Yvonne de Carlo isn't remembered as a great star but from 1945 to 1951 or thereabouts she toplined a bunch of Universal action films, normally in technicolor. She's best remembered for her turns in film noirs like Brute Force and Criss Cross but in those movies she had support parts; in these she drove the action.
Here she's a damsel who is captured by a pirate - another version of the famed Lafitte. The bloke who plays her is some guy called Philip Friend, an English actor who had a decent career - but really didn't have the charisma for a leading man. This was his big chance and he's not up to it.
Fortunately there's a very strong gallery of supporting characters - Elsa Lancaster as a (surprise) eccentric old thing who befriends de Carlo; Robert Douglas as a nasty shipping magnate; Norman Lloyd as his secretary; Henry Daniell as a villainous captain. It's an excellent line up.
De Carlo is vivacious, looks good and sings a bunch of times - her real voice too, she was an opera person. As much as I like her films I don't think she was a top rank star - there's something about her that lacked great individuality, for me at any rate. Sometimes she could blend into the background a bit too much; for all her beauty and spirit, there's something about her that doesn't quite draw the eye. I think Maureen O'Hara was better at this sort of stuff. She is fun.
Its colourful, with good production values and there's a bit of action. I liked the setting of New Orleans around the time of Lafitte (Friend's buccaneer is based on that pirate).
The main problem, apart from the casting of Friend, is the story, which is needlessly and confusingly complicated. All the elements are there: Friend lives a sort of Scarlet Pimpernel existence, as a pirate and a respectable person on land; Friend has a bitchy fiance who hates de Carlo. But it isn't quite smoothed over.
I was unsure of the context and what was going on at times. Also I got what Friend's character was doing but not de Carlo's... was she out for money? Love? What was her character? She was really the protagonist - this needed to be fleshed out more. The film was geared too much to Friend.
Still, a decent second-tier swashbuckler from Universal when they were really strong in this area.
Monday, November 06, 2017
Saturday, November 04, 2017
Movie review - "Bear Island" (1979) ** (warning: spoilers)
The money really was wasted. I mean, I appreciate they went and shot in the icy wilds - there's some spectacular locations: glaciers, fjords, all that stuff. It looks terrific. But at its heart this is a film about a bunch of people stuck in a room struggling to get outside - you could've filmed a lot more of it inside if you wanted to save money and I think provided you'd given those scenes some atmosphere you wouldn't have cared too much.
Cast wise it's very much a B team - good actors to be sure but hardly big box office, and all so old: Donald Sutherland is the hero, Vanessa Redgrave is wasted as the girl (basically), Richard Widmark, Christopher Lee and Lloyd Bridges all handled different accents.
There's some decent action - snowmobiles zipping around, the odd fight, a chase on a boat at the end.
The main problem is I just didn't care. There were too many scenes of people in parkas where their faces were hidden (may be accurate, but hard to make an emotional connection). The stakes were old Nazi gold which I guess is okay - just not as good as something like, say, beating the Nazis in war time.
It was also hard to engage with any of the characters. Donald Sutherland didn't seem particularly interested with what was going on - no one did. MacLean came up with some decent twists in the past- like in Puppet on a String the heroin addicted girl being show to putting it on etc. But here you know it's going to be Widmark or Bridges so when its Bridges, its like "so what"?
It's not terrible, not a disaster just a B movie.
Friday, November 03, 2017
Movie review - "Puppet on a Chain" (1971) ** (warning: spoilers)
1960s Alistair MacLean adaptations featured top rank stars, and excellent behind the scenes talent. The 1970s version tended to be B list efforts - you'd have stars like Barry Newman and David Birney. Here is some bloke called Sven-Bertil Taube as an "American" agent poking around Amsterdam trying to crack a drug ring.
That means he basically walks around Amsterdam following dodgy people, encountering addicts. There's some tsk-tsk-ing from older characters about rampart use of drugs among young people which wouldn't be out of place in a 1930s film (although from memory this wasn't uncommon in action novels aimed at middle aged men that came out in the 60s through 80s).
It's not a very good movie. The pace is plodding, the story uninteresting. Taube lacks charisma. There's little humour and not much action in the first healf - the odd fist fight. The best thing about it is the photography and the Amsterdam locations - these are pretty good.
Barbara Perkins is pretty as the girl who helps Taube. I didn't quite buy she'd fit in as an undercover operative - too American for someone working in Holland. The girl who plays a girl whose brains have been so raddled by heroin she's childlike isn't terribly convincing, to put it politely. Alexander Knox is very good.
