Brian Hannan

The Mark (1961) ****

Despite an exceptional and Oscar-nominated performance by Stuart Whitman (Rio Conchos, 1964) , I suspect modern audiences will take less kindly to this tale of convicted child molester trying to come to terms with his feelings. At least it’s considerably more honest than the creepier May December (2023) where the criminal steadfastly contended her innocence.

And I suspect, too, that Whitman’s square jaw and muscular physique got in the way of his attracting the parts for which the depths of vulnerability he was able to exhibit were most suited. He came to this straight after an action role, as the charming bad-good-guy of The Commancheros (1961) where, as far as audiences were concerned, what he did with his fists was more important that what he expressed through his eyes.

There’s a bit of a grey area that lends the convicted Jim Fuller (Stuart Whitman) the benefit of the doubt. He was found guilty of intent not of actual molestation and a goodly part of the picture is spend on examining why he went down that route, either in a group exercise in prison or one-on-one with a psychiatrist, chain-smoking Irishman Dr McNally (Rod Steiger) in both instances.

I’m not sure how the psychiatric evidence adds up, but basically, with a dominant mother who bullied his father, he grew up frightened of women, despite being attracted and attractive to them, and sought out someone with whom he felt more comfortable, less challenging, leading him to spend too much time watching children at play and eventually buying a young girl an ice cream and going out on walks with her.

It would have been too much for audiences of the time – as it even was with May December – to go into the technicalities of what he intended to do so we are left to trust his own word that he never intended to instigate anything sexual, though why kidnap a child in the first place. The second element that would fill modern audiences with alarm is that though he manages to begin a sexual relationship with a woman of his own age, secretary Ruth Leighton (Maria Schell), she is a widow with a young daughter. Most people would instantly come to the conclusion he was using mother to groom daughter.

However, the film takes the tack that he’s using the daughter to explore a normal relationship with a child, the joy of having a daughter, and the delight and happiness that a young person can bring into a dour repressed life. Dr McNally keeps on banging on that Fuller is “cured” but it’s a very uneasy watch trying to work out if he is or not.

In the event, the first time he’s alone with the girl he is photographed by a local journalist who sticks the photo on the front page, destroying the life Fuller has carefully rebuilt. He has found employment as an accountant with a sympathetic business owner Andrew Clive (Donald Wolfit), fitting in so well he is promoted, though at odds with another senior employee Roy Milne (Paul Rogers). He is chucked out of his accommodation, loses his job and although Ruth initially stands by him the minute she sees Fuller with her daughter her instincts are hostile.

There would be no point in an actor trying to gain sympathy for such an unsympathetic character by playing to the gallery with bouts of temper or floods of self-pitying tears, but even so, the vulnerable husk Whitman presents, his struggles with his self-contempt, his understanding of the feelings he must invoke, his determination to live as quietly as possible, almost in that determined English manner of never being heard nor seen, is what makes this film. Interestingly, he replaced Richard Burton, who pulled out at the last minute (as did Jean Simmons) and you could easily imagine with those trademark quick intakes of breath and deep growls how that actor would have played the part.

Whitman doesn’t go near any grandstanding. It’s just a heartfelt performance of a man who’s lost his way and knows he might never find his way back, haunted by his past, unable to trust himself, unable to believe that he is, in fact, cured. Probably, the biggest issue is that the movie comes down on his side, especially when he becomes one of the usual suspects in another crime involving children, though he did not commit that, and tries to suggest that a child molester will find salvation through living with a mother and child in the normal fashion. As I said, this is not my subject of expertise, thankfully, and that may be well what’s advocated rather than staying away from children altogether.

While the approach might be considered a shade naïve at the same time it does examine issues surrounding reintegration and avoids the obvious trap of attempting some kind of character redemption.

Apart from Whitman, there are good performances all round. Maria Schell, whose career within a decade would go from roadshow blockbuster Cimarron (1960) to WIP epic 99 Women (1969), subsumes her normal more glamorous persona to play a believable working mother. With his chain-smoking, Rod Steiger (The Pawnbroker, 1964) is allowed to fidget to his heart’s content but even such obvious scene-stealing only places more emphasis on the quieter Whitman. Donald Wolfit (Life at the Top, 1965), too, reins in his usual bluster.

Guy Green (The Magus, 1968) directed from a screenplay by Sidney Buchman (The Group, 1966) and Stanley Mann (The Collector, 1965) from the bestseller by Charles E. Israel.

