Category Archives: Foreign Films

See No Evil (1971)

Posted on October 2, 2014 | Leave a comment

see no evil

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 7 out of 10

4-Word Review: Psycho stalks blind girl.

Sarah (Mia Farrow) is a young woman who becomes permanently blinded during a horse riding accident. After months of rehabilitation she returns to her family home in the English countryside. Dealing with her new handicap is awkward at first, but things go genuinely smoothly. Unfortunately a psychotic man harboring a petty grudge lurks in the shadows. One day while Sarah is away he murders her entire family and when she returns he goes after her, but the viewer is as in the dark as she is to his identity as all that is shown are the nifty looking cowboy boots that he walks in.

Veteran director Richard Fleischer takes Brian Clemens compact script and turns it into a visual masterpiece. The camera angles and shot compositions are not only perfect, but highly creative. One of the highlights is when Sarah comes home and doesn’t realize at first that her family is dead and only slowly becomes aware of it along with the viewer. The countryside, which was shot near Berkshire, England, is majestically captured particularly during the horse riding sequences. The pace is fast and intense and never lets up with twists that prove to be quite interesting.

Farrow has a limited range as an actress, but her delicate features and the character’s self-reliant nature make her easily likable and the viewer immediately becomes empathetic to her plight. The rest of the characters are well-rounded and believable with noted character actress Lila Kaye in a small, but memorable role as a gypsy mother.

The fact that the identity of the killer is kept a secret until the very end is an added bonus, but you actually do see his face in an earlier scene, but are not made aware that it is him, which I thought was pretty cool. The only misgivings that I had in this area is the fact that the killer supposedly murders these people in a fit of revenge for accidently splashing water on his precious boots when they drove past him in a car, but then later after he kills them he goes to bed and allows the droplets of blood from his victims to dry on his boots while he sleeps even though I felt with his obsessive preoccupation with them that he would have wiped that off right away. Also, for a man who brazenly murders a family in broad daylight for such a petty reason he seems to get a little too nervous about it afterwards even though if he is that crazy I would think that he would have remained cocky about it and felt that he would be able to murder anyone else who got in his way. He also puts up no fight in the end when he finally gets cornered making him look wimpy and making the climax a bit of a letdown.

Overall though I found this thriller to be highly entertaining and its effect has not diminished through repeat viewings. They don’t seem to be able to make them like this anymore, which is unfortunate.

My Rating: 7 out of 10

Alternate Title: Blind Terror

Released: September 2, 1971

Runtime: 1Hour 29Minutes

Rated GP

Director: Richard Fleischer

Studio: Columbia Pictures

Available: DVD, Amazon Instant Video

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Posted in 70's Movies, British Movies, Foreign Films, Mystery, Thrillers/Suspense

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Heat and Dust (1983)

Posted on August 25, 2014 | Leave a comment

heat and dust

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 5 out of 10

4-Word Review: Illicit love in India.

Anne (Julie Christie) has acquired a great fascination with her long-lost Aunt Olivia (Greta Sachi) who was involved in scandal while living in India during the 1920’s. After doing some extensive interviews with Harry (Nickolas Grace) a man who knew Olivia and was friends with her during the period, Anne decides to make a trek to the region herself.  Although several decades removed Anne still manages to find some interesting things about her Aunt including her illicit affair with a local ruler named Nawab (Shashi Kapoor) which caused great scandal at the time and forced her to go into hiding.

The film has a unique structure in that it weaves back and forth between the ‘60s when Anne travels to the region and the ‘20s when Olivia was there. Initially this is slightly off-putting as it cuts back and forth quite suddenly and without warning, but eventually I adjusted to it and amazingly it comes off quite seamlessly most of the way. The film spends more time on Olivia, but by the end it’s cutting between the two every couple of minutes and it one cool moment even have the two come together in a surreal type of way. The only real problem I had with this is when Anne meets a young American man who has ‘purified’ himself from the capitalistic culture of the west, but then still seems to fall back on his old ways at times creating a tumultuous relationship with Anne that I found rather interesting and was upset when the film suddenly cut back to Olivia and then stayed with her for too long a time before going back.

