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Reviews
The Biggest Bundle of Them All (1968)
Heist spoof, Italian Style
It's not as wacky as it tries to be, and it really drags at parts in the first hour. Ut once they actually go into the heat sequence, it becomes much more enjoyable as a plot.
The humor is sometimes forced, sometimes campy and sometimes works. I got a kick out of seeing Edward G Robinson use an easel and picture boards as he briefed the group on the heist he wanted to pull, anyone who has sat through an unnecessary power point presentation at work should enjoy that little bit of satire. Robert Wagner's character is a real heal, something Wagner didn't play very often. There are some funny scenes relating to rivalries among various Italian police forces, but American audiences probably didn't get the jokes on that score.
It took much longer than usual to set up the caper than is usually the case in a heist flick, and that's where it feels like it drags on and on, but once they do actually start pulling the job, I enjoyed the action and liked the plan they had put together. The ending is so very predictable and everybody should see it coming long before it happens.
Best aspects of the film are the fine Italian landscape, the scenery Raquel Welch contributes and Godfrey Cambridge's comedic segments.
Horse Hare (1960)
Retread gags, but not bad.
Although I saw this cartoon for the first time ever today, I noticed that every single gag had been used before in a previous cartoon. That was becoming a problem with WB cartoons by the late 50's and early 60's. I tend to view the 1944-52 time period as peak quality Looney Tines. There were sone great individual cartoons both before after this era, but I think the late 40's and very early 50's was a time when almost everything thing they did was a gem. By 1960, the artwork, the puns and the gags were often not up to the quality of previous work.
They did a lot of western spoofs, and early cartoons spoofing the cliche of Indians attacking a fort were often quite funny. Taken by itself, this cartoon is funny if you hadn't seen the previous 25 years of WB cartoons. The joke about singing Ten Little Indians while shooting at the attackers was especially old hat - I think it had been used three or four times before. The sight gags of military units charging all bunched together with swords flailing all around was amusing, but it too had been used many times before.
One good thing I will say is, that like many of their later cartoons, in this one the facial expressions of characters after getting hit on the head or blown up or what have you are hilarious. Chuck Jones greatest influence on the studio was paying close attention to facial expressions in bizarre or painful situations and I really get a laugh out of them in this short.
Basically I'd say this is a not bad example of slightly past it's prime Warner Brothers cartoon work. I gave it a 5.
How to Steal a Million (1966)
The last of a kind
Hollywood changed more between 1965 and 1969, four short years, that at any other time other than the invention of talkies in the late 20's. This movie really represents to me the end of the old Hollywood style More than any other mid 60's film. Old Hollywood was just then being replaced by "New Hollywood" - edgier, more openly sexual, grittier in terms of the language used and topics covered in film.
This movie was one of the last romcoms made in the lighter, more innocent style that romantic comedies had followed for decades. It also Is one of the last American films to treat Europe as a playground for the fashionable, sophisticated and wealthy. It the last traditional romantic comedy for both Wyler (Funny Girl, in 1968 was more of a fictionalized biopic) and for Hepburn (Two for the Road in 67 was more of a drama). It was O'Toole's only foray into romcom leading man territory.
If it is the end of an era, it certainly takes the era out in style. It has witty dialogue, a charming leading couple and fun heist. Not to be taken seriously for a moment, it's beautifully filmed and that locked in a closet scene is one of the most romantic moments in filmdom. The French comedian Moustache steals every scene he is in, Boyer adds a touch of elder class in his brief scenes, and Hugh Griffith puts in a great comic performance.
The plot has holes in it, to be sure, and the whole thing is entirely implausible, but the performances make it believable anyway.
High class went out with a bang with this flick.
Star Trek (1966)
An iconic series
Most of the 1960's adventure and drama tv series followed a similar formula - a formula that dates back to the late 50's in fact. A regular cast of characters, sometimes as small as one regular character, sometimes an ensemble cast, travel around to different locations in each episode, meeting different guest characters and interacting with the situation and people that they encounter. Have Gun, Will Travel pioneered this format, many later westerns followed it. So did other programs. Dramas like Route 66 and The Fugitive followed it. War action series like Combat! Followed it. The old story about Star Trek being described as "Wagon Train in outer space" could have used one of many other tv series of the time to achieve the same description. In this sense, Star Trek is very much a product of its time.
I'm not more than just a casual science fiction fan, but I do love many of the classic stories of Golden Age and Silver Age sci fi and Star Trek fits into that category in a many ways too. So in this sense, Star Trek is almost the last example of the Golden and Silver Age style science fiction adventure stories.
Yet at the same time, Star Trek was in ways ahead of its time too - fitting in with the kind of high technology based science fiction stories and movies that came later.
The bridge of the Enterprise also functions as a bridge between past, then current and subsequent sci fi and I think that's why it has stood the test of time so well.
