Category Archives: Movies for the Whole Family

Scavenger Hunt (1979)

Posted on May 31, 2014 | 1 comment

scavenger hunt 3

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 6 out of 10

4-Word Review: Mad dash for money.

When rich toy inventor Milton Parker (Vincent Price) dies all of his relatives gather for a reading of his will hoping to get a giant share of his 200 million dollar estate. There’s his greedy sister Mildred (Cloris Leachman) along with her child-like grown son Georgie (Richard Masur) and shyster lawyer Stuart (Richard Benjamin) his servants (Cleavon Little, Roddy McDowell, James Coco, Stephanie Faracy) a dimwitted cab driver (Richard Mulligan), his nephews Kenny (Dirk Benedict) and Jeff (Willie Aames) as well as his son-in-law Henry (Tony Randall) and his four children.  At the reading they are given a list of items each having a certain point total and told that whoever can collect the most items by the end of the day will be given the inheritance. Everyone then splits off into five teams and scours the city of San Diego looking to collect everything from a fat person, to a toilet and even an ostrich.

The natural inclination would be to write this movie off as being lame right from the beginning as the characterizations are quite broad, the action very cartoonish and the humor at an almost kiddie level, but farce/slapstick is a legitimate movie genre, so lambasting it simply for being silly isn’t really fair. Yes, you will have to park your intellect at the door to enjoy this one, but I found myself laughing more than I thought and it is great mindless escapism for the whole family without ever being crude or offensive. It also has Cloris Leachman who adds to her already legendary and eclectic resume by playing another extreme character and flying with it.

The film has a few hilarious bits including the servants stealing a toilet inside the bathroom of a post hotel and then later on while in a science lab getting attacked by a ‘giant soufflé’. Benjamin’s confrontation with an angry gang of bikers led by Meat Loaf is pretty good and the wild car chase that ensues at the end isn’t bad either. The film successfully interweaves moments of cynical humor as well, which helps make it more agreeable to older teens and adults.

There are also a myriad of famous faces in bit parts that are funnier than the main cast. I loved Ruth Gordon as a tough talking old lady and Robert Morley as the lawyer heading the estate whose facial expression when Leachman hugs him is a gem. Henry Polic II appears as a motorcycle cop who comes into contact with laughing gas and then loses his uniform and there is Arnold Schwarzenegger as an overzealous fitness instructor. I also really liked Scatman Crothers who appears for a while as Mulligan’s partner and then disappears only to come back in a pivotal part at the very end and even sings over the closing credits.

The only thing that really got on my nerves was Richard Masur as the overgrown man-child named Georgie. Acting wise he does it pretty well, but there is never any explanation why a grown man would be acting so infantile. Was he mentally challenged, or just mentally ill? It is never explained, but comes off more as creepy than funny. I also didn’t like Faracy initially as the dumb French maid, but she grew on me and eventually I came to adore her especially when she tells off Coco. Randall, as a beleaguered father is pretty much wasted, but I did like Julie Ann Haddock as his oldest daughter who later went on to play Cindy Webster on the first three seasons of ‘Facts of Life’.

African American director Michael Schultz shows quite the flair for variety. He started his career doing black-themed films like the classic Cooley High and Car Wash only to turn around and direct the Bee Gees in Sergeant. Pepper’s Lonely Club Hearts Band and then this one, which is in every way diametrically different from his earlier work, but still an accomplishment for his ability to take on such varying works and genuinely be successful at them.

Filmed entirely on-location in San Diego this film can be great fun for kids of all ages even those that are over 40.

My Rating: 6 out of 10

Released: December 21, 1979

Runtime: 1Hour 55Minutes

Rated PG

Director: Michael Schultz

Studio: 20th Century Fox

Available: VHS, YouTube

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Posted in 70's Movies, Farce, Fast Cars/Car Chase, Movies for the Whole Family, Obscure Movies

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Candleshoe (1977)

Posted on February 7, 2014 | 1 comment

candleshoe

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 8 out of 10

4-Word Review: Treasure hidden on estate.