I enjoyed the on-location shooting of India, which makes you feel almost like you’ve traveled there yourself. The film not only analyzes the crowded squalor of the big cities, but also the rocky beauty of its rugged terrain. The film immerses the viewer in the culture looking at both the positive aspects of it as well as the negative, which gives you an overall balanced viewpoint. However, I would have liked more an expansive look of the area with greater use of a wide angle lens and a few bird’s-eye shots of the city, but this was most likely limited because of budget restraints.

I enjoyed the wide-eyed idealism of the Olivia character and Sacchi captures it just right. Christie is also solid, but in the end a bit wasted. The film itself is interesting enough to hold your attention, but some of the scenes go on longer than necessary and could have easily been trimmed. The story seemed rather simple and predictable and has no action at all making the runtime excessive especially with a final payoff that is not too exciting and leaves more than a few loose ends open.

My Rating: 5 out of 10

Released: September 15, 1983

Runtime: 2Hours 13Minutes

Rated R

Director: James Ivory

Studio: Merchant Ivory Productions

Available: VHS, DVD

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Posted in 80's Movies, British Movies, Drama, Foreign Films, Movies Based on Novels, Movies with Nudity, Romance

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The Last Woman (1976)

Posted on August 16, 2014 | 2 comments

the last woman 1

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 2 out of 10

4-Word Review: He ends his manhood.

Gerard (Gerard Depardieu) is a single father of an infant son whose wife has left him due to his controlling ways. By chance he meets Valerie (Ornella Muti) who is just getting over a tumultuous relationship with her boyfriend Michel (Michel Piccoli). She loves Gerard’s little boy and it is enough for her to move in with them almost immediately. The two have a passionate affair, but then Gerard becomes as possessive with her as he was with his ex-wife. Valerie tries to stick with it due to her feelings for the child, but Gerard’s abrasive personality and his inability to see her as anything more than a sexual object eventually becomes too much.

The film, which was directed by the notorious Marco Ferreri who was known to push-the-envelope in just about all the movies he made, is laced with a streaming sexuality that makes it almost pornographic. The sex is raw and explicit even showing Depardieu with a full erection. The characters take their clothes off and prance around naked in front of the child and even have sex with him in the room, which many American viewers will most likely find quite shocking and offensive making it easy to see why this film has never been released onto VHS, DVD or Blu-ray. The sex also seems more real and not the simulated kind one finds in most Hollywood films. There is an animalistic quality to it like it is being done unrehearsed and on-the-spot.

Unfortunately Ferreri relies too heavily on the sensual aspect to carry the film while ignoring the storyline, which is too wide-open and badly in need of more structure and editing. The sex becomes redundant and the conversations between the two characters are endless and pointless. The production plays like it has one of those scripts that gives the actors a generalized understanding of their characters and then allows them to improvise their lines, which unfortunately fails to elicit anything interesting. Ferreri’s direction lacks visual appeal by focusing in on an apartment building, which is where most of the story takes place that is too ordinary and dull.

Muti is certainly beautiful, but her acting is too restrained although it is interesting to some extent at seeing her subdued performance playing off of Depardieu’s hyper one.

Depardieu is solid as expected, but having to spend ninety percent of the time looking at his out-of-shape, chubby nude frame gets a bit trying and even gross. His character is also obnoxious and the callous way he treats Valerie eventually becomes a turn-off

Spoiler Warning!

The film’s biggest claim to fame though is the ending where without warning the Depardieu character takes an electrical meat cutter and slices off his own penis, which is done in such a graphic way that it will make any viewer wince and turn away. Having him then hold up the bloody thing and shove it into the faces of both his shocked and crying girlfriend and child is genuinely disturbing. However, the film as a whole is so boring that this horrific moment does not make it worth sitting through and in many ways just makes it even worse.

End of Spoiler Warning!

Released: April 21, 1976

Runtime: 1Hour 52Minutes

Rated X

Director: Marco Ferreri

Studio: Columbia Pictures

Available: None at this time.