In this instance, given the Oscar nom, Stuart Whitman could hardly be considered under-rated but over the years seems to have disappeared from sight.

Worth a look to see what he could do with the right material.

Marco the Magnificent (1965) **

Small wonder this flopped even with the requisite all-star cast of Omar Sharif (Doctor Zhivago, 1965), Anthony Quinn (Zorba the Greek, 1964), Orson Welles (Austerlitz, 1960), Horst Buchholz (Nine Hours to Rama, 1963) and Elsa Martinelli (Hatari! 1962). Oddly enough, Quinn comes close to saving it. Although initially laughable, presented as a cross between Yul Brynner’s long-lost brother and Ming the Merciless, he tones down the trademark rasp and growl to deliver a powerful performance.

Of course, we also have to take the word of Marco Polos (Horst Buchholz) that he had all these adventures and that he did encounter The Old Man of the Mountains (Akim Tamiroff) and The Lady with the Whip (Elsa Martinelli). The former wore a mask of gold and if you ever saw his face that meant you were in for the chop. And he had a nice line in sonic torture. The latter chooses love above betrayal.

*The name of Marco Polo either meant so little to German audiences or the title change was due to the producers hoping to capitalize on the success of “Genghis Khan.”*

Love – or sex I guess – is a consistent theme. Marco is chosen for this adventure – whose main aim is to get a message to Mongol overlord Kublai Khan, now the ruler of China, that Italy, the dominant western power at the time, wants peace – in part because he is so handsome. He has no other pedigree that I can see. At the age of 20, he’s best described as an idler. But his father Nicolo (Massimo Girotto) is a renowned trader and has ventured along the Silk road to Samarkand.

But, would you believe it, following that old western genre trope where there’s always someone wanting to sabotage relations between Native Americans and soldiers, the idea of peace doesn’t sit well with everyone. Spies report on Marco’s every move and attempt to stop him completing his mission and when he reaches China discovers that another Mongol warlord Prince Nayam (Robert Hossein) prefers the traditional method of conquest, with the raping and pillaging that goes with it, rather than growing the economy through peaceful means.

Just as well Marco is so good-looking because whenever he is in a tight spot he is rescued by a beautiful woman, including the aforementioned Lady with the Whip, and, would you believe it, Princess Gogatine (Lynne Sue Moon), who has been chosen as a potential wife for Kublai Khan (Anthony Quinn). Multiple romance is the name of the game here – Arab chieftain Emir Alaou (Omar Sharif) has twenty-six wives, one of whom has the temerity to complain at his expanding harem.

Mostly, it’s a travelog – with a bucket of travel cliches thrown in such as Russian dancing – punctuated by occasional peril. But beyond looking handsome and putting his seductive powers to the test, there’s not much else for Marco to do.

The screenplay is so limited and haphazard you get the impression it must have been heavily truncated, that there was a three-hour roadshow covering the ground in a more sensible manner, but that appears not to have been the case. Producer Raoul Levy (who wrote and produced And God Created Woman, 1956, and wrote, produced and directed The Defector, 1966) ) spent so much assembling the cast he scrimped on a workable screenplay and was so intent on ramming it with oddly-named characters (Old Man of the Mountains and Lady with the Whip) that he took his eye off the narrative ball.

The final section with Kublai Khan trying to integrate through his own marriage the conquering Mongols and the conquered Chinese and dispensing with war in favor of peace makes more sense but by then you are so exhausted by the multiplicity of star names contributing nothing and the meandering plot that you have just about given up.

And it wasn’t as if Levy didn’t have time to get a screenplay in place. He’d been working on this since 1962 when an earlier version starring Alain Delon (Once a Thief, 1965) was abandoned when finance ran out. One of the most expensive French movies ever made, and extensively funded by Levy, it proved such a flop, it wiped him out financially and contributed to his suicide.

The inconsistency may have been caused by having three directors – Levy, Denys de la Patellier (Caroline Cherie, 1968) and Noel Howard (D’Ou Viens-Tu, Johnny, 1963).

All-star cast wasted, promise unfulfilled.

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Behind the Scenes: Ingmar Bergman

My first cinema all-nighter, back in the early1970s, comprised five Ingmar Bergman films. You try watching back-to-back The Seventh Seal (1957), Wild Strawberries (1958), The Virgin Spring (1960), Through a Glass Darkly (1961) and Winter Light (1963) and stumble out into a cold Edinburgh morning without your brain ringing from exposure to one of the greatest filmmakers of all time.

