte should die too and his mother not Conte should kill Gates.

Movie review - "Five Against the House" (1955) **1/2

Phil Karlson's Columbia thrillers have a deserved cult these days. This has the benefit of a bright idea - four over age college students (two are Korean War veterans) get an idea to rob a casino for a bit of a lark. I thought maybe this might work more if they were bored veterans in the suburbs but college students does work as one is clearly attracted by the mental challenge (Kerwin Matthews), one is a bored f-wit (Alvy Moore), another has bad PTSD (Brian Keith). I guess it's three - there's a moral fourth one (Guy Madison) in love with a singer (Kim Novak).

Guy Madison was quite good - he has a no-nonsense persona, a little lightweight but he's used well. Keith is excellent. The film would've been better with a better actor in the Matthews role, a less annoying actor in the Moore role, and if Madison's and Novak's characters had been more greedy. The film kind of gets worse as it goes on - it gets lighter. There's no threat. Keith goes mad but doesn't kill anyone. No one dies. Madison persuades him to give himself up. 

Why don't they make Novak bad? Or have her kidnapped? Or kill someone? Or have a big baddie? William Conrad looks great as a casino operative but he's not used enough. Location filming in Reno helps.

The college students are boorish - picking on a freshman, whining, not working too hard.

Movie review - "Scandal Street" (1952) ***

 In the early 1950s Columbia (and a few other Hollywood studios) used to like to team old stars with new stars. This one reunites Broderick Crawford and John Derek, who'd been in All the Kings Men together - though Derek had become a slightly bigger 'name' since.

It's directed by Phil Karlson who made Mask of the Avenger with Derek, and produced by Edward Small. Based on the novel 'The Dark Page" by Sam Fuller.

It's a decent thriller. Crawford kills his ex wife and Derek investigates it. Reed is the voice of reason. Derek is alright - someone like John Payne would've been better. Crawford is one note but has great presence. Stylish photograph. Well handled by Karlson.

Fuller complained about what was done to his book and I'm sure he would've done a better version but this was entertaining.

Movie review - "Mask of the Avenger" (1951) **

 Phil Karlson is known for his tough crime films and Westerns but at Columbia he made some swashbucklers - this and Lorna Doone. It's a sort of sequel to The Count of Monte Cristo - John Derek is the son of a count (I don't think it's the count, but we see a statue of the count so it's in that universe) who is murdered by Anthony Quinn, who the count discovered was embezzling. John Derek pretends to go along with it but then puts on a mask and gets busy with derring do.

Quinn acts with panache, clearly well aware he should be playing the lead but also that he has the best part. Jody Lawrance is fun as the girl. In the final sword fight between Derek and Quinn there's a bit where Lawrence takes over sword fighting duties while Derek is momentarily injured - that's cute never seen that before. I think Karlson had a soft spot for Lawrence. Or maybe he felt she had more life than Derek, who is pretty though not that lively.

In Derek's defence he doesn't have much to play. When it started off and he was pretended to be injured yet running around swashbuckling I thought 'oh he's going the Zorro route' and that would've given him something to play - pretending to be cowardly, falling in love with Lawrance who doesn't know the truth, etc. But he just puts on a mask and tells Lawrence who he is pretty quickly.

This is fine. Decent production values.

Movie review - "The Brigand" (1952) **1/2

I didn't mind this - better than Lorna Doone with a stronger story and support cast. It's ostensibly based on an Alexander Dumas tale but surely the greater inspiration was The Prisoner of Zenda.

The lead offers an acting challenge to Anthony Dexter who can't do it. He was a handsome enough guy cast as Valentino by Edward Small and Small gave him a few more chances. At times Dexter works - he's believable as a lounge lizard king not so much as the decent officer who imitates him.

A lot of plot but the basic impersonation is solid. Anthony Quinn adds clash, dash and verve as the villain - he should have played the lead he would've been marvellous. Ron Randell would have been better too - he's got a thankless part as a sort of helpful officer, a little like the role David Niven played in the 1937 Zenda.

There's bright colours and action. I wasn't wild about Jody Lawrence as the dopey princess but Gale Robbins was a lot of fun as a horny aristocrat.

Movie review - "Lorna Doone" (1951) **

This novel is a classic? Alright, sure, whatever. It's not a very good adaptation. At least it's in colour. There's no a lot of action. This is meant to be Western influenced by I felt the greatest influence was Robin Hood.

I'm not a massive Richard Greene fan - this may be more fun if you are. As a loyal Aussie I wish Ron Randell's part was bigger - he has some pleasant dash as Greene's... mentor I guess. Someone who is already an outlaw.

