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Spudling2
My favourite films include "No Trees for Lilly Cromarty" "The Egg and the Policeman" and "Crazy, Man, But Not So Bad", an eclectic mix of genres, styles, moods and pocahontas-absence.
I love the Waterhole but cannot make my life of it. I am too obsessional to fit the internet into my life, and so obsessional that I have to do without it in my house. A pity, for I have much to give, and much to take, and easter bunnies and broken dreams are all part of the equation, and there are people on the site I, yes, love but it isn't real, is it, yes, yes, it is, but there is more to the equation than just personal need, there is also commitment to the broader life, the world that exists inside and outside the net, inside and outside your head blah blah blah blah. So I come and go. Self-protection.....
I love Cinema. It saw me through a boyhood when I was shy and friendless for the most part. I used to go to bed pretending I was my heroes of the day. Holidays were spent in cinemas through all three showings if I liked the film and often I'd go back for more. My redcord was "Seven Brides for Seven Brothers" nine times in a week : god, how I loved that film, and how I wished I was Russ Tamblyn, all cute and freckled and uncomplicated....
But my love of films is a simple one. I am not interested in the private lives of the stars, or the social implications implicit in the film, or indeed of anybody elses opinions. I know what I think : why should I care what anybody else thinks. But so many people are so PRETENTIOUS on these boards, so humourless, so full of their own wind.
I love the films that move me, thrill me or make me laugh. I hate the films that bore me. That's all.
Reviews
The Glory Brigade (1953)
A film for b-movie war and Victor Mature fans and Lee Marvin completists.....
This is a pretty average small-scale war-movie, in which a platoon of American soldiers show themselves to be tougher, braver and cleverer than the Greek soldiers they have to join forces with. It's standard stuff all round, Victor Mature agonises, his colleagues wisecrack and the Greeks redeem themselves by the end.
I waited thirty years to see this film because Lee Marvin was given third billing. But all he does in the film is sit at a radio, wearing glasses, with the occasional bit of insubstantial dialogue. In fact he should have got tenth or eleventh billing, but one assumes that, following his success in "The Big Heat", the publicity boys decided to 'use' his name.
I felt cheated, which probably accounts for my not liking the film a bit more.
Damn Yankees (1958)
Forgotten, but undeservedly so.......
Forgotten, but undeservedly so,"Damn Yankees"-- as I always think of it -- is a peppy musical based on the Faustian legend in which the Devils' Advocate (Ray Walston) and his temptress assistant Lola (Gwen Verdon) persuade an ageing baseball fan to sell his soul to become Tab Hunter,baseball-player extraordinaire. But there's a problem; he allows his victim an escape clause....
It's a strong storyline, then, and nicely realised, which is a good thing as the musical numbers are rather thrown in as if the songwriters had been given the screenplay and asked to fit in whatever songs they could manage wherever they could fit them, and to give everybody a turn, whether or not it advanced the story or just stopped it dead.
But the score is a fine one, the Bob Fosse and Gwen Verdon dance routines are stunning (even if totally superfluous) and the film as a whole is very much worth a couple of hours of relax time.....
Joe MacBeth (1955)
Good B-list cast, terrible Z-list production values......
Paul Douglas is the hapless gangster who kills his way to the top of the tree. Ruth Roman is the vicious, ambitious wife who pushes him on his ever more destructive way. Sid James, Gregoire Aslan,Bonar Colleano and Robert Arden are amongst the welcome familiar faces in support. Unfortunately this interesting cast and Philip Yordans' excellent screenplay -- which I assume could not find Hollywood backing -- are given British B-feature production values.
As a result, the whole film is studio-bound and drably photographed, and there is no feeling that it is set in the Thirties or, for that matter, in America, beyond that the leading actors are American and all the British supporting actors essay unfamiliar accents.
Director Ken Hughes does attempt some atmospheric shots,but too many scenes are given perfunctory treatment and emphasis is lost. It has its' moments and retained my interest -- but it could have been so much more that just a minor Shakespearean adaptation with a bit more money spent on it....
Naked Fury (1959)
Neat little B-movie - but the title is a misnomer...
Four men rob a factory, stealing £50000, coshing the nightwatchman unconscious before he can see them but kidnapping his daughter who turned up at the wrong time, taking her back to their hideout on the top floor o0f a derelict house. Three of them go back to their usual lives until the boss has arranged safe passage abroad. However complications arise when the wife of one crook wants her husbands share or she will rat him to the police, another wants his share immediately when he learns his son is very ill, and the third is persuaded by a pal to grab all the loot for themselves. They then learn that the nightwatchman has died, and the ships' captain drives a hard bargain to smuggle the gang abroad. And all the time the derelict house is crumbling.... Every now and then the British B-movie makers produced B-films that weren't risible, and this is one of them because it is so fast paced.At 65 minutes, the makers had no time to spare for extraneous stuff, and if it is no more than a time-filler, it is an extremely agreeable one. But where did they get the title ? Nobody gets naked. Nobody even gets furious....
Deadly Reactor (1989)
One of the great bad movies......
This was David Heaveners' laughable homage to/ copy of the westerns of Clint Eastwood, combining as it does elements of the Dollar films, Pale Rider and High Plains Drifter. It is set in a post-apocalyptic world purely as a cost-cutting measure. A Western would have required horses and costumes and you wouldn't be able to hire bikers to play the heavies for a couple of barrels of beer.
The other reviewers have amply covered the ludicrous aspects of this movie that make it so stupid, so funny and so entertaining. But the highspot to me came when the townsfolk were waiting for the biker gang to attack them. Our hero shows them how to use guns, but then, just before the gang are due to arrive, he leaves the town and the townsfolk to their own devices. WHY ? He liked the townsfolk. He loved one of the women. He wanted revenge on the bikers. Why ride away and leave the townsfolk to certain death etc ? And it suddenly struck me. That is what Eastwood did in High Plains Drifter......
The Challenge (1960)
As Monroe starred with Laurence Olivier....
...so did Mansfield star with another noted Shakespearean actor, Anthony Quayle. The difference being that Mansfield was never the star that Monroe was,and Quayle was just a jobbing actor in films, and the production accorded them was a cheapie. Actually, for the first part of this, with Mansfield hiding beneath a brunette wig, she is not bad, but back to blonde for the last half of the film she resorts to her usual simpering.
The picture and sound quality of the CD is so bad, I could not even take my usual pleasure in this sort of film of enjoying the cast of familiar faces. The credits said Percy Herbert was in there somewhere, but I didn't see him.