Fantastic book. Big subject but superbly done, great research (access to archives) very thorough and fair. Deep dives on unmade films such as Napoleon and AI. Discusses Kubrick's interest in sex, often ignored by critics. Covers his arseholeness and eccentricities. The book is really fair.
Full of interesting stuff - his battles to make things, a daughter turning into anti-Semitic neo con, his dreams of moving to Australia, James Brolin was considered for The Shining.
Splendid.
1) North to Alaska (1960) - genuinely funny
2) The Pink Panter (1963) - terrific, holds her own against Sellers and Niven
3) What's Up Pussycat? (1965) - a third great comedy performance
4) The Seventh Dawn (1964) - flawed movie but she's excellent
5) The Exquisite Cadaver (1969) - stylish thriller and she's very well used
6) The Trail of the Pink Panther (1982) - film is terrible but it's fun to see her and Niven married
7) Fellini Satyricon (1969) - again she's well used
8) Walk on the Wild Side (1962) - ah look she's not great nor is the film but she and it are interesting
9) Fraulein Dockter (1969) - seducing Suzy Kendall
10) Red Sun (1971) - I'm starting to struggle to find credits by now... but the top five are strong!
Very good book. Emphathetic. Not a hagiography. Has the occasional smart arse aside. Tries to give all sides. He punched his wife and was a terrible dad and had major mental health issues. Could also be wonderful. He made so many good movies. Managed to keep amazingly relevant - I mean, compare with everyone else around him. He was always at some sort of cutting edge - the Goons, Boultings, Kubrick, peak Edwards, Paul Mazursky, Hal Ashby. Survived a very long cold streak thanks to Clouseau. Fascinating life and career and Sikov does it justice.
I wanted to like it more than I did because it was so great to Rank making a black comedy, a spoof of scandal mags with Dennis Price's publisher blackmailing some lovely actors, including Terry Thomas, Peter Sellers and Shirley Eaton. There's a few too many characters - some consolidation would not go astray. Sellers is fun, ditto Eaton - and everyone really. It doesn't quite nail it but is fine.
The turning point in Billy Wilder's career. Up til then he was on a hot streak - after this he could barely put a foot right. Would it have made a difference had Peter Sellers stayed on? Or if Jack Lemmon had stepped in?
Dean Martin is marvellous playing a version of himself. The film is wonderfully structured. It's very clever. Gorgeously shot. Naughty. I mean Ray Walston has sex with Kim Novak and Felicia Farr has very, very willing sex with Dean Martin... that's adult. Very French. Too much for Americans though. obviously.
It doesn't quite work. I wanted to like Kim Novak and she tries but she felt wrong. Right look, silly deep voice - imagine Marilyn Monroe or Shirley Maclaine in that part. Walston acts his butt off, is full of energy - still, I would've preferred to see Sellers or Lemmon (who wanted to do it if Wilder could delay)... they are stars, Walston isn't, and I would've bought them more easily scoring Felicia Farr, who is gorgeous and fun. I watch it and think "you've got no right to be jealous mate she's that much more hotter than you, you should be grateful for what you've got." Still, I think Novak is more of a debit.
The big hits of the year - Doctor in Love (they don't need Dirk Bogarde!), Sink the Bismark (Kenneth More draws them in) and Carry On Constable.
All three films very "British". Two of them "franchises".
Other British money makers:
* Battle of the Sexes
* Brides of Dracula
* Conspiracy of Hearts
* Dentist in the Chair (what is that film?)
* Expresso Bongo
* Follow a Star
* A French Mistress
*Kidnapped
*The League of Gentlemen
*Light Up the Sky
*Make Mine Mink
*The Millionairess
*Our Man in Havana
*Please Turn Over
*Sands of the Desert
*The Savage Innocents
*School for Scoundrels
*Sons and Lovers
* A Touch of Larceny
*the Trials of Oscar Wilde
*Two Way Stretch
*Village of the Damned
*Watch Your Stern
So what can be learned?