            Jodie Foster stars as Casey a teen living on the tough streets of New York and reselling stolen items for a living. Her abilities come to the attention of small-time crook Harry Bundage (Leo McKern) who gets her to pretend that she is the long lost granddaughter of a rich matriarch by the name of Lady St. Edmund (Helen Hayes).  Bundage has become aware through a former servant that worked there that there is a trove of treasure hidden somewhere on the premises and it is up to Casey to follow the clues and find it.

I saw this movie when it was released in 1977 and the only thing I could remember from it was the little boy who would slide across the polished floors of the mansion. It’s a surprisingly elaborate plot for a children’s movie, but one that is engrossing and interesting. The characters are believable and diverse and it is fun seeing them evolve and learn to get along. Parents should find this as enjoyable as the kids. I was impressed with the way the filmmakers never talk down to their young audience and trust that they will be sophisticated enough to pick up on the little nuances and subtitles, which the film does have.  I found myself longing for this type of family entertainment again. It seems like the family films of today either have kids spewing out a lot of crude nasty things, or they are so sugary sweet and benign that they make you want to throw up, but this film nicely straddles the middle and it really works.

Jodie is great in the lead and the movie wouldn’t have worked as well with another actress in the role. The part nicely takes advantage of Foster’s confident, smart, streetwise persona and almost had me believing that the part was written specifically for her. Later I read how the original director for the film, David Swift, dropped out of the project because he felt Foster was ‘all wrong’ for the role even though I felt she was perfect and other viewers should feel the same.

Helen Hayes is okay in her role, however the character isn’t all that interesting, nor has that much to do. It seems like once she won the Academy Award for Airport in 1970, which helped revive her career, these were the typical ‘sweet old lady’ roles she was perpetually offered afterwards. However, when it comes to the caricature of an old lady Hayes is absolutely perfect almost to the point that it is hard to imagine her ever being young.

David Niven, who plays the butler named Priory, is engaging, but was starting to look frail and elderly. He gets a chance to play several different roles including that of the gardener and chauffeur. The Irish accent that he uses for the gardener part sounded very authentic and I was impressed. His best moment comes at the end when he takes on the McKern character in an imaginative and drawn out duel segment and watching his scared and nervous facial expressions during this is amusing.

I liked the other children who play the orphans that Lady St. Edmond adopts. They are cute in a nice genuine way without it being forced especially the young blonde haired boy named Bobby who speaks in a thick cockney accent. Veronica Quilligan plays Cluny one of the older children who are initially an adversary to Casey. She showed the most disciplined and realistic facial reactions to the action around her while the other kids had lost or vapid looks on their faces. Although she appeared to be about 13 or 14, the same age of the character that she played, I was shocked to find that she was actually 21 when the movie was made.

I was surprised that there wasn’t a car chase scene as every Disney movie from the 70’s seemed to have one. The action for what it is worth is sparse, but enjoyable without ever getting too cartoonish. The ending where the kids take on the band of adult crooks is good and the scene where their car is stopped on the tracks and the train comes just inches from Priory, who is shielding the vehicle, before stopping is a near classic.

I think adults who were kids during this era can watch this film again and still find it entertaining. The kids of today should find enjoyable as well although the ideal age would be between 8 and 14 as I think it is too slow paced for anyone younger.  The film also has a good life lesson in regards to teamwork and how working together and taking advantage of each other’s special talents and abilities can help achieve a common goal.

My Rating: 8 out of 10

Released: December 16, 1977

Runtime: 1Hour 41Minutes

Rated G

Director: Norman Tokar

Studio: Buena Vista

Available: VHS, DVD, Amazon Instant Video

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Posted in 70's Movies, Action/Adventure, Comedy, Movies Based on Novels, Movies for the Whole Family, Mystery

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The Art of Love (1965)

Posted on December 29, 2013 | 1 comment

art of love

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 3 out of 10

4-Word Review: Artist fakes his death.

Paul (Dick Van Dyke) is a struggling painter living in Paris who has not been able to make any money with his paintings and feels ready to give up and move back to the states. Casey (James Garner) is his roommate and best friend who tries to convince him to stay by coming up with a scheme where Paul fakes his death by jumping off a bridge and committing suicide, which should bolster the value of his paintings based on the concept that an artist’s work becomes more sought after once they are dead. The plan works, but it forces Paul to go into hiding and allows Casey to make a play at Paul’s fiancée Laurie (Angie Dickinson). When Paul finds out about this he confronts Casey and then things get really zany.

