Movie review - "Year of the Gun" (1992) ** (warning: spoilers)

 Andrew McCarthy is an amiable leading man who could've had a longer stint as a semi-star. He's not a real star - Sharon Stone is. It's bizarre this film was made - an account of an American in 1970s Italy dealing with the Red Brigade. John Frankenheimer wanted it shot in black and white which would have made it more interesting. He also wanted a different leading man

Valerie Golino is very good and often nude as McCarthy's girlfriend.  They should have cast an Italian rather than John Pankow as an Italian lecturer.

It never answers the question why do we care. McCarthy sleeps with Golino, writes a novel, the Red Brigade think he's got inside information, kidnap him, but let him go. He's very passive. At least Stone has a proper job, taking photos etc

Sex scenes between McCarthy and Golino quite hot though him and Stone feels awkward. 

Maybe this would've worked if from Stone's point of view. 

Theatre review - "Letter to Brezhnev" (2026)

 The film on stage basically. Needed more of a reason to make it. Like songs, or tell the story of the making of the film (its gay writer picking up Russians and passing a script to an heiress passed out on his couch whose brother financed it). Still entertaining to watch. The lead girls were great.

Movie review - "Letter to Brezhnev" (1985) ***

 Sweet, simple, fantastic idea, lots of nightclub scenes, from the heart. You want to see what happens when she goes to Russian. Acting is fine - the girls have authenticity, if the guys are putting on accents that's understandable and the film's not really about them.

Movie review - "The Manchurian Candidate" (1962) **** (warning: spoilers)

 Wacky, imaginative, scary, funny. Frank Sinatra looks conspitated, Janet Leigh slightly camp, Laurence Harvey effective, Angela Lansbury sublime. Kicks up when Harvey kills his very nice bride and her father.

Sinatra's character is a bit of a dill, letting Harvey go, failing to stop assassinations. Sinatra's torment strong at the tend. Woman very sexually aggressive here - Leigh and Harvey's girl and Lansbury. Lansbury so good. 

Movie review - "Threads" (1984) *****

 The greatest TV movie ever made? Powerful. Uncompromising. Important. Starts as gritty British drama (shotgun marriage, squabbling family). Torn apart. So many terrifying things including this - the government do a lot. Tries to keep order, gets involved in planning. It's not enough.

Book review - "Death of a President" by William Manchester

 Got into this reading a Vanity Fair account of its writing. I'd actually never heard of it but it's renowned as a classic of reporting, made with Kennedy involvement only they backed off.

Exhaustive, feels accurate. Powerful. So believable. I began to get angry reading it at the conspiracy theorists. Maybe that was just trauma dealing. Of course it was. The truth too uncomfortable but we see it so clearly now. Hostile press. Mad city. Anti-commie rhetoric. Incel with a gun. Trained by marines. Wants to kill someone. Hates his wife. Looking for a place in a world. Wife leaves him for another woman (I totally didn't know this.)

Very thotough.

Movie review - "Deal of the Century" (1983) *

 Having shown he couldn't do comedy in The Night They Raided Minsky's and The Brinks Job William Friedkin showed it again with this flat satire of the arms industry. People who work in that arena are inherently unlikeable but they can be made compelling - but Friedkin directs sluggishly, Chevy Chase is miscast, Sigourney Weaver flounders.

When Wallace Shawn shoots himself it perks up briefly. That's what the movie should have been - real stakes. 

It's bad. Flat. Unfunny. You don't care. Greg Hines could be cut out of the film. Not drama. Just odd. 

Movie review - "Another Country" (1984) ****

 Well made British film has a great subject - Guy Burgess at school - and does it well. The other main character is his commie mate played by Colin Firth though he actually doesn't get much screen time - he starts as a commie ends as a commie (Ken Branah played this role on stage). The story is about the politicisation of Burgess. Some critics from the time whined that it didn't show his politicisation - but it shows very clearly his disenchantment with the estabishment, at first he disdains it cheerfully then comes to loathe it when he's booted from making head prefect. 

Cary Elwes is Bennett's love object, Bennett is played excellently by Rupert Everett in a star making portrayal. The make up at the beginning and end is a litte off putting - and would an American journalist be allowed to interview a spy?

But a very good movie. 

Movie review - "The Holcroft Covenant" (1985) *

 Such a bad movie. Confusing. Slow. Devoid of action. Dull. No decent action scenes.

Michael Caine replaced James Caan. Caine is bad. Everyone is bad. Incomptent. Finale is a press conference. No sex, no intrigue, no suspense.

This was an abomination. 

Play review - "I Am My Own Wife: A Play" by Doug Wright

 A look at a German transgender activist and spy. One person plays a lot of roles. Some history. The author is a character. Interesting, The right performer I can see it going down a treat.

Movie review - "The Seventh Dawn" (1964) **1/2 (warning: spoilers)

 Big budget Malayan Emergency film didn't have to have a big budget. It actually felt like it could be a TV play - suspenseful account of Erusian woman (Capucine) framed by commie (Testuro Tamba) so she'll be shot by Brits, so British woman (Susannah York) hands herself to commie so American (William Holden) who loves Eurasian woman goes to rescue British woman.

You could play that out simply. There's two big battles - at the camp and later on - which aren't needed as are the big protests. Acting is fine. York is a bit of a middle aged man fantasy - horny, nubile, brave, who just wants to shag Holden. Capucine carries history and gives one of her best performances. Holden is fine in these self loathing roles. The guy who plays York's dad is undercast, I got him mixed up with a military guy. A british soldier should've loved York.