In the second half things pick up. There's a few decent twists: the execution of Parkins; the reveal of a reverend as a baddy (this actually wasn't such a surprise); the double reveal of a head cop and his heroin addicted niece as baddies. There's a justifiably famous boat chase, which was shot by Don Sharp (who also did some other sequences on the film), and less talk and more thumping... and you can see what sort of movie this might have made: more action, more like Bond, less bad acting.
That means he basically walks around Amsterdam following dodgy people, encountering addicts. There's some tsk-tsk-ing from older characters about rampart use of drugs among young people which wouldn't be out of place in a 1930s film (although from memory this wasn't uncommon in action novels aimed at middle aged men that came out in the 60s through 80s).
It's not a very good movie. The pace is plodding, the story uninteresting. Taube lacks charisma. There's little humour and not much action in the first healf - the odd fist fight. The best thing about it is the photography and the Amsterdam locations - these are pretty good.
Barbara Perkins is pretty as the girl who helps Taube. I didn't quite buy she'd fit in as an undercover operative - too American for someone working in Holland. The girl who plays a girl whose brains have been so raddled by heroin she's childlike isn't terribly convincing, to put it politely. Alexander Knox is very good.
In the second half things pick up. There's a few decent twists: the execution of Parkins; the reveal of a reverend as a baddy (this actually wasn't such a surprise); the double reveal of a head cop and his heroin addicted niece as baddies. There's a justifiably famous boat chase, which was shot by Don Sharp (who also did some other sequences on the film), and less talk and more thumping... and you can see what sort of movie this might have made: more action, more like Bond, less bad acting.
Movie review - "Race for the Yankee Zephyr" (1981) **
I remember wanting to enjoy this as a kid because of its great title and concept but being underwhelmed by it. It remains underwhelming, with a great title and concept.
Brian Trenchard Smith was apparently flown to New Zealand for a day to keep director David Hemmings in line. It's a shame Trenchard Smith couldn't take over because he'd have brought the right light touch that this needs. Hemmings' work is fairly ordinary.
Brian May's score feels brooding and the playing isn't there. Donald Pleasance is ideal in the Walter Brennan part, and George Peppard camps things up as he's been asked to. Ken Wahl is a good looking guy with some charisma but isn't quite right here - he's a bit lumbering or something. (At times I wished Peppard was playing Wahl's role and Hemmings was playing the villain). Lesley Ann Warren feels wasted - I get she's meant to be a good girl who gets a bit naughty but she lacks a scene that's hers; a bathtub moment or an action scene or something.
The plot is fairly simple - Peppard chases the gang of three. It could've done with a twist like the betrayal of a friend or a death or some other reversal - like the government being involved, or a widow of one of the dead pilots coming along or something. I guess Pleasance is captured but that doesn't feel too major.
The scenery is stunning, there's some awesome camera work. Bruno Lawrence pops up as Peppard's henchmen. It is a film that just wants to entertain you, I'll give it that.
Brian Trenchard Smith was apparently flown to New Zealand for a day to keep director David Hemmings in line. It's a shame Trenchard Smith couldn't take over because he'd have brought the right light touch that this needs. Hemmings' work is fairly ordinary.
Brian May's score feels brooding and the playing isn't there. Donald Pleasance is ideal in the Walter Brennan part, and George Peppard camps things up as he's been asked to. Ken Wahl is a good looking guy with some charisma but isn't quite right here - he's a bit lumbering or something. (At times I wished Peppard was playing Wahl's role and Hemmings was playing the villain). Lesley Ann Warren feels wasted - I get she's meant to be a good girl who gets a bit naughty but she lacks a scene that's hers; a bathtub moment or an action scene or something.
The plot is fairly simple - Peppard chases the gang of three. It could've done with a twist like the betrayal of a friend or a death or some other reversal - like the government being involved, or a widow of one of the dead pilots coming along or something. I guess Pleasance is captured but that doesn't feel too major.
The scenery is stunning, there's some awesome camera work. Bruno Lawrence pops up as Peppard's henchmen. It is a film that just wants to entertain you, I'll give it that.
Wednesday, November 01, 2017
Could Margaret Lockwood's career have been saved?
I've been thinking about Margaret Lockwood lately, as you do (okay no one does except me) - in particular, about what went wrong with her career after the triumph of The Wicked Lady. The most popular star in Britain at what was arugably the high point of the British film industry... within ten years her name was thought to repel audiences from Cast a Dark Shadow.