Carl Reiner’s script is trite to the extreme and although it moves at a brisk pace it is not very funny, or even passably amusing. The concept of an artist having to die in order to get his work to sell is an interesting idea to explore, but unfortunately like everything else in the film it is handled in a superficial way and used mainly as a springboard to all sorts of other wild scenarios that become increasingly sillier as it goes along.  Norman Jewison’s direction is dull and unimaginative and despite the fact that it has a European setting it was actually filmed on a Universal studios back-lot, which doesn’t help give it any atmosphere or distinction.

Van Dyke’s character is unrealistically ‘goody-goody’ and clean-cut.  He comes into contact with Nikki (Elke Sommer) a beautiful blonde woman who shows a strong interest in Paul, but he immediately and rigidly rebuffs her like he has no sex drive at all. The comic schtick that he does here is the same stuff we’ve seen him do hundreds of times before and he basically becomes Rob Petrie again simply transplanted into a European setting.

Although he has less comic opportunity Garner is clearly the better actor and has much more of a screen presence. It is easy to see why he continued to get choice movie roles for decades to come while Van Dyke became permanently demoted back to television.

Sommer is wasted in a transparent role. Dickinson, who three years later co-starred with Van Dyke in Some Kind of a Nut is equally forgettable and her constant propensity at fainting becomes increasingly more unfunny the more it occurs.

Ethel Merman makes the most of her role despite its limitations, but every time she speaks she seems to be shouting. Reiner is probably the most amusing out of all the characters in a brief bit as Garner’s shyster lawyer.

I wish I could tell you that there was at least one truly funny moment here, but there really isn’t. The humor is flat and dated and no better than a poor TV-sitcom and in many ways even worse.

My Rating: 3 out of 10

Released: June 30, 1965

Runtime: 1Hour 39Minutes

Not Rated

Director: Norman Jewison

Studio: Universal

Available: None at this time.

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Posted in 60's Movies, Buddy Movies, Farce, Movies for the Whole Family, Obscure Movies

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Money Talks (1972)

Posted on December 27, 2013 | 3 comments

money talks

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 6 out of 10

4-Word Review: It’s all about money.

Allen Funt the creator of ‘Candid Camera’ returns with his second cinematic feature all centered around pranks and stunts done on unsuspecting regular people to see just how far they will go when presented with the allure of money. The film examines the deep seated psychological effect that money has in society and how it controls what people do and in some cases what they don’t do.

This feature is an improvement over Funt’s first. Fortunately he keeps the majority of it on a comic level and avoids trying to make unnecessary ‘profound’ social statements. The film is also faster paced and although the music is still annoying it isn’t as bad and has a bit more of a funky beat. Some of the stunts aren’t necessarily all that funny and few become rather redundant and predictable. However, the majority of them I liked and even found fascinating including the one where a woman walks down the street and intentionally allows dollar bills to fall out of a hole in her pocket and drop to the ground behind her and how surprisingly many people would pick them up and chase after her to give them back. The funniest one is where a mild mannered middle-aged woman gets a job answering phone calls for a man who she finds out is a professional hit man. Hearing her diligently taking down an order and answering questions over the price of a hit while trying to mask her shock and remain calm had me laughing-out-loud.

A few of them are definite artifacts of a bygone era including the many relentless attempts a woman goes through to try to retrieve a simple five dollar bill that is lodged beneath a car tire. Another segment has a bare foot hippie girl begging for money on a street sidewalk and her startlingly naïve willingness to go back to a strange man’s apartment who approaches her and says he has shoes for her, which she almost does until Funt and crew advise her not to.

A few of the pranks have celebrities in disguise. My favorite was the one with actress Marian Mercer pretending to be a waitress and asking beforehand how much of a tip the customer planned to give her, so she could plan out what type of service she would give him. The segment where comedian Henny Youngman has no money to pay a hot dog vendor, so instead he tells the irritated man a bunch of lame jokes as ‘payment’ is quite funny and I wished it had been extended longer. Muhammad Ali’s bit isn’t quite as good, but his personality is as engaging as ever.

