1957 - THE PRIDE AND THE PASSION - large scale epic about pulling a big cannon around Spain

Liberal producer Stanley Kramer had carved out a decent career making quasi goody two shoe films aka "message films" for Columbia pictures.  They were generally well made thanks to talented directors Kramer hired like Mark Robson, Fred Zimmerman and Richard Fleischer.  Kramer decided to move into directing as well as producing his own films and his skill as a director was to put it mildly uneven.  In 1957  Kramer really rolled the dice with a large scale production of a C.S. Forrester novel "The Gun" which was sort of a Bridge of San Luis Rey multi character story except instead of a bridge it was a really big cannon.

The film made considerable changes to the novel.  During the war with the French in the early 1800's the British send an officer who is an expert on field artillery to assist the Spanish guerillas.  The plot involves the guerillas hauling a huge cannon around the Spanish countryside in order to take part in an attack on a French fort.  The film ends with a large scale battle with the usual cast of thousands running around.  However the drama on this film was all behind the camera.

A very uncomfortable looking Cary Grant is the British artillery officer.  Grant did not usually take roles in period films as he felt he was more suited to comedy.  Grant apparently signed up for this film to escape from a troubled marriage in Hollywood.  Frank Sinatra was cast as the Spanish guerilla leader.  Well it can be said that Italian American Sinatra wearing brown makeup and a rather ridiculous wig was probably miscast.  Apparently Sinatra took the part to be near his then wife Ava Gardner also making a film in Spain, they were having marital problems as well.   

 

Finally there was Italian actor Sophia Loren who was trying to break into Hollywood.  This was about her second or third American production and her English was none to good.  The solution was to put her into lots of low cut blouses to distract from her dialog.  To top it all off Cary Grant decided he was in love with her and spent most of the film chasing her around.

 

All this foolishness with the cast was not going to help make this a good picture.  Stanley Kramer probably had his hands full dealing with these three actors and managing and expensive production. In spite of everything The Pride and the Passion is entertaining enough although it could have been a whole lot better.  The chief merits of this film were the excellent photography, interesting Spanish locations and the kind of viewing pleasure watching a large scale production with lots of large scale action scenes can provide.

The film was written and rather poorly by Edna and Albert Anhalt, the running time is 132 minutes. 

2026 - WAR MACHINE, science fiction action junk which is entertaining

The latest streamer action movie and there are a lot of streamer action movies is War Machine.  It's an entertaining time waster and no one will confuse it with Wild Strawberries.  War Machine is essentially a remake of Arnold's Predator action classic and it does have as it's star another man mountain Alan Ritchson.

Ritchson plays a soldier who gets admitted to the Army Ranger training program although in real life he would probably be considered a little old.  Ritchson is suffering from PTSD from a previous tour in Afghanistan but he's still one tough SOB.  Anyway on the final test of his Ranger training he and his classmates get dropped into the middle of the Colorado woods although Australia is the substitute for Colorado.  They run into a robotic killing machine released from where else space aliens who apparently want to take over the earth.  So now the plot sequels into a rehash of that other space alien invasion epic Battle:  Los Angeles.

 

Lots of shooting, ray gun blasting and chases the usual stuff.  The War Machine seems unstoppable until Ritchson finally gets his hands on a bulldozer.  So now the film borrows from the climax of Aliens which had Sigourney Weaver battle it out in a mech suit with the prime Alien monster.  The War Machine looks a lot like the ED-209 from RoboCop by the way.

 

There are really no original ideas anymore or so it seems in the movie business.  Still this film does a decent job with the action stuff. Alan Ritchson has been kicking around the film business since 2004 until he finally hit the big time with the "Jack Reacher" series.  I'll say this for Ritchson at least he's young, it's getting a little hard to stomach all these geriatric action stars still working, I'm talking to you Arnold, Sylvester and Harrison.  Time to take your millions and maybe retire to a turkey farm or something.

War Machine was written by Patrick Hughes and James Beaufort, the running time is 107 minutes. 

1970 - ASSIGNMENT TERROR aka The Monsters of Terror or Dracula vs Frankenstein

This film is review protected especially from the musings of this little blog.