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Posted in 70's Movies, Drama, Foreign Films, French Films, Movies with Nudity, Obscure Movies, Sex

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Heat of Desire (1981)

Posted on August 11, 2014 | Leave a comment

heat of desire

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 3 out of 10

4-Word Review: Obsessed over a woman.

Serge (Patrick Dewaere) is a college professor ready to take his wife Nicole (Nicole Jamet) to Barcelona for a second honeymoon when he meets the mysterious and beautiful Caroline (Clio Goldsmith). Immediately there is an attraction and Serge instantly leaves his shocked wife for her. The two share a strange relationship as Caroline pulls all the strings with Serge constantly crawling after her. As he loses his job, friends, reputation and finances he continues to obsess over her even as it eventually puts his life on the line.

The film has potential. I liked the idea of this intelligent man acting very unintelligently simply because of a beautiful woman, which happens much more often than one might realize. Seeing his successful life devolve into shreds is actually kind of funny and amusing. Unfortunately the script is not fleshed out and seems like a rough draft that is poorly thought out and badly in need of revisions. Everything happens much too fast without any backstory to the characters given. We have no understanding to the Serge character and the actions and behaviors of Caroline are quite bizarre without any explanation given for why she is that way. I found myself put-off by it and unable to get into it at all.

The film does have a few amusing moments. I enjoyed Serge’s attempts at giving a lecture to a roomful of college students about a book that he had actually not read. The makeshift fort that Caroline makes out of some furniture and blankets inside a hotel room is cool and Serge’s standoff with another man inside a urinal is funny as well. Unfortunately writer/director Luc Beraud doesn’t take these scenes to their full potential leaving the viewer with a small chuckle or two instead of all out laughter.

Dewaere gives a solid performance in one of his last roles before is untimely death by suicide just a year later. Goldsmith is attractive, but her nude scenes don’t mean much since they are all done in the dark and the shadowy lighting doesn’t allow the viewer to see much of her figure. Jeanne Moreau is terrific as Caroline’s mother who pimps her own daughter out to clients and then even herself.

The ending like the beginning is a disappointment and leads to a lot of nothing. The viewer is left with no conclusion to anything and the badly disjointed narrative makes this potentially explosive idea a big misfire.

My Rating: 3 out of 10

Alternate Title: Plein sud

Released: April 29, 1981

Runtime: 1Hour 31Minutes

Rated R

Director: Luc Beraud

Studio: Gaumont

Available: VHS

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Posted in 80's Movies, Black Comedy, Foreign Films, French Films, Movies with Nudity, Obscure Movies, Offbeat

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Rabid Dogs (1974)

Posted on August 9, 2014 | 1 comment

rabid dogs 3

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 7 out of 10

4-Word Review: Terror filled car ride.

Four men decide to hijack a car that is delivering the payroll to the employees of a local Italian pharmaceutical plant. Both men inside the car are killed, but the four manage to get away with the money only to have the driver of the getaway vehicle shot in the back of the head by a security guard as well as having a bullet hole put into their fuel tank. The remaining three are then forced to find another car. There is the Doctor (Maurice Poli) who is the level-headed leader and mastermind. There is also Bisturi (Don Backy) a lanky child-like man prone to savagery without warning and Thirty-two (George Eastman) who can be equally savage especially with women. They kidnap a beautiful woman named Maria (Lea Lander) and then hijack another car driven by a father Riccardo (Riccardo Cucciolla) who is trying to take his sick son to the hospital. The six then go on a terrifying car ride through the Italian countryside while playing a game of cat-and-mouse with each other and eluding the authorities.

This film turned out to be Mario Bava’s swan song. His career had faded during the 70’s as his style of horror films were no longer considered chic and he made this film project a personal crusade to prove that he could keep up with the modern sensibilities by creating a film that was gritty, raw and violent. All things considered he succeeds valiantly. The film has a nasty edge right from the beginning and manages to stay at that tone throughout. The killers are truly mean and keep the viewer on edge with their unpredictable trigger-finger personalities. It achieves a level of ugliness reminiscent in a true crime that most Hollywood films never seem able to attain and its shoe-string budget and bare-bones approach becomes a major benefit.

