Radio review - BP - "Blithe Spirit" (1952) **1/2

Noel Coward's classic play is probably actor proof, which is why it's been so popular among amateur companies over the years. That's not to say you can't give an average production, which is what this is. John Loder plays the lead role and he's strictly average - so is everyone else except Mildred Natwick as Madam Arcadi. The ending doesn't have Loder die - he just takes off, leaving his two dead wives as ghosts.

TV review – "The Tudors – Season 4" (2010) ****

This falls into two halves: Catherine Howard and Catherine Parr. The first half is sex and relationship stuff, with some terrific characters, especially Katherine (brilliantly played by Tasmin Archer) – sweet, sexy, thick as a plank, hungry for love, totally in over her head (I love it when Mary meets her for the first time - the expression on her face, "where did he find this one?"). There's also the smug, greedy Thomas Culpepper, so vile he rapes a peasant and kills her husband (and this apparently actually happened); Lady Rochford, who is in lust with Thomas and gets off arranging trysts between him and Katherine; the lecherous, angry Earl of Surrey (who seems to replace the "bad boy" role that was played by Charles in Season 1 and Sir Francis in Season 3 - he's a bit too old to be sexy though). This part ends with a rash of executions, including a hung drawn and quartering (of a snotty character so it's okay).

 

The finale as terrific tension, even though I knew the outcome – the central thrust is, will the King arrange for the execution of his last wife? And will Catherine Parr, who's been shanghaied into the marriage, be able to push through her protestant agenda? There's the torture and murder of Anne Askew (like most outlandish seeming things in this series it was the most true) and also a movingly pointless battle at Boulogne. I had no idea the Catholics came so close to taking over again during the last days of Henry VIII - Catherine Parr's place in history needs to be reconsidered.

 

There are some boring bits - Charles Brandon Duke of Suffolk ran out of usefulness a long time ago and seeing him brood again about the Pilgrimage of Grace is dull (no wonder his wife left him - is that a new actress playing the wife at the end under the veil? He does have a good death scene though.) 

 

The actors who play the Seymours don't kick goals in their parts - these felt undercooked. (A season 5, about the reign of Edward VI would surely have fixed this.) Jonathan Rhys-Meyers plays old through attitude and performance rather than make up, except for the last two episodes.

 

All in all a wonderful, enjoyable series - a great shame there's no Season 5 and 6. There's easily a season each in Edward and Mary's reign - the Seymours, Lady Jane Grey, Norfolk, Bloody Mary, princess Elizabeth, etc.

Movie review – “The Beach Girls and the Monster” (1964) *1/2

It didn’t take long for the success of Beach Party to spawn a number of imitators, of which this was one of the most weird. It belongs to an unusual Beach Party sub-genre – "Beach Party Horror", which also includes The Horror of Party Beach. 

This has the attraction of a Hollywood semi-legend in the cast – former Maria Montez co-star Jon Hall, who also directs (and offered up his house as a location). He's not much of a director to be honest - although he's not helped by the film being in black and white.

The plot involves a hilariously bad rubber suited monster going on a killing rampage along a beach - although to be fair the killer turns out to be a person in a rubber monster suit. There's a bit of Eugene O'Neil drama at the Jon Hall house - he plays a scientist whose younger wife is a tramp who hits on her step son (to Hall's first marriage) who just wants to go surfing, and there's some crippled sculptor there as well. So much drama!

There are some attractive girls and some surprisingly good songs apart from an atrocious ballad. There's also a lion puppet. Frank Sinatra Jnr helped provide some of the music. A lot of fun despite being appalling - there are plenty of beach girls and surfing and monster stuff.

Book review – “The 39 Steps” by Mark Glancy

A wonderful book on the classic film, which covers details into the pre-production, production and release, as well as an extensive critical analysis. Very enjoyable to read - unavoidably it's on the academic side, but it's not jargonistic. John Buchan receives his due (I wouldn't have minded a little more on this); the piece benefits a lot from the files at the BFI. 

Glancy is a bit harsh on Charles Bennett being too disdainful of Hitchcock - that just came about because Bennett had been ignored for so long in discussion of Hitchcock's films (and he continues to be - he is not credited at all in the theatre show The 39 Steps despite it being a facsimile of the script).

Movie review – “Homicidal” (1961) **1/2 (warning: spoilers)

William Castle not only rips off Psycho (visiting a motel, a blonde driving in a car in the rain with headlights behind, a Martin Balsam lookalike investigating, mother complex), he rips off himself - there are heartbeats on the soundtrack, a mute old woman, a bland pair of juvenile lovers, an old rickety house... all things that were in The Tingler.

After a bland flash back there is a terrific opening sequence where a beautiful woman (Jean Arless) pays a bellhop at a hotel money to marry her - but then she stabs the justice of the peace to death. She then goes to an old house where she's been staying with a mute nurse in a wheelchair and money is to be inherited by a weird looking kid, Warren. You'll guess from the moment you see "him" that the man is actually a woman - but you know something? Knowing this doesn't really detract from the story, it's just so weird. A bit sordid.

Castle's direction is functional, and makes the story look like the episode of a TV anthology - this would have been far better had he only produced and gotten someone else to be behind the camera (he could have still done his introductions). And it's never as gripping after that opening sequence. But it does have a fascination due to the dual man and woman role. Also I love the fright break towards the end of the film when audiences are given a chance to leave the theatre - it's terrific.

Script review – “Sgt Rock” by John Milius (draft dated 1993)

A pleasant surprise – the quality of Milius’ scripts seemed to decline in the 80s, his work became more self-important and too consciously Kurosawa-y (i.e. all about honour and legend): but this is a bright, tough war film, full of guts and glory. It helps in that it’s a bit cynical too –it’s set during the Italian campaign around the Battle of Monte Cassino, and pays due notice to General Clark’s determination to get to Rome, even when it wasn’t the smartest tthing to do militarily.

There's cameos from General Fryberg (the New Zealand commander in charge at Crete), Ernie Pyle, Nisei soldiers, black soldiers, New Zealander diggers... Milius was always more aware than most American writers of war films that other countries and races fought during ww2. The German enemy is treated respectfully - there's a final duel between Rock and a senior German (which is a little silly to be honest).

The film seems to have been written for Arnold Schwarzeneggar - Rock has a German accent (indeed he infiltrates the German lines). I can see why it wasn't made - it's not that it's bad, I really enjoyed it, it's just it would be expensive to do and at the end of the day this is a straight up war-is-hell film. It just seems to lack a bit of X factor - reading I thought it would need direction of the quality of Spielberg's in Saving Private Ryan to make it memorable.

Movie review – “Living It Up” (1954) ***1/2

Martin and Lewis films rarely had strong plots but this one does – it’s based on Hazel Flagg, the musical adaptation of Nothing Sacred. The duo are shoehorned into the plot very well: I totally bought Jerry Lewis being willing to fake a fatal illness to get a trip to New York, and Dean Martin as his dodgy doctor who wants to go along with it, in part to get off with the hot reporter (Janet Leigh, in best mid 50s pointy boobed form) who is promoting the story.

 

Lots of fun: both Jerry and Dean are in excellent form - they are bright and lively, bounce off each other well, and sing and dance like real musical comedy stars. The plot is solid and brisk, and there's a strong support cast: Leigh, Fred Clark (newspaper editor), Edward Arnold, Sig Ruman and Sheree North (she does a terrific shimmy on the dance floor with Jerry). 

 

It lags in a few places - could have done without the surgery comic sequence going on for so long - and Jerry could have done with a love interest but it's bright and colourful. New York is fun in that sound stage way.