In Spain, space aliens revive the bodies of two deceased scientists bringing them back to life for their own nefarious purposes.  The leader of the space aliens was played by Michael Rennie who had come a very long way from his previous alien character "Klaatau" from The Day the Earth Stood Still.  German actor Karin Dor who is probably remembered for her appearances in You Only Live Twice and Topaz if she is remembered at all is one of the resurrected scientists.

Well the space aliens plans to take over the world involves them resurrecting all of the great movie monsters.  Dracula, the Wolfman, the Mummy and of course Frankenstein's monster.  All the monsters end up in a Spanish castle ready to go to work for the space aliens and waiting to pounce on an unexpected mankind.

 

Fortunately for mankind Inspector Tobermann of the Spanish police figures out what's going on and confronts the monsters in the castle.  Inspector Tobermann's main squeeze Ilsa Sternberg has been kidnapped by the space aliens and brought to the castle.  So now Inspector Toberman must rescue his girlfriend and fight off the monsters. 

Assignment Terror does have nice color photography.

The film was written by Jacinto Molina Álvarez who apparently played a lot of monsters in his career including, Dracula, Frankenstein's Monster, the Wolfman and the Mummy although not all of them in this movie.  The running time is a tidy 85 minutes. 

1955 - I AM A CAMERA, you know it as CABARET

This was previously a play on Broadway.  Julie Harris had a big success in the role of Sally Bowles the madcap American living in pre-war Berlin.  The inevitable transition to film did not go particularly well.

In pre-Nazi Germany force of nature Sally Bowles becomes mixed up with reserved (stuck up) wanna be writer Christopher Isherwood.  She ends up moving in with him and it's one crazy adventure after another.  There's a subplot involving a Jewish woman who is romanced by Fritz a friend of Isherwood's as the persecution of Jews begins to gather steam.

As in Cabaret, this film contains the basic plot lines of the story, Sally thinks she's pregnant, Sally gets mixed up with a rich wacky American, Sally parties a lot and on and on. 

 

I Am a Camera was a big success on Broadway but you sure wouldn't know it watching this film something clearly got lost when they decided to film it.  Laurence Harvey played Christopher Isherwood but he seems really miscast and exactly where did the filmmakers get the idea he was funny.  As for Julie Harris well it's safe to say her performance is larger than life and is it ever larger than life.  It's borders on hammy at times and her inability to control her character really makes watching this film an ordeal.  When it comes to acting in film less is more.

Apparently the woman who Isherwood based the character of Sally Bowles on was none to amused by her portrayal on Broadway or film. In real life she was a writer, advocate, a life long member of the Communist party and a war correspondent.  There's an implied reference to her and Isherwood having a sexual relationship but Christopher Isherwood was a very gay author.  Well that's the movie business for you.

The screenplay was written by John Collier, the running time is 98 minutes. 

1963 - PT 109, sickening tribute to John F. Kennedy's navy years.

Everyone, well Democrats anyway complain about how Republicans are constantly sucking up to the current President.  Here's an example of the libs really going for it in the ass-kissing department.  An entire movie celebrating the military exploits of the then sitting President John F. Kennedy.  Politicians whether conservative or liberal apparently have no shame when it comes to currying favor with people in power. 

During World War II inexperienced Lt. (j.g.) John F. Kennedy wants to see action.  He gets assigned to a beat up PT (patrol torpedo) boat and only has one week to refurb it or the grumpy maintenance officer will scuttle his command.  After a few suspect adventures, PT 109 is rammed by a Japanese destroyer. Lt Kennedy must now rally to save the lives of his crew.

 

This film had a few production problems.  Warren Beatty was originally chosen to play Kennedy but Beatty could smell a stinker script when he read one.  The White House had a "liaison" officer on set probably to make sure nothing derogatory was allowed to get into the film.  Kennedy had veto power over the director and declined to have veteran Raoul Walsh helm the film.  Admittedly Walsh was on the tail end of his career.

The next choice  Lewis Milestone dropped out of the project also citing issues with the script.  The man who ended up with the job was Leslie Martinson primarily a television director.  Martinson got the job done but he was no John Ford who had already made the best film about World War II PT boats, They Were Expendable, which is really the film to watch. 