They should have made Randell the villain instead of William Bishop who is dull. Randell, Greene and Bishop all look alive. Couldn't one of them had a beard or something?

Barbara Hale, a cheery actress, feels very American - they would've been better off with a more English type actor. Or maybe someone who doesn't seem so contemporary.

There isn't even a particularly memorable Charles II. There is some neat stuff around waterfalls.

Movie review - "Gunman's Walk" (1957) **1/2 (warning: spoilers)

I recognise the quality of this - it's expertly put together. There's something not nice about it though. Maybe it lacks warmth despite being a family story. Gnarled rancher Van Heflin has two kids - bad Tab Hunter and good James Darren.

No one is entirely comfortable in Western garb but they acquit themselves fine. All the gasp-shock acting about half breeds got wearying especially as for all the film's ostensible anti racism the only Indian who gets a decent part is Kathryn Crosby and she's so clearly white and just plays an aw-gee type (aw gee I want to be a teacher).

Hunter is very good in an unsympathetic role. Darren isn't bad. Neither is Heflin. I apprecite the film showed some warmth between Hunter and Darren.
 
Solid ending where Heflin shoots Hunter dead then cries about it to Darren - this was moving.  It feels cheap. Low budget. I wasn't wild about it but recognise its professional sheen.

Movie review - "The Secret Ways" (1961) **

What a dull movie. MacLean's original novel wasn't perfect but it was full of pace, intrigue, twists and decent characters. It threw you right into it - the hero was on the run from page one. Here dull Richard Widmark rocks up, gets a mission, ambles into Vienna, then across the iron curtain.

There's some decent chase stuff in the middle and at the end - the final chase isn't bad. It needed more of his. There's strong actors.

But it's boring. Really boring. Trudge, trudge. Actors with accents. I couldn't tell the characters apart. One hot girl and less obviously hot girl. Widmark. Some Europeans.

Location filming helps but it's in black and white so even that isn't too great.

Movie review - "The Scarface Mob" (1962) ***

A two part episode for Westinghouse Desliu Playhouse this cost a lot and was cut together to make a feature film. It is very handsome for a 50s TV production - Desi Arnaz deficit financed to give it extra production value - there's plenty of extras, and shoot outs.

You've got crisp black and white photography, Phil Karlson's decent direction, Walter Winchell's staccato delivery narrating it, a striking sense of cynicism (it's constantly reinforced how apathetic the public are).

I was struck at the story similarities to the 1987 film version - Ness and Capone barely meet, Ness has a polite nice love interest (Pat Crowley), Ness has an ethnic sidekick cop whose death is the end of act two, the opening bit is a raid ruined by corruption, a slimy official tries to bribe Ness in his office.

It's not as good as the later film - less poetic and moving - but it works on its own terms. Most of the Untouchables are indistinguishable except for Wynn with his vaguely comic accent. It has the pleasures of late 50s gangster tales - well done studio settings, tough actors spitting out dialogue, violence, character actors playing weasel informants and strippers.

Movie review - "Ride the Wild Surf" (1964) **1/2 (warning: spoilers)

This is a beach movie which is a bit more critically respectable because it has some excellent real life footage of surfing in Hawaii. It is flawed - Tom Lisanti thinks its the best surf movie from Hollywood. I don't really like it - maybe I prefer  my beach movies more junky.

Some random observations:
 * great Jan and Dean title track - but they should have played it over the opening credits to get the movie off to a brighter start
* there's a lot of three girls beach movies but this is one of the few "three guys" movies
* some excellent surfing footage but its intercut terribly with footage of the stars on the backlot
* the film gets points for being more multicultural - there's a Hawaiian surfer, and an Aussie (Murray Rose) - and also for incorporating some slang and attitudes, however badly
* Jim Mitchum is meant to be the baddy but actually the nastiest character is some random surfer called Frank ( played by Anthony Hayes) who keeps baiting Fabian - I kept expecting him to die or something but he doesn't - some undercooked drama there
* Fabian is fine, though not terribly believable as a surfer - well not a top surfer - and he has to glower and be bitter a bit too much - also there's a yuck moment where he tries to force himself on Fabares
* there's three nice romances but badly constructed scenes - Fabian goes from "I hate college" to "okay I'll go back to college" in one scene (admittedly Shelley Fabares is looking hot in the scene but still), Hunter and Hart's mother is clunk too - all the stories have good potential but the writing isn't good
* actually dramatically the whole flow of the film feels a bit wonky
* the women have nice camaraderie but the guys don't - they don't feel like friends - in part because Tab Hunter is so clearly older than the others
* Barbara Eden is a lot of fun as a kook and is even allowed to beat up Brown - though she spends most of the film watching him on a towel
* Fabares and Hart are very sweet - Fabares is more professional but Hart does have a great shimmy dance (she'd repeat in Pajama Party)

Movie review - "Shanghai Cobra" (1945) **1/2

Maybe two and a half stars is a bit much but after the first couple of Charlie Chan Monogram Pictures the extra energy provided by director Phil Karlson came as a relief. I'm trying not to be too wise after the event, knowing Karlson went on to a very fine directorial career, but he's clearly putting in more effort than Phil Rosen - the camera actually moves around in a few scenes, there's some decent atmosphere with the murder via cobra. 