Star Trek debuted about a month before I was born, so can only first recall the program in afternoon syndication, but the stories were adventurous and characters were do relatable that even a like warm science fiction fan like me found them compelling and enjoyable.
I've never watched much of the later series, or the later movies, but I really love the original series.
Thriller: The Hungry Glass (1961)
Absolute gem
Along with "Pigeons From Hell", this episode is one of the two best remembered and widely respected episodes of the series. I tend to agree With many who say that "Pigeons" is the better overall horror story of the two, but it's a Gothic horror episode, not strictly a "ghost story". The Hungry Glass is very much a ghost story, in the most straightforward way. Therefore I am going out on a limb and say The Hungry Glass is the best American television series episode adaptation of a ghost story that I've ever seen. It even ranks up there with some of the best British television ghost stories, the "Ghost Story For Christmas episodes.
William Shatner puts in a terrific performance, similar to his classic Twilight Zone role - his character is a young husband, a Korean War veteran, who suffered some sort of hallucinatory fever while he was in the war, malaria or perhaps the horrible "hemorrhagic fever" that was such a serious medical problem for troops in that war. He is still prone to flashbacks and recurrences, and therefore he is prone to doubt his own perceptions when the ghostly events start happening. Joanna Hayes plays his wife, whose character is bit less defined, or at least a bit more commonplace, she is portrayed as a typical young married woman of her time period, intelligent and strong minded and not given to hysterics, but her background is not gone into as much as her husband's.
They buy a house on a rocky cliff overlooking the Atlantic Ocean, in New England, probably Maine. The locals at the general store seem to know something bad about the house, but don't say anything beyond vague hints that the house isn't right.
Their real estate agent and his own own wife (Elizabeth Allen) arrive to accompany them to the house. Played by Russell Johnson, of Gilligan's Island fame, the agent has quickly become friends with the young couple and he is glad to have them moving in and living nearby. He does however acknowledge that there are local legends about the house, but it's an old big house that has been empty for a couple decades, all such houses get rumors attached to them, and he thinks nothing of it. He drops them off, helps them put in a few things, and leaves, promising to come back the next day with his wife for a housewarming party. The electric power won't be on for a few days, so they'll make do with picnic style food.
It's odd that there are no mirrors anywhere around the house. And the agents wife thinks she sees something in the window which makers her scream before they go.
The next morning the ghostly events start happening. When the real estate agent and his wife arrive, Shatner and his wife have found where all the mirrors are, Shatner, who is a professional photographer has captured the image of a young girl on a phot of the cliff where nobody was when he took the photo, and prevails upon Russell Johnson to tell hm the full story of the house.
I won't spoil the rest of the story, but it's one of the most atmospheric television ghost stories I've seen, and while the ending may be predictable, the gradual buildup in that direction is what is so well done and enjoyable from a goose bump perspective.
Just great tv from the classic era of anthology television.
Fantasy Island: The Red Baron/Young at Heart (1979)
An old favorite
I remember watching this episode when the first aired in 1979, and I was at age 13 fascinated with WW1 planes at that time, so it was naturally a big hit with me then.
Rewatching it again for the first time in 43 years, I still enjoyed it, especially since now I am familiar with Don Adams, having seen reruns of Get Smart and his other routines Many times in the last 40 years.
The Red Baron episode is of course my favorite among the two stories - Adams plays a locksmith from Milwaukee who is a World War 1 history buff. His fantasy is to do battle in the sky with the Baron. Adams is playing a somewhat toned down version of his Maxwell Smart character. He's more intelligent, less clumsy (but still a bit of a klutz) and there are a few serious moments, especially at the very end - I won't spoil it, but he makes a very poignant decision. The plot is a "behind enemy lines, steal the battle plans" caper. The French woman he becomes attached to is played by Martine Beswick, who appeared in two James Bond movies in the 60's. Nice tight plot with humor added in, overall still one of my favorite stories in the series.
The flipside story is a love story, a woman who is in her 50's wants to be young again and find romance. She does, and while I found the likable little love story predictable, it played out nicely and was well acted.
At this point the series was in full stride, and I used to very much enjoy my childhood Saturday nights at 10 pm watching episodes like this one.
The Pink Panther (1963)
The end of one era, the beginning of another.
First of all, it must be remembered that this movie was not originally intended to be the first in a long series of movies. It was meant to be a standard single production that unexpectedly took off. So comparing it to the later films, most of which were more than a decade later in a different time and era, is beside the point.