The film also has some good interviews including an opening bit where a commercial jingle writer comes up with on-the-spot a ditty for the film’s theme, which is not bad. Dominic the knife sharpener becomes almost a show in itself with the flamboyant way that he tries to bargain with Funt over not only how much he should be paid to sharpen his knives, but also for his fee to appear in the film. The interviews with hippies who don’t have jobs and don’t want them could have been more interesting had we seen what happened to them twenty years later and if they were still adamantly in the non-work camp, which I doubt. Funt also interviews his own 6-year-old daughter who is surprisingly more perceptive than you might think.

My Rating: 6 out of 10

Released: August 30, 1972

Runtime: 1Hour 21Minutes

Rated PG

Director: Allen Funt

Studio: United Artists

Available: Amazon Instant Video, Netflix streaming

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Posted in 70's Movies, Comedy, Documentaries, Movies for the Whole Family, Obscure Movies

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Jingle All the Way (1996)

Posted on December 25, 2013 | 1 comment

jingle all the way 2

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 6 out of 10

4-Word Review: He needs Turbo man.

Howard (Arnold Schwarzenegger) is a middle-aged father who finds that the long hours at his job is preventing him from attending some events that his young son Jake (Jamie Langston) is in including his karate exposition. This makes Howard feel bad and he tries to go to every effort to attain the much wanted Turbo Man action figure to give to Jamie for Christmas. Unfortunately every store is sold out of them and he must trek across the Twin Cities to find some place that might have them while competing with a mailman named Myron (Sinbad) who is on the same mission.

The film is energetic and engaging and the segment where Howard runs all through the Mall of America while chasing after a small bouncing ball is funny. The part where he kicks the burning head of a wise man statue out the window that sends carolers screaming and running for cover had me laughing-out-loud. I also liked the scene where he has to take on a roomful of bad guy santas with a giant plastic candy cane. One of the santas is so huge that he dwarfs Arnie and makes him look puny, which is hard to believe but true.

The climatic sequence done during a parade in which Howard and Myron dress up in costume to resemble the Turbo Man as well as his arch enemy and continue to battle each other for the toy is quite lively. Watching Howard flying around the Minneapolis skyscrapers while wearing a turbo charged jetpack is fun, but completely implausible that a costume to be worn at a parade would ever be equipped with something like that. It is also hard to believe that Jamie wouldn’t recognize his own father even if he is wearing a costume especially when he continues to speak in his very distinct Austrian accent.

Sinbad with his engaging personality is good in support. However, the scene where he is seen dumping letters out of his mail bag in order to keep up with Howard while running down a street is a federal offence and would most certainly get him terminated and even given some jail time and since he did it in broad daylight in front of others it could have easily gotten reported.

Langston as the kid is cute, but there are those from the old-school who think that a young child slamming a door in the face of a parent even if he is mad at him is quite rude and out-of-line. Also, being upset with his father because he doesn’t attend some of his events due to working hard at his job isn’t really fair. Becoming enslaved to a demanding job to keep up a cushy suburban existence is a plague of most fathers and if the Dad didn’t do it they might lose that nice house and be out on the street and I’m sure the borderline entitled kid would dislike that even more.

Robert Conrad is great in support as a tough-guy-like cop who is constantly having hilarious confrontations with Howard. Watching him give Howard a sobriety test is ironic since Conrad’s real-life car accident that he had while intoxicated, which occurred just a little after doing this essentially ended his acting career.

Phil Hartman is always good as a slimy character and in this case it is as the lecherous next-door-neighbor, but having him constantly speak his lines like he is a spokesman in a TV commercial becomes irritating. Harvey Korman and Laraine Newman appear in very small roles near the beginning and barely have any speaking lines, which made me wonder why they would even bother to appear at all.