The mystery is once again solid - I think George Callahan, whose name appears on a lot of these, was a decent writer. Sidney Toler tries to be animated in a few scenes but still isn't much chop. There's comic relief once more from Mantan Moreland and Benson Fong (as Tommy Chan).

Movie review - "Hell's Island" (1955) **

John Payne and Phil Karlson were both dab hands at film noir, often together. This one doesn't quite make it.

It has its moments - such as an interesting opening where Payne is shot by a man in a wheelchair and then explains to a cop while smoking in an operating theatre (!) about what happened. It starts off well with Payne working in a casino and being asked by the man to find a ruby on a fictitious island.i

But once Payne arrives on the island, when the film gets better it gets more dull. There's too many scenes of him talking with his ex, Mary Murphy (who I wondered why didn't have a bigger career after The Wild One but after seeing her in this I know... she's just too ordinary, too girl next door). There's not enough plot.

The Maltese Falcon - which this aped - had lots going on: Sam Spade, his secretary, dead partner, partner's wife, Joel Cairo, Gutman, the gunman. This one has Murphy and the guy in the wheelchair and some crocodiles but that's about it.

It feels like it should be shot in black and white and made ten years ago. It's actually in colour and there's a few scenes outside but I felt the island setting wasn't really exploited - a few market scenes and a killer alligator lifted my hopes but there wasn't enough.

Movie review - Matt Helm#4 - "The Wrecking Crew" (1969) *1/2

The fourth and last (to date) Matt Helm film is tired, creaking along at a slow pace, unsure of where to pitch its jokes. Say what you will about the first one or two movies, they knew what they were - over the top Bond spoofs which played up Dean Martin's image as a drunken, lecherous crooner. This one they seem reluctant to go there, but don't know where else to aim either.

It has the benefit of Nigel Green as the villain plus some stunning girls - Sharon Tate as a klutzy assistant, Elke Sommer as the femme fetale, Nancy Kwan as another femme fetale.

But it's slow and dull and Tate, for all her beauty doesn't have the  spark of Stevens or Ann Margret. By the time it stumbled to an end I was falling asleep and when the end credits promised Helm's return in The Ravagers (never made) I was depressed.

Movie review - Matt Helm #1 - "The Silencers" (1966) **

A major inspiration for the Austin Powers movies, a series of James Bond spoofs starring Dean Martin as photographer/secret agent Matt Helm. I kept wanting to like this more than I did because it was so sixties, with all those show girls and garish colours and Dean Martin. There is something automatically endearing about a Bond spoof that figured "right - what the people want are girls, gadgets and gags so lets just give them heaps of that."

But it isn't very good. It ambles along without much excitement or eroticism and looks cheap with some unspectacular sets and action sequences. The running time feels padded with musical and dance numbers, many of which consist of Martin imagining himself singing.

Stella Stevens is good fun as a klutzy girl who may or may not be a double agent. There are attractive femmes including Cyd Charisse and Daliah Lavi plus decent male support cast including Victor Buono (main baddy) and Robert Webber. I liked the gun that shot the person who fired it. But it's a bit dumb.

Movie review – Elvis#10 - “Kid Galahad” (1962) ***

Elvis’ first remake. Elvis is, as usual, just out of the army – he moves back to the country region where he grew up, with the goal of becoming a mechanic. The big business in the area is a boxing training camp. Elvis gets work as a sparring partner and is revealed to be a top boxer. Luckily it’s a singing boxing camp (no kidding – the boxers sing in the evening) so he fits in.

There are familiar Elvis movie elements: he flirts with an elder woman, gets involved in fist fights, sings a song while driving (forcing Charles Bronson and Gig Young to listen – they do try to respond to this more than your usual Elvis-singing passenger) and becomes a boxer.