 

Cliff Robertson ended up being cast as Kennedy and he probably does about as well as an actor can do having to play a living President.  But Kennedy is portrayed as such a goody-two shoes it's really sickening to watch.  The rest of the cast was made up of character actors the one standout being veteran performer James Gregory who really hams it up as Kennedy's superior officer.

 

This is frankly not a bad film just a really mediocre one. All the expected cliches are in place for any viewer who had already seen about any other war film.  The only thing good about the film is the cinematography of Robert Surtees a legendary cameraman with extensive credits which included Ben Hur, The Graduate and The Sting.

The film was written by Richard L. Breen probably with the White House watching every word and comma he put into the screenplay.  The running time was an overlong 140 minutes. 

1960 - STOWAWAY IN THE SKY, aka LE VOYAGE EN BALLON

A rare family film that's actually good for a change.  Stowaway in the Sky has a very light touch like the air balloon that our protagonists use to travel across France and eventually the Alps.

The story is a very simple one, a young boy, Pascal manages to stowaway on his grandfather's latest air balloon. They fly over the French countryside and narrowly miss church steeples and towers and that's about it for a plot.

 

What this film has going for it is spectacular aerial footage taken with a specially developed camera by the director Albert Lamorisse called "Helivision." This camera was sort of an early version of the "steady cam."  

 

The photography in Cinemascope is remarkably clear and steady this is wide screen camera work at it's finest.  The film took 3 years to complete and was apparently a very difficult production but the resulting film is very impressive.  A really marvelous film.

This film was written by Albert Lamorisse, the running time is 85 minutes  

2018 - OCCUPATION, space alien invasion stuff from Australia

Yet another space alien invasion story.  Let's get this out of the way the film is clearly beholden to War of the Worlds, Battle:  Los Angeles, Independence Day and particularly Red Dawn.  Space aliens have landed on earth in particular the Australian Outback.  A plucky group of survivors flee into the woods and set up a makeshift camp where they learn survival skills and begin to carry out a commando war against the aliens who are up to a nefarious purpose.

You can't argue there isn't enough action in this film, it has lots of shooting, ray gun blasting, car chases and explosions to keep the non discriminating action freak satisfied.  There is some attention paid to characterization.  One guy suffers from depression, there is a pregnant young couple, an ex-con whose family has been put in an alien concentration camp, the usual stuff.  

 

The is a B-movie with a fairly decent budget but it's still a B-movie.  It's entertaining in it's own way and has the required big action climax which feels a little tacked on.  The acting is decent for the most part. The special effects are not that bad.  

 

An attempt is made to send a message of brotherhood between the earthlings and the space aliens but who the hell is interested in that.  Peace is peachy but fighting is more exciting.  There is actually a sequel to this thing called Occupation: Rainfall. 

The film was written by the director, Luke Sparke, the running time is 119 minutes. 

1964 - THE BLACK TULIP, entertaining update of a traditional swashbucker

French star Alain Delon does the Errol Flynn swashbuckler thing in this entertaining throwback to one of Flynn's 1930's or 1940's sword fighting films.  Delon's in a dual role as Guillaume de Saint Preux, The Black Tulip sort of a Robin Hood type of role.  Delon also plays his look alike brother brother Julien de Saint Preux who has to step into the role of The Black Tulip after Guillaume is injured.

This film is set just before the French Revolution and it's a handsome production filmed in 70mm by Henri Decaë who had an extensive list of credits working for directors Francois Truffaut, Louis Malle, Claude Charbol, Jean Pierre Melville, Roger Vadim, Robert Wise and Wim Wenders, a very impressive resume.

 

The film also stars Italian actor Virna Lisi an attractive woman who as it turns out could act.  Also showing up in this film is perennial ham actor Akim Tamiroff who as usual just plays the same character from film to film.  Tamiroff was a favorite actor of Orson Welles and showed up in a couple of his films.

 

The director Christin-Jaque keeps the film moving with some very entertaining action scenes and the whole film has a very fast moving light touch to it.  It takes a lot of skill to pull off this kind of a fun film.

The film was written by Henri Jeanson and Christian-Jaque, the running time is 110 minutes.