The one-joke premise gets stretched about as far as it can go, but manages to come up with enough different scenarios to keep it feeling like it is evolving. The humor veers a bit too much to the cartoonish and although I liked the on-location shooting done for the most part in Minnesota I felt they didn’t take advantage of the Mall of America locale enough and more could have done more with it. The closing credits take an amazing 7 minutes off the runtime, but it is worth it to stick through them because there in one last amusing bit at the very, very end.

jingle all the way 1

My Rating: 6 out of 10

Released: November 16, 1996

Runtime: 1Hour 29Minutes

Rated PG

Director: Brian Levant

Studio: 20th Century Fox

Available: VHS, DVD, Blu-ray

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Posted in 90's Movies, Campy Comedy, Christmas Movies, Cold Climate/Wintertime Movies, Movies for the Whole Family

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Mr. Hobbs Takes a Vacation (1962)

Posted on December 1, 2013 | 1 comment

mr hobbs takes a vacation

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 5 out of 10

4-Word Review: Calamity filled family vacation.

Roger Hobbs (James Stewart) is a slightly cantankerous man in his 50’s who is tired of family vacations as he finds them to be more stress than they are worth. He loves his family, but hates going on trips with them. He dictates a letter to his secretary that is to be opened by his wife (Maureen O’Hara) upon his death detailing his many grievances of one particular trip that they took to a beach-side house that ended up being one catastrophe after another and through flashbacks the viewer relives them along with him.

Stewart is a real blast and the best thing about the movie. He doesn’t have that wide-eyed country boy charm like in some of past roles, but instead is a world-weary cynical man whose constant flow of acerbic comments and observations are quite funny. O’Hara is beautiful and engaging as his wife and helps as a sort of anchor between him and the rest of the family although I thought she looked much too young to be playing a grandmother. 60’s teen-heartthrob singer Fabian can also be seen as Joe a young man who takes a liking to one of Hobbs’ daughters. I liked the beatnik beard that he grows, but the part where he breaks out into a duet with his date in a film that is otherwise not a musical is very weird.

The actual beach house is a crazy sight and looks creepier than the Psycho house and sits literally right on the sandy beach and looking vulnerable to getting flooded during high tide. Beachgoers sit and sunbathe all around it and I would have thought many of them might walk into the house, or peer through the windows, but that angle does not get played up. Some of the myriad mechanical issues that Hobbs has with the building are the film’s funniest moments especially his difficulty getting the water pump going. The film should’ve continued to focus on this story thread all the way till the end, but doesn’t, which is a weakness.

While the movie is cute and pleasing it is also contrived and unoriginal. Many of the scenarios that they have could have easily occurred had they stayed home and the whole vacation concept seems to get lost. The writing and humor are better suited for television and the plot is threadbare. In a lot of ways this could better be described as an ordinary family sitcom with several different episodes strung together.

The visit that they have with a boring couple (John McGiver, Marie Wilson) near the end doesn’t work at all and should’ve been cut as a two hour running time is too long for this type of film to begin with. The scene where Hobbs get stuck in the bathroom with the tipsy and nude visiting wife elicits a few chuckles, but the bird spotting trek that he takes with the husband becomes too much of a pointless tangent. The scene also has a glaring goof because the two men decide to wake up at 4:30 in the morning to start their trek but when they first get outside the sun is already high in the sky and looking like it is the middle of the afternoon.

My Rating: 5 out of 10

Released: June 15, 1962

Runtime: 1Hour 56Minutes

Not Rated

Director: Henry Koster

Studio: 20th Century Fox

Available: VHS, DVD, Amazon Instant Video

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Posted in 60's Movies, Comedy, Movies Based on Novels, Movies for the Whole Family, Movies with a rural setting

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All the Way Home (1963)

Posted on May 5, 2013 | Leave a comment

all the way home 2

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 8 out of 10

4-Word Review: Life must go on.

Based loosely on the childhood experiences of writer James Agee who is best known for penning the screenplay to the classic film Night of the Hunter.  The story here looks at how a southern family copes and in particular the young boy Rufus (Michael Kearney) after their father (Robert Preston) is tragically killed in a car accident.

Based on Agee’s unfinished novel ‘A Death in the Family’, which was also made into a stageplay the film makes loving tribute to the era. The sets and even the Model T car driven by the father are all authentic. In fact it was filmed near the exact neighborhood in Knoxville where Agee grew up. The mannerisms and dialogue are true to the period without any compromising for a more modern audience. The revisionism which has become so trendy in today’s period piece films is thankfully missing here. The slower and gentler pace seemed reflective of the era and I found it refreshing.