For a film that takes place almost entirely inside a car the shot selections has an amazing amount of variety. Bava ended up having to do the cinematography himself because he couldn’t afford to keep the one he had hired on, which makes it all the more incrediable how brilliantly visual this is. The characters faces get up so close to the lens you literally feel like you can smell them and sense the sweat glistening off their bodies making you believe you are stuck in the car with them. The film is never boring or slow, the action well-choreographed with interesting  plot twists proving what an underrated genius Bava was and making me believe that despite the many difficulties getting produced this is his finest effort.

Backy who was and still is today a singer/songwriter with limited acting experience gives a great performance and is possibly the most memorable of the villains especially with his shocked expressions after he commits a particularly vile act proving that even he himself is shaken at his own savagery. Leander isn’t necessarily the best of actresses, but her perpetual look of shock and fear is quite entertaining. I was also impressed with the child actor who manages to stay asleep despite all the violence and chaos around him.

I also enjoyed the similarities to Last House on the Left including an exciting foot chase through a cornfield where you think the women is going to get away as well as a scene where the women is forced to urinate in front of the men while they laugh and mock her.

If you are a fan of 70’s exploitation than this lost gem deserves to be on top of any true fan’s list as it delivers-the-goods without ever watering things down for good taste. I also enjoyed the neat twist ending, which I saw coming, but it’s pretty cool anyways.

Years later Bava’s son Lamberto used existing footage from this film while adding new scenes with a different ending to create a movie called Kidnapped although I prefer this version better.

My Rating: 7 out of 10

Alternate Title: Kidnapped

Released: February 25, 1998 (Never released during Bava’s lifetime.)

Runtime: 1Hour 36Minutes

Not Rated

Director: Mario Bava

Studio: Spera Cinematografica

Available: DVD, Blu-ray, Amazon Instant Video

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Posted in 70's Movies, Foreign Films, Heist Movies, Italian Films, Kidnapping Movies, Low Budget, Road Movies, Thrillers/Suspense

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The Boy Friend (1971)

Posted on July 18, 2014 | Leave a comment

Boy Friend, The

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 9 out of 10

4-Word Review: An eye popping musical.

I would not call myself a big musical fan, but I found this one to be excellent and the gold standard for all others. The whole thing is visually stunning from beginning to end with a wide variety of backdrops and settings used. You get everything from conventional dance numbers to a fairy tale recreation where the performers dress like ladybugs and live in giant mushrooms. There is even a fun take-off on Greek mythology done in a scenic forest setting.

The best segment has the dancers on not one but two giant record players shown side-by-side and from overhead. The performers dance on top of the huge turntables while as a group make unique symmetrical designs with their bodies. Another part has them on a gigantic playing card, which reminded me of an old Busby Berkley number and who has always been considered the godfather of splashy dance numbers and yet here it seems to outdo even him.

The film carries itself on the visual level alone with a story that can be best described as a standard musical plot. It involves a group of underpaid actors who put on a tacky musical for a small group of people. The film than interweaves between the low budget numbers, which are all still really good, and their fantasies of what things would look like if they had more money. Twiggy plays the shy awkward crew hand that comes on as the star when the leading lady breaks her leg.

Sure it is at times predictable, corny, and lightweight but it makes up for it with a really good sense of humor. The songs all sound great and the dance routines are certainly extravagant. Twiggy may never score as a great actress, but she hits the mark here. She has a cute bob haircut and a constantly perplexed expression that is really amusing. All the other characters have funny idiosyncrasies as well including Glenda Jackson as the injured leading lady who comes back and is none too happy to see how successful her replacement is.

Ken Russell has immense talent and is sadly one of the most unheralded directors around. Some of his films have been considered excessive and nonsensical, but that is not the case here as his visual flair and indulgence work to enhance the production including his use of primary colors in every shot.

This is a highly recommended visual delight that is impressive even by today’s standards and fun to watch for every member of the household.