1979 - ISLAND OF THE FISHMEN aka ISLAND OF MUTATIONS

A horror film as only the Italians could do it.  A survivor of a shipwreck ends up on an uncharted island that just happens to be near the underwater continent of Atlantis.  The island is ruled by a madman who has coerced a mad scientist to breed fish people in order to steal the gold from underwater Atlantis.  Needless to say the mad scientist has a beautiful daughter and somehow a voodoo priestess is mixed up in all of this.

This film borrowed from many other films.  The Creature From the Black Lagoon, Plague of the Zombies, The Island of Dr. Moreau and War Gods From the Deep.  The great thing about this film is that it just doesn't borrow (plagiarize) from all these other films, it takes scenes and situations from them and just bends them into it's own nutty story line.

 

The film stars model/actress Barbara Bach with the emphasis on model when it comes to her performance. The actor Claudio Cassinelli died young while working on another film for this director.  Then there are a couple of washed up English speaking actors, Richard Johnson and Joseph Cotton.  Johnson had acted with the Royal Shakespeare Company performing in Shakespeare but an actor still has to make the house payment.  

 

What can you say about Joseph Cotton?  The star of Citizen Kane, Shadow of a Doubt, and The Third Man.  Well Hollywood is not particularly kind to it's older actors.  I guess you take the work where you can get it.

The film was written by Sergio Martino, Sergio Donati and Cesare Frugoni, the running time is 100 minutes.

1998 - AUTUMN TALE, Rohmer's take on middle age love

A film so light as a feather it could blow away if it were not made by one filmmaker, Eric Rohmer.  The last of Rohmer's group of films called  the "Tales of the Four Seasons, " an Autumn Tale is a serene love story.  Many of Rohmer's films are about young people falling in and out of love.  The spin in this film is that it focuses on a group of middle aged people. 

Rosine and Isabelle are the friends of a winemaker named Maxine.  Maxine is lonely so her two friends decide to play matchmakers and set her up with someone she can start a relationship with.  Rosine through the want ads finds a man named Gerald who she thinks would be good boyfriend material.  Isabelle also zeros in on one of her old college professors Etienne who as it turns out is only interested in relationships with younger women.  With all Rohmer films complications arise as everyone sorts out what is going on and who is interested in who.

 

By this point in his career Rohmer was an old pro at telling this type of story.  His storytelling style was never flashy and he tended to get his plot points across with his actors and his dialog instead of lots of fancy photography and editing.

 

Autumn Tale is set in the Rhone Valley near the Swiss Alps I believe.  The scenery in the small towns and vineyards in this area is gorgeous. This is a smoothly made and very enjoyable film from the master storyteller.

 As usual Rohmer wrote the film.  The running time is 112 minutes. 

1960 - THE SUNDOWNERS, a "Meat Pie Western."

A well made but almost plot free film set in the outback of Australia around the 1920's.  The story concerns a roving family of sheepherders moving flocks of sheep from one location to another. The mother wants a place to call home but the father is a free spirit who doesn't want to be tied down and that's about it for a plot.

The entertainment value comes from the director Fred Zinneman one of Hollywood's best storytellers and the excellent cast.  Robert Mitchum is the father and he does a decent job with his Aussie accent.  The mother is played by Deborah Kerr and their son is Michael Anderson Jr. the son of unsurprisingly the director Michael Anderson.  Kerr was one of Mitchum's favorite people to work with and he amusingly said "she was the only leading lady I never slept with."  

 

Zinnemann was a very meticulous filmmaker he carefully cast the supporting cast with some excellent actors.  Peter Ustinov, Glynis Johns and an actual Australian actor Chips Rafferty who I think showed up in about every Australian film I've seen.

 For a story with an almost nonexistent plot Fred Zinnemann's story telling skill was so good The Sundowners is a very entertaining film.  Some of Zinnemann's other films worth checking out, High Noon, Act of Violence, The Seventh Cross, The Search and The Nun's Story.  

The film was written by Isobel Lennart, the running time is 133 minutes.

1935 - THE WALKING DEAD, modest but entertaining horror/crime film

Boris Karloff is a man framed for the murder of a judge.  After being sentenced to death in the electric chair he is brought back to life by sort of mad scientist played by "Santa Claus" himself Edmund Gwenn.  As is the way with a 1930's Karloff film he lumbers around seeking revenge sort of like Frankenstein looking for the people who set him up for murder.  Karloff is a very good lumberer.