During World War Two Lockwood's resume was full of hits, notably the Gainsborough melodramas - The Man from Grey, Wicket Lady, Love Story. She was also in some well received other kinds of films such as Dear Octopus and I'll Be Your Sweetheart.
Let's look what followed:
*Bedelia (1946) - which could and should have been right her up her alley (she played a murderess) but was hurt by some odd scripting decisions and inadequate casting
*Hungry Hill (1947) - should have been a blockbuster but the film lacked focus - it needed to be about Lockwood's character through and through but instead she pops in and out of it
*Jassy (1947) - did okay at the box office - a half success - but could've done better. Again, the movie lacked focus. Was Lockwood good or evil or what? It felt like a movie that didn't know what it really was.
*The White Unicorn (1947) - I haven't seen this film yet. It's about delinquent girls.It was a melodrama. Didn't sound very exciting.
*Look Before You Love (1948) - I haven't seen this either but it sounds terrible.
*Cardboard Cavalier (1949) - Lockwood tries comedy but instead of using a well worn source material she decides to play foil to Sid Field. It's not a very good movie.
* Madness of the Heart (1949) - not a bad melodrama, though it has a poor rap. Lacks big name co-stars.
*Highly Dangerous (1950) - an attempt to make a Lady Vanishes style film but it never seems sure of her tone.
She then made three poorly received films for Herbert Wilcox, and basically ceased to be a star.
So anyway what happened to Lockwood's career? What could she have done differently?
I'll try not to be too harsh in hindsight here but it seems her main errors were
*Not featuring against bigger stars. Most of her late 40s movies lacked names- no Phyllis Calvert, no Stewart Granger or James Mason. You had people like Denis Price, Dermot Walsh, Griffin Jones, Dane Clark.... very much the second eleven. Nothing wrong with making a trashy movie but the trashier films generally need stars.
*She should have been the focus of more of her films. Hungry Hill and Jassy in particular pulled against the fact they needed to be women's pictures, about women.
*She should've tried Hollywood. I understand her reluctance, but the material was simply better. Interestingly all the big British stars of the late 1940s - Mason, Granger, Anna Neagle, Michael Wilding - suffered when the 1950s came in, in Britain. The only ones to survive were those who went to Hollywood and stayed. (Phyllis Calvert and Patricia Roc gave it a go but didn't stay).
Margaret Lockwood... a big star who should've been a LOT bigger.
During World War Two Lockwood's resume was full of hits, notably the Gainsborough melodramas - The Man from Grey, Wicket Lady, Love Story. She was also in some well received other kinds of films such as Dear Octopus and I'll Be Your Sweetheart.
Let's look what followed:
*Bedelia (1946) - which could and should have been right her up her alley (she played a murderess) but was hurt by some odd scripting decisions and inadequate casting
*Hungry Hill (1947) - should have been a blockbuster but the film lacked focus - it needed to be about Lockwood's character through and through but instead she pops in and out of it
*Jassy (1947) - did okay at the box office - a half success - but could've done better. Again, the movie lacked focus. Was Lockwood good or evil or what? It felt like a movie that didn't know what it really was.
*The White Unicorn (1947) - I haven't seen this film yet. It's about delinquent girls.It was a melodrama. Didn't sound very exciting.
*Look Before You Love (1948) - I haven't seen this either but it sounds terrible.
*Cardboard Cavalier (1949) - Lockwood tries comedy but instead of using a well worn source material she decides to play foil to Sid Field. It's not a very good movie.
* Madness of the Heart (1949) - not a bad melodrama, though it has a poor rap. Lacks big name co-stars.
*Highly Dangerous (1950) - an attempt to make a Lady Vanishes style film but it never seems sure of her tone.
She then made three poorly received films for Herbert Wilcox, and basically ceased to be a star.
So anyway what happened to Lockwood's career? What could she have done differently?
I'll try not to be too harsh in hindsight here but it seems her main errors were
*Not featuring against bigger stars. Most of her late 40s movies lacked names- no Phyllis Calvert, no Stewart Granger or James Mason. You had people like Denis Price, Dermot Walsh, Griffin Jones, Dane Clark.... very much the second eleven. Nothing wrong with making a trashy movie but the trashier films generally need stars.
*She should have been the focus of more of her films. Hungry Hill and Jassy in particular pulled against the fact they needed to be women's pictures, about women.
*She should've tried Hollywood. I understand her reluctance, but the material was simply better. Interestingly all the big British stars of the late 1940s - Mason, Granger, Anna Neagle, Michael Wilding - suffered when the 1950s came in, in Britain. The only ones to survive were those who went to Hollywood and stayed. (Phyllis Calvert and Patricia Roc gave it a go but didn't stay).