My Rating: 9 out of 10

Released: December 16, 1971

Runtime: 2Hours 17Minutes

Rated G

Director: Ken Russell

Studio: MGM

Available: VHS, DVD, Amazon Instant Video

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Posted in 70's Movies, British Movies, Campy Comedy, Foreign Films, Moody/Stylish, Movies for the Whole Family, Musical, Romance

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The White Bus (1967)

Posted on June 22, 2014 | 7 comments

the white bus 1

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 6 out of 10

4-Word Review: Bizarre tour through Manchester.

Patricia Healey plays a young lady who is never given any name that is bored with her job and looking for a diversion. While walking through some of the slum sections of the city she comes upon a white double-deck tour bus headed by the Mayor (Arthur Lowe) promising to show her the exciting areas of town. The tour group visits a factory, library and even witness a civil service drill of people saving victims from burning buildings that had been attacked during an unnamed war. In the end the young lady breaks from the group and goes wandering the streets herself looking into windows of homes where she learns a lot more about ‘the real’ city that she lives in that the tour bus could never show.

the white bus 2

This short film, which only runs 45 minutes was directed by Lindsay Anderson who later went on to collaborate with Malcolm McDowell in the classic if…., O Lucky Man! and Britannia Hospital. Anderson’s films were known for their surreal qualities, absurd situations and bizarre characters. This film proves to be no exception and part of the fun of watching the movie is never knowing what strange thing will happen next.  There are some weird moments for sure including the young lady envisioning herself hanging by the neck from a rope connected to the rafters of the ceiling at her job while the cleaning crew obliviously works around the dead body like it is not there. To me though the best moment is when she witnesses a group of people pushing a polio victim inside an iron lung through a lonely train station.

The film is mostly done in black-and-white, but occasionally for no reason or warning will flip over to color for a few seconds and then back to black-and-white again. These intervals become more frequent towards the middle of the film, but then go back to all black-and-white during the final fifteen minutes. In some ways I found this to be diverting and interesting initially, but eventually it became distracting and pointless.

the white bus 3

Healy does well in the lead and speaks only 9 words of dialogue through the whole thing. Her prominent light blue eyes look like emeralds and she exudes a nice detached quality where she at times seems a confused and curious about her surroundings as the viewer. Classic British character actor Lowe offers some moments of levity as he leads the group through a library while expounding on his opinions about ‘dirty books’.

This movie also marks the film debut of Anthony Hopkins, but to be honest I couldn’t spot him anywhere. Supposedly he can be seen in the background of one scene singing a song in German, but I couldn’t find it. I even went back through the scene selections re-watching moments that had some singing, but I still didn’t see him. If anyone knows exactly where he appears in the film and could let me know I would be forever grateful.

My Rating: 6 out of 10

Alternate Title: Red, White and Zero

Released: December 9, 1967

Runtime: 46Minutes

Not Rated

Director: Lindsay Anderson

Studio: United Artists Corporation

Available: DVD (MGM Limited Edition Collection), Amazon Instant Video

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Posted in 60's Movies, Black & White, British Movies, Foreign Films, Low Budget, Offbeat, Surreal/Fantasy

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Minnesota Clay (1964)

Posted on June 15, 2014 | Leave a comment

minnesota clay 2

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 6 out of 10

4-Word Review: Gunfighter loses his sight.

Minnesota Clay (Cameron Mitchell) is a revered gunfighter stuck in a work camp prison for a crime he didn’t commit. One day he manages to escape and tracks down Fox (Georges Riviere) the man who withheld evidence that would have gotten him off. Fox is now the self-imposed sheriff and extorting money from the citizens of a town in order to keep them ‘safe’.  One of the townspeople is Minnesota’s grown daughter Nancy (Diana Martin) although she is not aware of this and local rancher Jonathan (Antonio Casas) is the only other person that does. As Minnesota tries to figure out a way to exact his revenge while also saving his daughter and townspeople from the reign of terror he realizes that he is losing his sight and doesn’t have much time before he goes completely blind.

