Category: 1964

Kraft Suspense Theatre (1963) s01e20 – Knight’s Gambit

Knight’s Gambit plays a little like a serious, American James Bond variation. Roger Smith is a former CIA agent–he inherited hundreds of millions and quit–out to seduce Eleanor Parker for information. Parker is a disgraced politician’s secretary; they’re living in Spain, in exile.

The spy stuff is terrible. Smith’s boss–Murray Matheson–wears around long shorts and wears an eye patch. Smith is atrocious in the scenes with Matheson. The big villain is a mobster too. The script never explains that angle enough.

Parker’s outstanding as a woman trapped and Smith does show his conflict once he takes to her. Ted de Corsia’s fine as the bad guy and Chester Morris’s good as Parker’s boss.

Lorenzo Semple Jr. and Halsted Welles write Parker some excellent dialogue.

Good John Williams music too.

Grauman’s direction is weak, but nothing could fix the bad spy action finish.

Still, Parker sells it.

Duo Concertantes (1964, Larry Jordan)

What do penguins and bees have in common? They both show up in Larry Jordan’s transfixing collage animation Duo Concertantes. I know, they’re also both animals too.

I’ve never seen any Jordan before and Concertantes might not be the best place to start, but it’s a phenomenal nine minutes. There’s practically a narrative for the first half, with one Victorian gentleman recurring through the scenes. These little prickly pods move through England, sometimes turning into butterflies, sometimes into luminescent bulbs. Set to some lovely classical music (probably one of the many pieces titled Dos Concertantes, but I don’t think the Stravinsky), the film is transcendent.

The most amazing moment is a small one. An astronomer looks into his telescope and the moon increases in size above him. It’s a stunning way of bringing the viewer in.

One minor complaint–near the end, it almost gets too tranquil and too hallucinatory.

3/3Highly Recommended

CREDITS

Animated and directed by Larry Jordan.

RELATED

Winter (1964, Piotr Kamler and André Voisin)

Winter is a music video for Vivaldi’s violin concerto of the same name. Kamler does an amazing job with the video–it’s technically unbelievable at times–but it’s just a music video.

The concerto, the parts Kamler uses, is in three segments. The first two segments have identical visual accompaniment. The third is a little different, but mostly the same.

If it had a narrative, it would be one of a snowstorm. The storm moves among the regular, boring clouds, before it comes upon a great city. Or at least the towers of a great city. The snow then begins to fall, having reached its destination.

Unfortunately, for all the filmmaking ability, Kamler doesn’t attempt to make Winter do anything. His techniques all stay basically the same, just different backgrounds. It’s a great technical exercise, but lacking ambition at the same time.

Winter is a disappointment. It should be better.

1/3Not Recommended

CREDITS

Directed by Piotr Kamler and André Voisin.

RELATED

The Third Secret (1964, Charles Crichton)

Between Crichton’s fantastic CinemaScope composition and Douglas Slocombe’s wondrous black and white photography, it’d be hard not admire The Third Secret. It’s an engaging enough thriller, though it does run into the problem of having one ending too many.

Stephen Boyd plays an American television journalist working in London–one of the lovely things about the script is how little is explained, we find out very little about Boyd’s life before the present action of the film–and he investigates the death of his psychologist. Joseph’s script has some problems with that subject, the topic of analysis needing lots of exposition and reminders there’s no shame. It hurts the film at times, but not significantly.

Boyd’s performance is impressive, since he’s adapting a character performance for a lead role. The friendship between him and Pamela Franklin (she plays the dead psychologist’s daughter) is touching and quite well executed. Franklin’s performance is great.

The rest of the supporting cast is solid. Diane Cilento and Paul Rogers are standouts.

A lot of time is spent developing Boyd’s character and the friendship with Franklin so the mystery aspect suffers. The two surprise endings are both pretty boring. The first one seems a little more believable–and there are some hints to a possible third ending they didn’t include.

The film, with Boyd and Franklin’s performances, should be a lot stronger. The mystery isn’t compelling, which seems like a conscious choice. Unfortunately, the attention the wanders, instead of focusing on the film’s successes.

But worth a look.

21-87 (1964, Arthur Lipsett)

The title credit card of 21-87 is a human skull and the second clip (the film is a collection of somewhat unrelated clips edited together) is of an autopsy.

It’s hard not to think about mortality while watching it, especially once the accompanying soundtrack—usually interviews unrelated to the clips—starts talking about religion. The short enters its second part when one interviewee equates nature to spirituality. Of course, there’s no nature in 21-87, just city.

The short’s often disconcerting because many people stare directly into the camera, which makes one wonder about Lipsett’s filmmaking process, not what he’s trying to do with the presentation of the sound and image. He’s very successful in showing how sound is essential to taking an image in context.

He also has an excellent scene at a fashion show.

But he’s never able to force the viewer to suspend the process questions.

