Labored with a director like Mark Rydell who has an uncanny knack for making a million dollar movie look like it was shot on a shoe- string, this is not a trip I would recommend. Mr. Rydell is really in his element here. He just loves to ignore his million dollar sets and concentrate instead on Elliott Gould's unprepossessing mug as if he were directing some small-scale TV show and not a film designed by Harry Horner and photographed by Laslo Kovacs. No less than three editors were employed to try to disguise Rydell's inadequacies. It seems Mr. Rydell took no notice of anybody. He didn't even bother to read the credits. For instance, there's a credit he ignored that told us that the stained glass windows in the restaurant set were based on designs by Alphonse Muca. What stained glass windows? Did you see any stained glass windows? I didn't! They were probably hidden behind Charles Durning's right ear. The screenplay – or at least as much of it as manages to percolate through Rydell's heavy hand – is occasionally not without interest, though why Rydell spends so much time on a scene in which Harry tries to persuade Walter to go to New York, beggars the imagination. For your information, Mr. Durning, that's what a movie entitled Harry and Walter Go to New York is all about. Elliott Gould plays Walter and is his usual camera-hogging style. On the other hand, Carol Kane and Jack Gilford are wasted in minuscule parts. But if you can wait that long, there is a nice climax where the songs finally come to the fore in an amusing Ruritanian pastiche.