For a basic spaghetti western this isn’t too bad. It certainly is no Sergio Leone masterpiece, but it fortunately isn’t the cheap looking, boring mess that some of the ones on the very bottom end of the genre are. The pace is quick with enough gunfights to appease any western fan. Director Sergio Corbucci manages to camouflage the low budget with a background and sets that look reasonable authentic. The plot is nothing special, but has enough twists and turns to keep it mildly interesting although having the Estella character (Ethel Rojo) one minute set-up Minnesota to be killed and then the next minute express her undying love for him gets a bit too dizzying.

One of the chief assets is amazingly Mitchell himself. His acting career started strong in the 1950’s including his critically acclaimed role as Happy Loman in the original Broadway version and eventual 1951 film Death of a Salesman, but a rumored drinking problem lead to a decline in the quality of roles. By the 1980’s he was lodged into doing a procession of grade Z productions simply for the money including shockingly co-starring in a non-sexual role in a porn film Dixie Ray Hollywood Star. Yet here he still shows to be the solid actor that he could be. He carries the picture well and having him a bit older than the conventional gunslinger makes it interesting.

The final shootout done when Minnesota has lost his sight and must rely completely on his heightened sense of hearing is well done and the best moment in the film. It lasts for almost fifteen minutes and has a certain surreal quality due to it happening in the middle of the night and neither man able to see the other. It might have been more interesting though had the character lost his sight at the very beginning, which would have made the entire story more distinctive as the majority of it is pretty ordinary and forgettable.

My Rating: 6 out of 10

Released: November 12, 1964

Runtime: 1Hour 25Minutes

Not Rated

Director: Sergio Corbucci

Studio: Harlequin International Pictures

Available: DVD (Mill Creek)

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Posted in 60's Movies, Foreign Films, Italian Films, Low Budget, Spaghetti Westerns

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Lord of the Flies (1963)

Posted on June 12, 2014 | 2 comments

LOTF

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 8 out of 10

4-Word Review: Kids turn into savages.

Based on the William Golding novel that has been required reading for most high school students. The story centers on a group of British schoolboys who survive a plane crash on an uninhabited tropical island. The boys are of varying ages, but none older than 14. Ralph (James Aubrey) is chosen as their leader, but finds almost immediate friction from Jack (Tom Chapin) who is an aggressive type that likes to hunt and doesn’t tolerate being told what to do. As things progress Jack breaks off from the main group and eventually starts his own following that comes to odds with Ralph’s. More and more of the boys join Jack and start to display savage behavior that leads to two deaths and puts the frightened Ralph on the run and into hiding.

It has been three decades since I’ve read the book, so I can’t really compare it with the film. The criticisms that I have are aimed solely at the film although as I remember the book had some of the same issues. One of the biggest ones is just the fact that there are so many survivors from a plane crash and all of them are conveniently the kids while all the adults perishing, which seems to play too much against the odds. There are also no scratches, bruises or injuries, which you usually come about with a crash even amongst those that survive it. Director Peter Brook does a clever job of intimating a plane disaster at the beginning over the opening credits through use of photographs, which I found to be creative, but showing an actual destroyed plane with kids getting out of it would have given it a little better foundation.

There is also another segment where the kids are convinced some sort of strange beast is on the island and as they go searching for it, it is found to a pilot in a helmet who was killed while trying to parachute to safety. Yet the kids don’t seem to realize this and remain frightened of it. I realize the setting is the 1940’s around the time of the war, but I would still think the kids of that time would have been sophisticated enough to recognize a dead man in a fighter helmet and the fact that they don’t seems pretty odd and even farfetched.

Overall though I really enjoyed the film and feel reluctant to watch the 1990 remake as I am afraid it would ruin the experience of this one.  It was filmed on-location off the island of Vieques in Puerto Rico during late August of 1961. The entire cast was made up of amateur actors who had not read the book. There was no actual script and the boys were allowed to ad-lib their lines, which helps give it an extra air of realism.

lord of the flies 1

I will admit there are shots where some of the boys look bored and detached from things, but then again I suppose boys that age can be that way anyways no matter what situation they are, so in some ways it doesn’t really hurt things. Hugh Edwards who plays Piggy is a real standout and apparently got the role simply by writing a letter to director Brook and informing him that he was fat and wore spectacles.