2/3Recommended

CREDITS

Directed by Arthur Lipsett; produced by Tom Daly and Colin Low; released by The National Film Board of Canada.

RELATED

It's Not Just You, Murray! (1964, Martin Scorsese)

It’s hard not to watch It’s Not Just You, Murray! without keeping Scorsese’s subsequent career in mind. The film’s got some moments out of Goodfellas, but also a couple where one wonders if Francis Ford Coppola saw the short before he made the Godfather films. Not to mention Scorsese ends the film with a Fellini homage. The short, from his student days, is really like nothing else he’s done since.

What makes it so peculiar? It’s a comedy. It’s a comedy about a dim-witted guy who lucks into being a mob boss, so long as he lets his best friend (and sponsor) continue to romance his wife.

Scorsese’s got a fine editor in Eli F. Bleich, who doesn’t just keep Murray moving, he keeps it unpredictable. Some of that unpredictability has to do with just how far Scorsese’ll go for a laugh or smile.

It’s good—not great—stuff.

2/3Recommended

CREDITS

Directed by Martin Scorsese; written by Scorsese and Mardik Martin; director of photography, Richard H. Coll; edited by Eli F. Bleich; music by Coll; production designers, Lancelot Braithwaite and Victor Magnotta.

Starring Ira Rubin (Murray), San De Fazio (Joe), Andrea Martin (Wife), Catherine Scorsese (Mother) and Robert Uricola (Singer).

RELATED

The Twilight Zone (1959) s05e16 – The Self-Improvement of Salvadore Ross

Don Siegel can compose no matter what ratio, so his shots in The Self-Improvement of Salvadore Ross are all fine. There’s a lack of coverage and the edits are occasionally off, but it’s a TV show (an episode of “The Twilight Zone”); it’s expected.

And Siegel does get in the occasional fantastic shot. He’s got a great lead actress with Gail Kobe and Vaughn Taylor’s all right as her father. The problem’s the lead, Don Gordon. Gordon has some great monologues but when he’s acting or reacting to someone else, he falls apart. It’s probably the script, which concerns a listless thug who discovers he can magically trade physical and psychological conditions with people.

He figures to “improve” himself with the power. But the character has no motivation other than filling twenty-some minutes of a television program.

Still, a single great Siegel shot makes up for the rest.

The Amazing Spider-Man (1963) #13

Asm13

Peter appears to be pushing Betty away at this point, but he might just be obtuse. The first appearance of Mysterio is decent, but not anything special. Lee spends a lot of time on Mysterio’s origin and the nature of his outfit–Lee’s pacing is great here, the amount of story he fits into the issue, but it’s barely about Spider-Man.

The Spider-Man story this issue is Peter worrying about developing a multiple personality or a Jekyll and Hyde type problem. Well, for a couple pages anyway. Then he’s worried about Aunt May’s mortgage payment (something he paid in full the first or second issue, for a year, so either Lee forgot or it’s been a while… and Peter missed out on Midtown’s summer vacation).

There’s just way too little Peter Parker and when there is Peter Parker, it’s usually as Spider-Man… so it’s not as compelling.

The Amazing Spider-Man (1963) #12

Asm12

I can’t believe no one’s ever talked about Lee’s plotting pattern. It’s pretty apparent here, twelve issues in–Spider-Man somehow gets beat in the first fight, wins in the second. Meaning there have to be at least two fights a comic book. How things have changed… Marvel comics now do a cliffhanger in the middle of one fight….

This issue’s got a big battle sequence. Spidey and Doctor Octopus fight all throughout the Manhattan skyline. Spider-Man even helps capture escaped zoo animals.

Sadly, Lee seemingly forgot Betty Brant never wanted to see Spider-Man again at the end of the last issue, because she’s over it here. She and Peter’s romance resumes, unfortunately off panel–Jonah yelling at them for their office romance is hilarious).

Ditko’s art’s gotten a lot smoother as the action has gotten bigger.

It’s good, but not great.

Doctor Octopus is a weak villain.

The Amazing Spider-Man (1963) #11

Asm11

I always forget how small the Marvel Universe is–if you’re going to get broken out of jail, might as well have Doctor Octopus do it. If you’re going to be a mobster and have a lawyer, it might as well be a lawyer whose sister is Spider-Man’s girlfriend.

There’s a lot of cool action in this issue–I love how small the fights are in these Spider-Man books. It’s not some grandiose skyscraper battle, it’s a couple guys duking it out on a runaway boat. Makes it feel a lot more… colorful.

Still, besides those action scenes, this issue is pretty weak. Doctor Octopus, now an ex-con (his sentence apparently ran under a year), is hardened and thuggish, not the laboratory scientist previously seen.

As for Lee’s resolution to Betty’s dilemma’s? It’s weak. Not terrible, but weak. It positions her and Peter too melodramatically separated.

Eh.