Elvis starts off playing a different sort of character in this – although a nice guy, Galahad is a fairly dumb country hick, open to exploitation. (Even Young’s nice sister, his romantic interest, seems mostly interested in him for sexual reasons rather than his brain.) But disappointingly this is not followed up on – Elvis becomes too confident and competent, which is great for the character but not so good for drama. I think they should have made up their mind – was Galahad meant to be naïve, or should he be Elvis’ normal snarly juvenile.

The film is set in a pine forest where people live in smart wooden houses – like the one James Mason had in North by Northwest. There is a touching scene when locals get proud of Elvis – although there’s always been a boxing camp in the area, he’s their first local champ, and it means a lot, which is sweet. Aussie viewers will enjoy the bit where Young tries to hype Elvis by lying that he won 17 knockouts in Australia.

This has one of Elvis’ strongest support cast - the line up including Gig Young (who I swear slurs his lines every now and then), Lola Albright, Ed Asner and Charles Bronson. It was great that Bronson became a film star but when he did Hollywood lost one of its best supporting actor, and he’s very good here – all craggy faced integrity. Some of the minor hoodlum parts are undercast.

The drama in this is pretty good and director Phil Karlson has flair for the violent bits, such as boxing sequences (especially the early ones with Elvis being pummeled) and when gangsters smash Bronson’s hands. Perhaps not coincidentally the musical numbers feel poorly integrated. Like Wild in the Country this didn’t actually need to be a musical. Entertaining film.

Movie review - "Kansas City Confidential" (1953) **1/2

I love it how in crime films everyone talks as though they're in a crime film - tough, slangy dialogue, gritted expression. 

I also love it when the villain has a decent plan, which the Mr Big (Preston Foster, who played a mountie in Northwest Frontier) does here - blackmail a bunch of crims into robbing a bank, then bust them and collect the reward money. Only problem is an ex-con who was blamed for the robbery (John Payne, best known as a 20th Century Fox featured lead but not bad here as a tough guy) goes looking for the real culprit. 

This gets off to a dynamic start, is very well directed by Phil Karlson, has some wonderful "faces", especially the baddies - Lee Van Cleef, Jack Elam (without a beard) and Neville Brand, that's a top line up in any book. Also the action confrontations, with brief spurts of violence are well done. (Post-Kefauver hearing gangster films all have a particular "vibe" to their violence - corrupt cops, slightly more sadistic, eg The Big Heat). 

But the script does get repetitive, particularly the last section in Mexico - there's a confrontation, then another confrontation, then another. 

Colleen Gray plays Foster's daughter with a sort of steely-eyed intensity reminiscent of untalented yet determined graduates from acting school you run into every year around the traps of co-op theatres.

Movie review - "Ride the Wild Surf" (1964) **1/2

This has a reputation as one of the better surf pictures. It doesn't start too well, with the trio of Fabian, Tab Hunter and Peter Brown not really believable as friends, and the surf footage suffering from some awkward back projection and intercutting between location and studio stuff. (There is a lot of location footage but it appears none of the leads went to Hawaii - so lots of doubles, some of it quite ingenious). But as the film goes on it improves - the three love stories all work, the players having charisma with each other.

Straight-laced Brown (a likeable actor, with a long list of undistinguished credits), hooks up with kookie Eden (who even beats him up as a meet cute - which partially makes up for the fact that for the rest of the film the girls watch the action sitting on towels). Working class Hunter hooks up with local Hawaiian Susan Hart (a very winning performance, without the stiffness that sometimes marked her AIP efforts) whose mother hates surfers. Chip on his shoulder Fabian (a sub-Elvis performance with even a semi-Elvis snarl, but for all that not bad) romances the enchanting Shelley Fabares - they have a particularly effective scene in a deserted shack after a rain storm. 

Jim Mitchum displays some charisma as a rival surfer and Aussie swimmer Murray Rose plays a sympathetic Aussie surfer called "Swag" (he gets a few lines, too). The surfing footage becomes more impressive the bigger the waves; the final surfing contest goes on a bit (though it did establish the "must conquer the big wave" template later used in Blue Crush). Why not play the Jan and Dean title song til the end?

Some interesting trivia from Tom Lisanti's book on beach movies
- Jan and Dean, then riding high with "Surf City", were meant to support Fabian - but after their friend kidnapped Frank Sinatra Jnr (partly using funds unknowingly loaned by Dean) they were kicked off the film and replaced with Hunter and Brown
- the producers, the Napoleons, went and shot two and half months of surf footage in Hawaii in late 1963/early 1964 then pitched the project to Coumbia who gave the go-ahead
- Art Napoloeon was the original director but shooting became a mess - the cast and crew complained and Napoleon was sacked as director - production was shut down and he was replaced by Don Taylor. Production later had to cease because of an impending tidal wave (which ended up missing the island).