Preston gives one of his best roles second only to his signature one in The Music Man. He doesn’t get killed until the second half of the film, so the viewer gets to know and like the character and thus feels the pain of the loss along with the family members. We never see the actual accident nor given any explanation for what happened, which is just as well. Too many times filmmakers seemed compelled to have to give a reason for everything even though in life that is not always possible, so it is nice that here they did not fall into that trap. This emphasis instead is on how the family members cope and the emotional impact of the loss, which is something everyone must go through at some point and it ends up being quite compelling.

Kearney gives a terrific performance and one of the best from a child actor that I have seen. He is cute without ever being precocious. Watching him observe everyone else around him are some of the best moments in the film. It also brings up the great point that sometimes children are better at adapting to tragic events than their adult counterparts.

Durable character actor Pat Hingle gives one of his most interesting performances as Preston’s nervous and hyper brother. Preston has a great line in describing him when he says: “Talking to him is like putting socks on an octopus.”

Aline MacMahon is good as the kind, but stern aunt. I particularly liked the moment where Rufus falls to the ground in an emotional tantrum, but she restrains the others from helping him and insists that it is important that he learns to get himself up on his own. Jean Simmons as the mother and wife is also splendid, but seems to get better as the movie progresses particularly in her conversation with Rufus at the end, which is touching.

My Rating: 8 out of 10

Released: October 17, 1963

Runtime: 1Hour 37Minutes

Not Rated

Director: Alex Segal

Studio: Paramount

Available: Amazon Instant Video

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Posted in 60's Movies, Black & White, Drama, Movies Based on Actual Events, Movies Based on Novels, Movies Based on Stageplays, Movies for the Whole Family, Movies that take place in the South, Obscure Movies

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The Straight Story (1999)

Posted on March 27, 2013 | 2 comments

straight story

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 9 out of 10

4-Word Review: Old man on lawnmower.

Richard Farnsworth plays Alvin Straight, an older man with health problems who decides to travel from Iowa to Wisconsin on a rider mower to visit his sick brother.

This film is a true achievement. For every flamboyantly bizarre film David Lynch has done he equals it here with his restraint. He truly proves himself a complete director and a sensitive one at that. He shows a deep respect for his subject and the area. Nothing is overplayed or exaggerated. It is the type of film no one thought Hollywood could do. Based on a true story they go along the same route the real Alvin took. The drama is not compromised and everything is handled in a dignified way. It propels itself on the quite eloquence of his journey and the people he meets. The soft pace is stunning especially when you realize that it is still quite captivating.

Farnsworth is perfect for the role. In many ways you feel he is Alvin Straight. He exudes so much of the same qualities of the character that you are convinced that they share some spiritual connection. His lines and little stories are both touching and powerful. Yet it is his deep expressive blue eyes that you remember the most. At any given time they can convey both his personal strength and sensitivity. Sissy Spacek is also terrific. Her portrayal of his mentally handicapped daughter is so convincing that you really can’t see the acting.

This is an emotional film and one that makes the viewer feel good without being manipulative or using any of the old conventions. The simplicity is refreshing. The only minor drawback is the meeting with his brother. Talented actor Harry Dean Stanton plays his brother yet he is only given a few lines. You wish he had more and we were able to see a more complete relationship. Even so this is still a wonderful movie.

My Rating: 9 out of 10

Released: September 3, 1999

Runtime: 1Hour 52Minutes

Rated G

Director: David Lynch

Studio: Buena Vista Pictures

Available: VHS, DVD

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Posted in 90's Movies, Drama, Movies Based on Actual Events, Movies for the Whole Family, Outdoors, Road Movies

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Those Magnificent Men in Their Flying Machines (1965)

Posted on September 16, 2012 | Leave a comment

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 4 out of 10

4-Word Review: A big airplane race.

This is a wide open comedy in a similar vein as It’s a Mad Mad Mad Mad World dealing with a 1910 cross country plane race and involving a wide assortment of over-the-top characters.