As a drama this isn't bad. Hurt by French Capucine as Eurasian and a Japanese as a Chinese communist and an American as a planter in Malaya. Some memorable moments. Malays are mostly background. 

Ben Hecht worked on script.  But it's a depressing story. Malays have their village burned down. Capucine is excuted. Tamba is killed. Holden gives up his plantations and goes off travelling and doesn't even root York. York is left alone. Just depressing.

Probably better dramatically if York had died. The true Malays - Capucine , Tamba - die.

Movie review - "Fly Me to the Moon" (2024) ***

 Sweet romantic comedy with a strong idea - background to the Moon landing - and theme - about selling, and the truth - is an enjoyable watch. It didn't have to close $100 million, this should've been a $40 million film. Maybe too much plot in the last act.

Movie review - "House of Secrets" (1956) **

 

A thriller from Rank, aiming at the international market and trying to turn Michael Craig into a big star.

Doesn't work, despite some decent action, great colour and locations and not bad cast.

Why doesn't it work?

- undercover story (a lookalike) but doesn't really exploit it - no fun of contrast.

- the person he looks a like is killed off, he should've still be alive and cause trouble

- didn't lean in to the concept - the fun/danger of being a crim

- he's not in enough danger... always reporting back to Geoffrey Keen

- no ticking clock and rising stakes. Who cares about currency. Just make it a bomb.

Just badly plotted.

Movie review - "You Know What Sailors Are Like" (1954) **

 Rank really liked Donald Sinden. Here is is as a young naval officer caught up in an Arab country which think the Brits have a weapon when they don't. Appparently the original novel on which this is based had more point. Maybe.

Rank invested in colour and elaborate sets, the film pushes Sinden as a hunk (he's often without his shirt), there are Arab harem women like a 1950s Universal movie, I'm sure the lechers went through then, yet still in a studio that had Kay Kendall and Diana Dors under contract the dull Sarah Lawson is the lead. When Lawson goes undercover as a harem girl at the end it should be funny - imagine the Carry On girls doing it - but it's not.

The movie starts of with three sailors and it should have had three sailors all the way through - it mostly has Sinden, although Bill Kerr joing him an hour in and the action perks up. It's fun to see him as an Aussie.

Kenneth More wanted to play the lead but it was after Genevieve had been shot and before it was released. That was a mistake. 

This movie seemed to go on forever despite gorgeous colour, sets and girls, there was just something plodding about it. Director Ken Annakin later admitted farce wasn't his natural genre and he was right.

Movie review - "The Young Lovers" (1954) ***1/2

 A surprise. This flopped and it doesn't have the stars (David Knight and Odile Versois) to put it over but it's beautifully made, simple, empathetic. Maybe too much Swan Lake. Anthony Asquith did a beautiful job and it's lovely shot. If only Dirk Bogarde and Mai Zetterling had one it.

Movie review - "High Treason" (1951) **

 Semi sequel to Seven Days at Noon isn't as good. No ticking clock, no compelling lead just a smug copper and a dull stressed agent, no humour, no interesting characters.

Red scare movies are fine if there are scares but this doesn't have any.

Stylishly shot and professionally put together. Just annoying, somehow. The posh commie villains lack the pizzaz of Hitchcock's foreign agents.

Movie review - "Goldeneye" (1995) **** (re-watching)

 Splendid theme song and romancing tune. Lousy action score. Pierce is very handsome and plays it well - he fits right in. Strong script. Memorable pieces. Why no Felix Leiter?

Movie review - "Sergeant Deadhead" (1965) ** (rewatching)

 Some bright moments but the film never seems to make up its mind what the story is. There's a bumbling soldier who gets shot into space - fine - but then he has a big head and so they get in a look alike, which is a whole new movie, then the lookalike tries to avoid having sex with Deadhead's fiance. Then the lookalike disappear and they go to meet the president.

It's unsatifactory. Some songs are alright. The players try. Frankie Avalon gives his all. Deborah Walley is sweet. Why is John Ashley in this? Harvey Lembck. Donna Loren gets some lines. Bobbi Shaw is wasted. Buster Keaton gets  a joke. Eve Arden gets a song.

Movie review - "Out of Sight" (1966) *

 There's no reason why a mash up of Beach Party movies and spy films couldn't have worked. AIP could've pulled it off - they mixed it with haunted house films and sci fi. This is just a bad movie. Jonathan Daly is hard work as a spy's butler who becomes a spy.  He' s a drag. Maybe he was famous at the time. But Frankie Avalon in this role would've been so much better.

There's some terrific music - versions of "Baby Please Don't Go" and "It's Not Unusual". I did really like the three female assassins

But on the whole this is a dull movie.

Movie review - "The Ipcress File" (1965) ****

 Harry Saltzmann's anti-Bond is still about a sexy agent who beds women, has some sophistication (he's a cook), outsmarts the bad guys and is cocky to his superiors - but he wears glasses, is unapologetically working class, and there's nice touches about filling out forms and bureaucracy.

It's very stylishly directed by Sidney J Furie, clearly loving having more of a budget. The music score is very James Bond-y as are Ken Adams' sets.

The plot was a little confusing but basically it's whether Nigel Green is the baddie or Guy Doleman is the baddy. You know that Gordon Jackson is going to be killed.

Some Aussies in the cast like Guy Doleman and Ric Hutton.