I’m not sure how Bergman would pass muster these days, if he would verge on cancellation, given his predilection, in his private life, for infidelity, often seducing younger actresses – Bibi Andersson, Liv Ullman, Harriet Andersson et al – working on his films for the first time. He had five wives, nine children (not necessarily in wedlock) and countless lovers. He was very much an absentee father, devoting his time to theater and cinema.

*The Knight plays chess with Death – iconic image from “The Seventh Seal.”*

Nor was I aware that cinema accounted for barely one-quarter of his creative output. For most of his productive career he spent three-quarters of the year working in the theater, on a huge variety of plays, none of which, that being the essence of that genre, are available to posterity. And he was the first – and possibly the only – famous director to develop television as a serious medium – Scenes from a Marriage (1974) and the Oscar-winning Fanny and Alexander (1982) were truncated versions of much longer mini-series first shown on television. The former was a spectacular success, watched by half of Sweden’s population.

He was also a best-selling author. His autobiography The Magic Lantern attracted an advance of $700,000 (equivalent to $1.8 million now) and sold over 100,000 copies in hardback in Scandinavia alone. His screenplays sold in vast quantities at a time when that area of publishing attracted only minority interest.

With a director as prominent as Bergman there were many interesting what-ifs. Barbra Streisand was slated to star in The Merry Widow, but that came apart after a first meeting, when the director recoiled at her personality. Movies were mooted with Fellini and Kurosawa. Richard Harris was to have starred in The Serpent’s Egg (1977) rather than David Carradine.

At one time he fielded offers from major studios like Paramount and Warner Bros and some of his later movies were funded by mini-majors – The Touch starring Elliott Gould (1971) by ABC and From the Life of the Marionettes (1980) by Sir Lew Grade’s ITC shingle. He was on the shortlist to direct Jesus of Nazareth, eventually made by Franco Zeffirelli.

The Seventh Seal, considered his greatest film, despite critical raves, was a flop, The Silence (1963) a whopping success, the biggest box office hit in West Germany for example since the war.

Peter Cowie’s biography, a Xmas gift which I’ve just devoured, has an apt title God and the Devil, for these were the underlying (not to say often obvious) themes of his movies, man giving in to temptation, deity not there to come to the rescue. His films showed the coruscating reality of relationships gone sour, imitating his own experience, even without his constant infidelity (or perhaps because of it) he had a fraught time of it with wives and lovers.

With so many projects – and so many lovers – on the go, his life lurched from professional triumph to personal disaster. Luckily, he could meet child support payments because he was by far the biggest earner in cinema in Sweden, and when wooed by Hollywood, even more able.

Peter Cowie, who founded and edited The International Film Guide for 40 years and ran The Tantivy Press for a quarter of a century, is to film criticism what Bergman is to the movies, someone who moves in the upper pantheon. It was he who interviewed Bergman on stage at the NFT. He claims to come from a generation whose life was changed after seeing The Seventh Seal.

Without being a no-holds-barred work, he does hold Bergman up to scrutiny, the personal life covered in as much depth as the professional. “Bergman’s childhood was clouded by a terrible fear of punishment and humiliation,” writes Cowie, which in essence could have been the template for his movies. He was beaten by his father, a pastor, and bullied by his elder brother. One time, locked in a cupboard, he feared someone was gnawing at is feet.

A cinema buff from an early age, the stage was his first calling and by 1938 had directed his first play. His first movie was Crisis (1946). By Hollywood standards all his movies until quite late in the day would be considered low-budget numbers and it was only when Swedish studios managed to attract international distribution for their films – mostly because of their perceived sexual content – that budgets increased.

While initially The Seventh Seal was considered his greatest cinematic achievement, Wild Strawberries and Persona (1966) have overtaken it in terms of critical approval. In the Sight and Sound Critics Poll of 1972 Persona was fifth and Wild Strawberries tenth. But neither film ever did so well again from the critical perspective though in the Directors Poll of 2022, Persona placed tenth.

A fascinated read and reminder of a director who dominated the cinematic landscape for over two decades.

Top 30 Films for 2023

Ann-Margret is pipped to the post by…Ann-Margret. The Swinger and Stagecoach duked it out at the top of the All-Time Top 40 with the former taking it by a good margin. But it was the reversal in the annual stakes, with the western ahead just by a nose. The films viewed most this year. As ever some surprise picks.