This is a good film for family viewing and has enough pratfalls to elicit at least a chuckle or two from everyone. The aerial photography is impressive and most of it looks like the actors are actually flying the planes instead of just being propped up in front of a blue screen. Stuart Whitman makes for a solid lead and Gert Forbe is funny as a German Commander. However, it is Benny Hill that practically steals it as the besieged fire captain constantly rescuing the participants from their many accidents.

On the negative side the film seems too similar to all the other comical race movies from that era without offering anything new or original.  The characters are broadly sketched and become tiring after a while. It also takes too long for the race to get going and when it does it isn’t all that exciting, or gripping. The film also has a tendency to miss out on potentially interesting, or even inventive comical moments. One segment has a French pilot crashing into a convent and requiring the services of the nuns to help repair the plane. I thought this scenario could’ve been loaded with hilarious possibilities, but the film pursues none of them.

The non-discriminating viewer may consider this funny and amusing, but everything gets played-out by the standard formula of that era without offering anything that is memorable.

My Rating: 4 out of 10

Released: June 16, 1965

Runtime: 2Hours 18Minutes

Rated G

Director: Ken Annakin

Studio: 20th Century Fox

Available: VHS, DVD, Amazon Instant Video

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The Glass Bottom Boat (1966)

Posted on March 17, 2012 | 6 comments

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 7 out of 10

4-Word Review: Doris is a spy.

            This is an energetic and zany Doris Day vehicle featuring her as Jennifer Nelson a tour guide at the NASA Space Center. She meets Bruce Templeton (Rod Taylor) who at first she can’t stand, but when she finds out that he is one of the top scientists at the lab and makes a lot of money she immediately becomes infatuated. This certainly does nothing to help fight the gold-digger stigma that some women have, but it was made over forty years ago, so I guess it was more acceptable. Through quirky circumstances she comes under suspicion as being a Russian spy and spends the rest of the time trying to prove otherwise while continuing her romance with Bruce.

Day looks gorgeous and is hammy at just the right level without going overboard and becoming cartoonish. Her best segment is when Taylor imagines here as a Mata Hari spy complete with skimpy outfit, which she looks great in, as well as dreaming that she is blindfolded and speaking in a foreign accent while ready to be shot by a firing squad. She sings the film’s title tune, which is bouncy, and even does, later on, a goofy rendition of her signature song ‘Que Sera Sera’.

Taylor is perfect as the love interest and I think he is the best out of all of Day’s male co-stars. His funniest moment, although brief, is when Day crosses her eyes to be goofy and then keeps them that way, which makes him momentarily panic. I got a kick out of his model of the solar system that he had in his office that displayed the planets in a symbolic fashion after the Greek gods they were named after.

The supporting cast is full of familiar comic pros. Alice Pearce and George Tobias appear as Jennifer’s neighbors and a variation of the Kravitz couple that they played on the ‘Bewitched’ TV-series. Pearce is hilarious and it was a shame that she wasn’t in more scenes and died before the movie’s release. Dom Deluise is amusing as the actual spy, who goes undercover as an electrical repairman. Normally his goofy fat-guy persona becomes tiring, but here it worked especially during the climatic sequence. Paul Lynde, who was always hard to cast and in the process usually got meaningless parts, has one of his best roles as the lab’s security guard and even dresses up in drag at the end. Dick Martin, Edward Andrews, and John McGiver help round out the cast. Arthur Godfrey, as Jennifer’s father, is the only one who is boring, but his part was dull, so it might be hard to completely blame him.

Director Frank Tashlin creates sets with bright, vivid colors and each scene is a Technicolor dream. Being a former cartoonist he creates some nicely played-out comic scenarios including Bruce’s hands-free futuristic kitchen that has a little robot that comes out of the wall and cleans-up any messes that are left behind and ends up attacking Jennifer. The out-of-control boat ride is also amusing, but the best part is the wild, fast-paced ending when Jennifer decides to turn the tables on her accusers.

Sure it is silly, but you know that going in and on a non-think level it is perfect entertainment for all-ages.

My Rating: 7 out of 10

Released: June 9, 1966

Runtime: 1Hour 50Minutes

Rated G

Director: Frank Tashlin

Studio: MGM

Available: VHS, DVD, Amazon Instant Video

6 Comments

Posted in 60's Movies, Comedy, Movies for the Whole Family, Romance, Spy/Espionage

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