The black and white photography helps heighten the dark undertones. The shot showing a close-up of the pig’s head on top of a stake with flies’ going in and out of its mouth and nostrils is quite impressive and a brilliant realized moment from the book. The climatic sequence where Ralph must run through the burning foliage to escape the other boys is quite intense. The shot showing a dead boy’s body floating in the water under the moonlight has an evocative flair, but fake looking to the extent that the child was stabbed to death and yet has no visible wounds or blood coming out.

On the DVD commentary Brook states that he likes to believe something like this couldn’t happen. That we have somehow evolved enough as a human race where this savagery would be impossible, but I respectively this disagree. I think this could very well happen in this day and age which is what makes this an infinitely fascinating look at human nature and ultimately a great movie.

lord of the flies 3

My Rating: 8 out of 10

Released: August 13, 1963

Runtime: 1Hour 32Minutes

Not Rated

Director: Peter Brook

Studio: Continental Distributing

Available: VHS, DVD (Criterion Collection), Amazon Instant Video

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Posted in 60's Movies, Adolescence/High School, Black & White, British Movies, Foreign Films, Moody/Stylish, Movies Based on Novels, Movies with a rural setting, Movies with Nudity, Outdoors, Psychological

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The V.I.P.s (1963)

Posted on May 29, 2014 | 3 comments

the vips2

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 3 out of 10

4-Word Review: Drama at the airport.

Several diverse characters come together at London’s Heathrow Airport. All have urgent needs that require them to board a certain flight that they hope will take off as soon as possible. Frances (Elizabeth Taylor) is the wife of rich tycoon Paul (Richard Burton) and is secretly having an affair with gambler/playboy Marc (Louis Jourdan). She has left him a ‘dear John’ letter at home and hopes to be well on her way to New York before he reads it. Les (Rod Taylor) is a businessman who also hopes to get to the Big Apple quickly to avoid the hostile takeover of his company. Max (Orson Welles) is a famous movie director traveling with his vapid starlet Gloria (Elsa Martinelli) and hoping to leave England before he is forced to pay an enormous tax penalty. Unfortunately for them a fog rolls in, which delays the flight and sends everyone’s plans into disarray.

The drama has some potential at the beginning, but the 2-hour runtime is much too long for this type of material. Whatever compelling elements the threads may have had when it started become lodged in endless talk and boredom. The scene where Burton smashes Liz’s hand against a mirror is the only time there is any action and Terence Rattigan’s soap opera script is too clichéd. Director Anthony Asquith’s direction shows no visual flair and fails to capture the airport in any type of interesting way. The background sets look like they were built on a soundstage and the fog effects are quite tacky.

Margaret Rutherford won the supporting Oscar for her portrayal of an aging Duchess. She adds some much needed humor particularly in the segment where she has difficulty getting her hat box into the plane’s luggage compartment. However, like with the story thread concerning the Orson Welles character she is seen to briefly and their scenes are spread so far apart that you almost forget all about them.

Spoiler Warning!

There is also another segment where a complete stranger played by actress Maggie Smith approaches the Burton character and asks him for a hundred and fifty three thousand pounds and he gives it to her in the form of a blank check, which had me floored. Men like him don’t become rich by handing out a lot of money to anyone who asks especially people they don’t know. Some may argue that because the character was considering suicide that he didn’t care anymore, but it still seemed too much of a stretch and for me sent this already stale drama into the realm of the absurd and ridiculous.

End of Spoiler Warning

Every story thread gets a nice, convenient happy ending that gives the whole thing a TV-sitcom quality and barely worth the effort to sit through. The production has some glossy aspects and certainly big-name stars, but ends up being a buildup to nothing.

the vips1

My Rating: 3 out of 10

Released: September 19, 1963

Runtime: 1Hour 59Minutes

Not Rated

Director: Anthony Asquith

Studio: MGM

Available: DVD, Amazon Instant Video

3 Comments

Posted in 60's Movies, Academy Award Winners for Best Supporting Actress, British Movies, Drama, Foreign Films, Movies Based on Actual Events, Taylor/Burton

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