This is a Karloff horror film not produced by Universal for a change.  Warner Brothers probably offered Karloff more money than he was getting at Universal to play yet another sort of monster.  One thing you have to say Karloff was very good at playing the sympathetic monster.  You actually feel sorry for the guy by the inevitable climax.

The film was directed by one of Hollywood's greatest studio directors, Michael Curtiz.  If any director knew how to move a story along it was Curtiz, this film races along at top speed.  Curtiz had an amazing career starting in the silent era and finishing in the early 1960's.

 

The Walking Dead was the usual good Warner Brothers production with an interesting mix of Warner's character actors.  Hal Mohr was the cinematographer his chief claim to fame was as the cameraman who filmed the first talking picture, The Jazz Singer.

The film was written by Ewart Adamson, Peter Milne, Robert Andrews and Lillie Hayward.  The running time is a brisk 66 minutes.

1954 - EXECUTIVE SUITE - a look inside the management team of a company circa 1954

This film was big stuff when it was released.  The story involves the jockeying for power among the senior vice presidents of a manufacturing company after the CEO dies from a stroke.  The drama comes from all the manipulation and backstabbing among the vice presidents as they maneuver to replace the deceased CEO and assume the leadership of the company.

 

This film is notable for being the first produced screenplay from Ernest Lehman who went on to write North By Northwest and The Sound of Music.  Robert Wise was the director and as a former editor at RKO he knew how to pace this story for what is basically a film with a lot of talking heads sitting around a conference table. 

MGM didn't scrimp on the cast it was a major group of stars.  Frederick March is the CFO who is strictly a numbers guy and doesn't care about the employees.  Paul Douglas is the head of sales having a fling with his secretary played by Shelley Winters.  Walter Pidgeon is a VP who knows where all the bodies are buried.  Dean Jagger is the old timer who is in charge of manufacturing. A very hammy Barbara Stanwyck is the major stock holder. An impressive cast anyway you cut it.

Then there's our hero William Holden the VP in charge of design and development, he's married to June Allyson who for a change isn't playing her usual goody two shoes character.  Holden is so full of the compassion for the company and employees he's just to good to be true. 

 Executive Suite has a real 1950's vibe to it and seems very dated.  Ernest Lehman did a good job moving all the chess pieces of the plot around but overall the film seems very superficial and hackneyed, time has not been kind to this film.  The film was a critical and commercial success.

The running time is 103 minutes. 

1978 - THE WIZ, the legendary bad musical

Writing about this film is like swatting a fly with a jackhammer.  Whatever is said about it today was covered in negative reviews of the film when it was released and they were very negative reviews.  A lot of the criticism of the film was focused on Diana Ross who was able to use her status as a superstar performer to get the role of Dorothy Gail the protagonist of The Wizard of Oz. In the original story Dorothy was a 6 year old girl. The role was rewritten for Ross to play a young insecure woman in her 20's.  Diana Ross hadn't seen 6 years old in a while much less 26 years old.  She was 33 when she played this role and she looked it.  However in spite of the disastrous participation of Diana Ross there was plenty of blame to go around.

For a film that wanted to channel the Black American experience there sure were an awful lot of white people behind the scenes calling the shots.  The director was Sidney Lumet who was known for filming tough dramas about New York City in particular.  Lumet's last film had been Network and there wasn't a dance sequence in that one.  Lumet had never directed a musical before and it showed.  Almost every number is shot in boring wide angle shots apparently more to show off the sets than the performers.

More white people behind the scenes.  Joel Schumacher another white guy wrote the screenplay.  Schumacher's claim to fame was as the director who took over for Tim Burton in the Batman series and ran that into the ground.  The cinematographer Oswald Morris was British.  The editor Dede Allen had cut Dog Day Afternoon and Serpico, again not a lot of singing in those films.   The costume designer Tony Walton was another Brit.  Quincy Jones was the music supervisor on the film and he apparently was not very impressed with the songs which probably didn't help matters.

 

The Wiz was a film with an all black cast and it's failure commercially and critically gave Hollywood executives an excuse not to finance any films which featured black performers and stories a fairly lame excuse considering all the under performing films featuring casts of white people that really suck. 

The film's running time is an unending 133 minutes.