Stagecoach (1966). Ann-Margret and Alex Cord in decent remake of John Ford classic western.
The Swinger (1966). Ann-Margret as novelist who tries to live up to the sexy persona she has invented.
The Sins of Rachel Cade (1961). Angie Dickinson as African missionary with Peter Finch and Roger Moore in thrall.
Fireball XL5. The famous British television series from Gerry and Sylvia Anderson, now colorized. “My heart will be a fireball…”
Fraulein Doktor (1969). German spy Suzy Kendall out-foxes Kenneth More. Grisly realistic WWI battle scenes and a superb score from Ennio Morricone.
Vendetta for the Saint (1968) Roger Moore vs the Mafia.
Plane (2023). Gerard Butler channels his inner Bruce Willis in Die-Hard-on-a-desert-island adventure.
Baby Love (1969). Orphan Linda Hayden proves too much of a temptation for upper-middle-class London family.
The Best House in London (1969). David Hemmings goes into battle for sex workers.
The Sisters (1969). Nathalie Delon and Susan Strasberg in complicated love triangle of love and betrayal.
Pendulum (1968). Taut thriller with cop George Peppard accused of murdering unfaithful wife Jean Seberg.
Moment to Moment (1966). Jean Seberg investigated for murder in Hitchcockian thriller set in the South of France.
Rage (1966). Glenn Ford and Stella Stevens combat pandemic in Mexican town.
The First Deadly Sin (1980). Frank Sinatra’s cop chases down a serial killer.
Go Naked in the World (1961). Gina Lollobrigida finds that her profession (the oldest) and true love (with rich Anthony Franciosa) don’t mix. Great turn from Ernest Borgnine as a doting father.
Lady in Cement (1969). Sinatra as private eye Tony Rome who takes on gangster’s moll Raquel Welch as a client.
Champions (2023). Woody Harrelson as the basketball coach saddled with a bunch of misfits.
A Dandy in Aspic (1968). Cold War thriller with Laurence Harvey as a double agent who wants out. Mia Farrow co-stars.
She Died with Her Boots On / Whirlpool (1969). Sleazy British film from cult Spanish director Jose Ramon Larraz sees kinky photographer Karl Lanchbury seduce real-life MTA Vivien Neves.
Once a Thief (1965). Less glamorous role for Ann-Margret as wife of ex-jailbird thief Alain Delon who is forced into another job.
Diamond Head (1962). Charlton Heston chews the scenery in Hawaiian epic.
Titanic (1997). Reissue in 3D of the James Cameron box office smash.
Can Heironymus Merkin Ever Forget Mercy Humpe and Find True Happiness? (1969) Self-indulgence reaches new heights with writer-director-producer Anthony Newley’s autobiographical tale about stardom. Then-wife Joan Collins co-stars.
Sergeant Ryker (1968). Lee Marvin in Korean War courtroom drama.
The Misfits (1960). Clark Gable goes out on a high, ably supported by Montgomery Clift and Marilyn Monroe in John Huston tale of losers.
Once Upon a Time in the West (1969). Sergio Leone masterpiece featuring the stunning cast of Claudia Cardinale, Henry Fonda and Charles Bronson and that fabulous Morricone score.
In Harm’s Way (1965). John Wayne and Kirk Douglas in Otto Preminger WW2 epic set in Pearl Harbor and after.
The Invitation (2022). Gothic thriller starring Nathalie Emmanuel.
Beat Girl / Wild for Kicks (1960). Gillian Hills is tempted into joining the striptease game. Christopher Lee puts in an appearance.
100 Rifles (1969). Raquel Welch, Jim Brown and Burt Reynolds heat up the screen in Tom Gries western set in Mexico.

Dear Brigitte (1965) ***

In the same year as his momentous turn in Shenandoah, James Stewart at his exasperating best has the time of his life in this throwback comedy that takes its time getting all its ducks in a row while taking a tilt at nuclear energy, computers and the eternal battle between the arts and science with a fair chunk of whimsy thrown in.

Surprisingly contemporary nod to this whole business of actors speaking directly to the camera, with the ramblings by the Captain (Ed Wynn) in this capacity constantly being interrupted by passersby in the vein of “you talking to me?” or “stop talking to yourself.” Professor Leaf (James Stewart), a distinguished poet constantly at odds with Dean Sawyer (Howard Freeman) at the local college where he teaches – on the few times when he’s not handing in his resignation – and which has a nuclear power station next door, tries to espouse the arts at every opportunity, including a family four-piece outfit playing classical music, only to discover son Erasmus (Bill Mummy) doesn’t have an artistic bone in his body.

