Category: 1973
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The Seven-Ups is a fascist daydream beyond almost any cinematic compare, certainly American cinema (except maybe a Charles Bronson movie from the 1980s or something). And it’s not a cheap, 1970s exploitation picture either. Yes, to some degree it’s cheap (Roy Scheider and Tony Lo Bianco are the only two recognizable principals), but producer and…
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While Frankenstein: The True Story singularly credits Mary Shelley as source material, the actuality is a little more complicated. A Universal-produced TV mini-series, True Story actually mixes some of the Shelley (basically, the end in the Arctic and a brother for Frankenstein), with Universal’s 1930s films, Frankenstein and Bride of Frankenstein (with a little of…
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The Last of Sheila has the most constantly deceptive structure I’ve seen in a while. Watching the time code on the DVD player (and on the laserdisc and VHS players before it, and the clock for televised films even before those inventions) really changes the way one experiences a film. I’m always telling my fiancée…
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I actually had some hopes for the Battle for the Planet of the Apes, the last film in the series, mostly because J. Lee Thompson did such a good job directing the previous entry. Except for not knowing when he’s getting boring, it doesn’t seem like the same J. Lee Thompson directed both films, however.…
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A miscast Paul Newman (he’s a British spy posing as an Australian for a bunch of the movie) tries to take down corrupt politician James Mason. Huston’s direction dilly-dallies and lolly-gags when it’s not dawdling. The script (credited solely to Walter Hill, who swears it’s not his fault) is bad. Newman having zero chemistry with…
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Walter Matthau hated Charley Varrick. He must have been stuck in a contract or something. It’s understandable why he did, however. Matthau’s whole image is one of the likable curmudgeons. Varrick casts him as a gum-chewing (for that Matthau effect) bank robber… who doesn’t do it because he needs the money, but because crop dusting…
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Fun but creatively lazy comedy Western about aging lawman Henry Fonda teaming up with amateur gunslinger Terence Hill to take on “The Wild Bunch.” Sergio Leone came up with the story, produced the picture in some uncredited but important capacity, and even directed some scenes. Or just one. He can’t doesn’t save it. In addition…
The Stop Button 