The British public still liked a good war movie (Bismark, Conspiracy of Hearts) and loved a star vehicle for Peter Sellers (Battle of Sexes, Millionairess, Two Way Stretch), Terry Thomas (School for Scoundrels, Make Mine Mink), Norman Wisdom (Follow a Star) and the Carry On gang (Watch Your Stern). Alec Guiness still worked in a comedy (Havana). They liked random comedies with stars from other mediums (Dentist in the Chair with Bob Monkhouse, Please Turn Over with Ted Ray, Sands of the Desert with Charlie Drake, Boutling comedies (A French Mistress), heist comedies (League of Gentlemen), war comedies (Light Up the Sky). Expresso Bongo was a musical. Kidnapped a classic novel adaptation.
Horror was a new earner (Brides of Dracula, Village of the Damned). Some heavy drama got through eg Sons and Lovers, Trials of Oscar Wilde.
But 26 British films... over half were comedies.
A bigger role for Cato and some funny stuff but a lazy set up - Robert Webber decides to kill Clouseau to prove that he's tough... I mean, what's that? Dyan Cannon is always good but she doesn't have much to play - "the girl". Lesley Anne Downe's spy in the previous film was a lot more fun. Give Clouseau a girlfriend with difference - Herbert Lom's wife or something.
I didn't like this as much as the previous two.
Jeez, Blake, did you need the money that badly?
It is nice to see outtakes from other Panther movies that we hadn't seen before - even if that would've been better suited for a doco. But when they start showing old clips the film got annoying.
Random plot lines like Joanna Lumley becoming important half way through, Robert Loggia as a mafia boss. I liked that David Niven and Capucine got married. Sad that Niven had to be dubbed.
I didn't mind this for the first bit but it was increasingly annoying as it went on. It's just so greedy.
Very funny. Simple concept - Herbert Lom tries to kill Clouseau - works brilliantly because it builds on the premise, i.e. the world sends assassins to kill him. Lesley Anne Downe is hilarious as a Russian spy who falls for him. Omar Sharif plays an assassin in a short scene.
Classy. Fun. Christopher Plummer looks very handsome in the beginning but his hair is messy later on. Great role for Catherine Schell. Nice locations. Sellers in good form - it's great to see him after the ten year break. This really revived his career - that and for Edwards. Plenty of style and laugh out loud moments. Herbert Lom has a ball - the supporting characters in these films were underrated.
Weird to see Alan Arkin in this part. I get why he was cast: The Russians are Coming, The Russians are Coming. This isn't bad. More odd. There's European locations but it lacks Blake Edwards' style.
Delia Boccardio is good looking. Beryl Reid is funny doing a highland fling. It's not a bad plot involving the theft of jewels. There's some groovy 60s thieves, mostly male unfortunately. People like Frank Finlay and Clive Revill are in it.
Arkin lacks Sellers' dignity. His poise. He tries. Doesn't disgrace himself it just doesn't work.
The second Clouseau film is based on a play that had nothing to do with him, but is the one that introduced Dreyfuss (Herbert Lom) and Kato (Burt Kwouk). It's not bad - very French. Elke Sommer is fun as the maid Clouseau believes is innocent despite all evidence to the contrary. Some slapstick. A lot of slapstick actually. I did prefer the first movie but this has it's own style. A decent mystery.
George Sanders looks old. Bryan Forbes makes a cameo in the nudist sequence.
Bright. Fun. Peter Sellers' part is a lot smaller than you think. Capucine is fabulous. David Niven fun. Claudia Cardinale gorgeous. Robert Wagner is fun too even if he's required to play a sex pest. There's breezy European locations - ski fields, small towns, etc.
It's a film of set pieces: shenanigans in a bedroom with Capucine trying to hide Niven and Wagner from Sellers, a long flirtation between Niven and Cadinale (he is too old for her but kind of gets away with it because it's Niven), the finale chase scene with men in gorilla outfits.
Credits and theme tune are deserved classics. Cardinale should've given her jewel back to the people.