But to me there are two movies that were filmed in late 1962 and early 1963, post-production in 1963 and released in December of 1963 which mark the end of the Old Hollywood attitude toward glamour and sophistication and the "Jet Set" lifestyle. Those two movies are "The Pink Panther" and "Charade". Both were released less than month after JFK was assassinated, (Pink Panther was not released in the US till early '64 but was released in Europe in December of 1963), but they are both among the final Hollywood products of the "Camelot" era in America and Dolce Vita Europe. It was the dawn of jet travel, but global travel was still expensive enough that living in Paris or Rome and skiing in Cortina were fantasy trips of a lifetime to Americans in general. It was an short lived era in which many young professional adults aspired to be as sophisticated as Jack and Jackie - paperback Mentor books on art, wine and classical music sold from drug store book racks, Life magazine did full color picture stories of "The Beautiful People" trotting the globe and Hollywood technicolor films showcasing the Riviera, the Alps, Paris and Rome. Most Americans had yet to understand where Vietnam was and what was happening there, and the Beatles hadn't arrived in the States just yet. Rock and Roll was for teens, adults over say, 25, savored the "more sophisticated" sounds of Mancini and Sinatra. The Rat Pack still Had more influence On the behavior of 25-45 year old men who wanted to feel like more than just an anonymous white collar suburbanite than a rock and roll singer or an anti-establishment actor like Steve McQueen. Sexiness the movies was still alluded to, not shown. Cursing in the movies was still confined to an occasional "damn" or "hell" and even then, almost never in a comedy.
All this was about to change very quickly, in the blink of an eye really, in the next 3 or 4 years.
So The Pink Panther is almost a time capsule of American attitudes (envy, admiration) toward the wealthy, toward Europe, toward global travel, toward comedy at the very end of the Old Hollywood era.
So comparing it to very funny Panther movies of the 70's with their non-stop slapstick and parodies and spoofs is not realistic.
Taken for what it originally was, the 1963 Pink Panther is an enjoyable and almost unique combination of wit and slapstick, a comical game of cat and mouse between The Phantom and The Inspector, and an early 60's sex comedy.
Niven's nonchalant persona perfectly offsets Sellar's pratfalls, and the result is plenty of fun, a lot of witty lines and great music.
Remington Steele: Small Town Steele (1984)
Good effort at an old concept
Almost every private eye television show in the 60's and 70's had one episode set in a small western town where every citizen in town was in on, and guilty of, a secret. In fact, it seems to have been almost a requirement of every detective show to Take a crack at this particular plot (just like there always HAS to be an episode related to horse racing. It is the way of things.). The secret is generally a past crime the town folk committed or in some cases just a fortuitous windfall from another person's crime that benefited the town financially. And of course they do not want any strangers snooping around who might dig up the past and cost them their windfall, so they are hostile toward any outside visitor who may show up. How a town is supposed to have survived economically with no social or business contacts outside of its own borders is always a puzzle to me, but sometime I think too much when I watch tv. I saw an episode like this on Mannix, Cannon, Rockford and I've lost track of how many others.
The cliche endured until at least 1984, but I kind of like the lighter touch of this take on it. My favorite line is when Laura says, with girlish glee, "I came to rescue you. I've always wanted to say that!"
I won't splint the plot but the banter is good in this one, and the cliche is handled well.
F Troop: The West Goes Ghost (1966)
Ghost town shenanigans
So many of the sitcoms from the 1960's did an episode, usually in aired October, that had a haunted house or ghost or in this case a haunted town. F Troop, as usual, did it with a great deal of wit, though not much by the way of genuine shivers. O'Rourke talks Agarn, Dobbs and Vanderbilt into leaving the army with hm and homesteading a deserted ghost town where he's heard the railroad is going to pass through. Jane tells them about the spooky stories related to the ghost town, which Agarn believes but O'Rourke doesn't. It turns out there is a ghost, it it further turns out that the ghost is just an old hermit trying to keep people away so he can live there by himself. Then it turns out that the railroad isn't coming through after all and a new ghost puts in an appearance, which scares the men back into the army.
There is some good banter between Agarn and Dobbs as they argue with one another, and as usual Larry Storch steals the show. The mandatory visit to the Hikawi camp has the usual anachronistic humor and is well done. The final appearance of the ghost - maybe he's real after all?
One of the better episodes of a witty little show with some great comedic talent in it.
I Dream of Jeannie: My Master, the Ghostbreaker (1968)
Standard 60's sitcom ghost episode.
Just about every sitcom from the 60's did a haunted house or ghost episode - from Andy Griffith to Gilligan's Island to F Troop to Dick Van Dyke.
This one isn't one of the better IDOJ episodes now one of the better ghost sitcom episodes in general, but it's not too bad. It's far too obvious who's faking the haunting and why. But, there are a few good slapstick moments, and it's fun to see Jeannie being scared of ghosts (isn't a genie a type of a ghost anyway?😂). Roger is a big chicken too when it comes to the ghostly events and has a couple of his usual wisecracks that work.
Productions values are pretty standard. The storyline has been done many times over the years and they don't add any new twists to it. Other than a couple stock establishing shots of England, this is entirely filmed on a frequently used haunted house set in LA, but two of the three actors who played British characters really are Brits themselves, so there's at least a minimum of phoney accents.
If you're marking Halloween by catching the various "haunted" episodes of old sitcoms, this one is worth seeing at least once.