Margaret Lockwood... a big star who should've been a LOT bigger.
John Carpenter in Concert
I was lucky enough to see John Carpenter in concert at the Hollywood Palladium last night. It was great fun - a very entertaining show. Wonderful to be in a packed room full of Carpenter buffs who clearly knew and loved his films.
Not a super long set. It was lovely to see Carpenter bopping around, feeding off the crowd's reaction. How many other directors would you pay to see in concert? Actually probably a few for me... but Carpenter is a skilled musician, whose tunes form an integral part of the mood of his movies. They played clips from his films on a screen in the background.
From memory the set list was like this:
* 'Escape from New York' title track - great choice, really got the night off to a good start.
* 'Assault on Precinct 13' - good follow up - the clips included killing the girl. Jeez!
* 'The Fog'
*'Village of the Damned'
* 'The Thing' - he made sure he credited the writer
* some songs from 'Lost Themes' i.e. Carpenter was like most older musicians, sneaking in the newer tracks after some hits. Audience enjoyed them though - and they are good songs.
* 'Starman' which Carpenter proclaimed "is my only love story!'
* 'In the Mouth of Madness' - a more rocking song... I don't normally like his rock and roll in films but it worked well live
* 'Porkchop Express' from Big Trouble in Little China - great live song
*'They Live' got a great response
*something from Body Bags which I've never seen
*'Halloween' - of course big rise
He went away and came back from an encore where he played
* 'Santiago' from Vampires
* 'Prince of Darkness'
* song from Christine. He ended the show saying "take care on the roads, watch out for Christine... " then launched into the song.
I think I've got all the songs down. The order may not be right.
Nothing from Dark Star or Ghosts of Mars or Memoirs of an Invisible Man, but I was very happy with what I got. He looked like he was having fun and so did the audience.
Not a super long set. It was lovely to see Carpenter bopping around, feeding off the crowd's reaction. How many other directors would you pay to see in concert? Actually probably a few for me... but Carpenter is a skilled musician, whose tunes form an integral part of the mood of his movies. They played clips from his films on a screen in the background.
From memory the set list was like this:
* 'Escape from New York' title track - great choice, really got the night off to a good start.
* 'Assault on Precinct 13' - good follow up - the clips included killing the girl. Jeez!
* 'The Fog'
*'Village of the Damned'
* 'The Thing' - he made sure he credited the writer
* some songs from 'Lost Themes' i.e. Carpenter was like most older musicians, sneaking in the newer tracks after some hits. Audience enjoyed them though - and they are good songs.
* 'Starman' which Carpenter proclaimed "is my only love story!'
* 'In the Mouth of Madness' - a more rocking song... I don't normally like his rock and roll in films but it worked well live
* 'Porkchop Express' from Big Trouble in Little China - great live song
*'They Live' got a great response
*something from Body Bags which I've never seen
*'Halloween' - of course big rise
He went away and came back from an encore where he played
* 'Santiago' from Vampires
* 'Prince of Darkness'
* song from Christine. He ended the show saying "take care on the roads, watch out for Christine... " then launched into the song.
I think I've got all the songs down. The order may not be right.
Nothing from Dark Star or Ghosts of Mars or Memoirs of an Invisible Man, but I was very happy with what I got. He looked like he was having fun and so did the audience.
Friday, October 27, 2017
Script review - "Say Anything" by Cameron Crowe
Crowe has written four classics in his career - Fast Times, this, Jerry Maguire and Almost Famous. This is a lovely simple story - it's just boy meets girl, but all the characters and scenes are fresh. Lloyd Dobler is unique - army brat, kick boxer (put in to make him seem less whimpy?), romantic, best friend with girls, impulsive, passionate. Diane is fantastic - beautiful, a nerd, adores being loved,loyal. The dad is good too - self righteous, loving, good for his old people patients, a crook.
Full of quirky touches, like the lawyers dealing, the relationship between Lloyd's mate Corey and her emotionally abusive ex Joe (I like the songs she sings about him), the school teacher who asks out Diane, the moment Diane realises how much she's missed out at school, the old person's home songs. Lloyd does get a bit "stalk-y" in one or two moments.
A lovely movie.
Full of quirky touches, like the lawyers dealing, the relationship between Lloyd's mate Corey and her emotionally abusive ex Joe (I like the songs she sings about him), the school teacher who asks out Diane, the moment Diane realises how much she's missed out at school, the old person's home songs. Lloyd does get a bit "stalk-y" in one or two moments.
A lovely movie.
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