Charming musical fantasy with gorgeous photography, music, and a strong cast. Plot a little on the light side. Russ Tamblyn is winning in the title role, Terry Thomas and Peter Sellars are fun as crooks. The tunes are memorable: I'm surprised this wasn't turned into a stage musical.
John Mortimer's classic one hour radio/TV/stage play padded out to feature length. It doesn't work as well but at least we have Peter Sellers in marvelous form as the barrister. Sellers excelled at wounded dignity - dumb people unaware of their own incompetence.
Richard Attenborough is fine though his fake nose was distracting. It was easy to get up movies in Britain back in the day wasn't it?
Fantasy sequences are used. Not bad. You just watch it and go "this is overlong". Or at least I did.
Odd the Bryan Forbes greenlit this. It is a two hander with Peter Sellers as one of the two, and he was a big name at the time - but this isn't a comedy. Not really. It's got some funny moments but it's creepy and rapey.
Sellers blackmails Sinead Cusack into shacking up with him for a few days. He doesn't try to kiss or mandhandle her so it's supposed to be... alright? It's creepy and uncomfortable and at the end when Cusack gets with him permanently you feel sick.
Sellers is excellent. Maybe that's part of the problem - if the character was played by someone more pathetic maybe it wouldn't have been as offensive.
Though I doubt it.
Cusack is lovely and charming. It makes this even more depressing to watch. Urgh. It's also boring. A lot of features based on TV plays suffered from feeling as though they had too little story. This is the case here.
It's not fun but it's like a colourful museum and every Bond fan should see it. And because there is so much happening with so many actors I like I got something out of it.
Where to start:
- Woody Allen has genuinely funny gags with the firing squad
- I liked Peter Sellars as a Bond type
- Orson Welles is a terrific Bond villain
- quite a few women have agency: Ursula Andress as Vesper, Barbara Bouchet as Miss Moneypenny, Joanna Pettet is the hero of her own segment
- Terence Cooper gets a big intro then disappears
- Deborah Kerr really really overacts
- I don't think David Niven was anything like Bond, in the books or movies
- Bouchet and Jackie Bisset should have been real Bond girls they are gorgeous
- there is a lot of genuine cleverness
- there is a lot more laziness
- it piles it on but then many 60s comedies did (The Great Race, It's a Mad Mad Mad Mad World)
- the music score is great - the theme and "The Look of Love"
- there's genuine emotional moments which could have (don't laugh) been more mined: Andress falling for Sellers, Pettet and dad Niven
Maybe you had to be there. This was a hit on the stage. Did people care about adulterous army officers? Maybe Ralph Richardson and Margaret Leighton made them care.
Peter Sellers mugs. He made this a hit in England - he had a hot streak at the time. I like Sellers. At least I think I do. This was a hard slog. Leighton's in it, she can act. Dany Robin is fine, I suppose. I wanted a bigger star. John Fraser isn't up to it. Maybe neither was director John Guillermin. He whinged that the producers ruined it. But did they?
It looks handsome. Cyril Cusack is in it. And Prunella Scales. I didn't find it funny. Or that it had any point.
I get why this wasn't a hit but time has been kind in part because we know now that Peter Sellers would not make many more dramatic performances, and Richard Todd became less of a star, and it was a very early appearance from Carol White.
It's a gripping crime tale, modest ambitions but made with terrific pace by John Guillermin. Sellers gets the most attention by Todd is excellent as a weakened, battered down man, a cosmestics salesman who is facing the sack, whose car is stolen by car thieves led by Sellers.
It turns out Todd has a tradition of quitting but in this one he's determined to guts it out. It's a brave performance by Todd, who plays a weak and hopeless person, although by the end end he grows a big dick and becomes a man by beating up Sellers.
Sellers is a terrifying, shouty villain, smacking around teen Adam Faith and Sellers' mistress Carol White, desperate for acceptance. I get audiences wanted to interpret it comically - but it's richer than that.
Jazzy score plus 'When Johnny Comes Marching Home' over the credits. Fresh photography. Strong acting. I liked Todd's slimy work rival. The part of his wife is thankless - Elizabeth Sellers steps in.