Surprisingy, in the UK down-graded to supporting feature in this kid-centric double bill. The marketing men pulled another fast one in the poster, leading audiences to believe that was BB in the bikini when it was only the usually-nude model of an artist neighbour attempting to be decent.

What Erasmus has, for some reason only now coming to the fore although he must be about ten or so, is that he’s a mathematical prodigy, able to work out complicated sums faster than a computer and pointing out errors in the calculations of the local bank. Leaf’s wife Vina (Glynis johns) doesn’t have a great deal to do except rein in the professor but she has a wonderful scene where she brings the local bank manager to book.

Anyway, eventually, Erasmus gets hooked into helping the boyfriend Kenneth (pop singer Fabian) of Leaf’s daughter Pandora (Cindy Carol) guess the winners of horse races as a way of assisting the couple in raising enough money to get married. By this time, Leaf has finally resigned and worked out he won’t pick up easy cash from the Government – another terrific scene – and is hoodwinked by con artist Peregrine Upjohn (John Williams) into setting up a charity to help disadvantaged students by employing his son’s skills.

Anyone familiar with horse racing will be aware how preposterous the conceit that anyone, no matter how scientifically skilled at working out the odds, can consistently pick winners. But this all flies by since it’s that kind of movie, one that not only defies belief, but basically sucks you into believing the whole thing, the way the untalented youngsters always managed in Hollywood times gone by to muster a great stage show or turned any kind of loser into a winner.

Still, all this goes on before we get close to the nub of the title. Erasmus has fallen in love with Brigitte Bardot and because he’s basically the family’s sole breadwinner eventually dad takes son to France to meet the real-life superstar who is far more charming than you would expect, the sexpot on hold for the occasion.

So, mostly, as I said, it’s an old-fashioned confection, the kind you could still get away with in the mid-1960s before the changing times demanded that comedies take on a harder edge. And with James Stewart in top form and husky-voiced English star Glynis Johns (who had her own television series in the U.S.) jumping in now and then to prevent him from making things worse it works a treat. Stewart exaggerates all those mannerism you might have thought mildly irritating before – he’s all limbs and sentences cut off in their prime and telling people to leave their own houses. But if he had toned any of that down, the air would have quickly escaped the balloon, for really he’s the only thing keeping it afloat.

But that’s stardom for you. A vehicle comes along that in total isn’t really worthy of the involvement of a marquee attraction like Stewart, who could be lending his talents to more solid fare like Shenandoah and The Flight of the Phoenix (also released the same year). While he’s crucial to both those other pictures, giving one of his best performances in the former, perhaps surprisingly, U.S. audiences, voting with their dollars, felt his performance here trumped that of the Aldrich picture.

Ir’s usually believable roles that attract the greatest critical plaudits for stars, but actually their most notable contribution is in making fly movies that should never work on paper but somehow with their magical injection not necessarily makes the screen sizzle but turns doughy material into something lighter and more easily digestible.

Henry Koster (Mr Hobbs Takes a Vacation, 1962) directs with occasional flair from a screenplay by Hal Kanter (Move Over, Darling , 1963) and Nunnally Johnson (The Dirty Dozen, 1967) based on the bestseller by John Haase.

As under-rated as The Trouble with Angels (1966) as lightweight comedies of the decade generally were, this is worth a look for Stewart alone.

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Behind the Scenes: All-Time Top 20

The “Behind the Scenes” articles have become increasingly popular in the Blog. As regular readers will know I am fascinated about the problems incurred in making certain movies. Perhaps one of the more interesting aspects of this category is that every now and there is out of nowhere massive interest in the making of a particular movie and it shoots up the all-time tree. Most of the material has come from my own digging, and sources are always quoted at the end of each article, but occasionally I have turned to books written on the subject of the making of a specific film.

(4) Waterloo (1970). No doubting the effect of Ridley Scott’s Napoleon in racketing up interest in this famous flop.
(5) Ice Station Zebra (1968). A complete cast overhaul and ground-breaking special effects are at the core of this filming of an Alistair MacLean tale.
(2) The Satan Bug (1965). The problems facing director John Sturges in adapting the Alistair MacLean pandemic classic for the big screen. One of three Alistair MacLean titles in the top 20.
(11) In Harm’s Way (1965). Otto Preminger black-and-white epic about Pearl Harbor and after.
(1) The Girl on a Motorcycle (1968). Cult classic starring Marianne Faithful and Alain Delon had a rocky road to release, especially in the U.S. where the censor was not happy.
(3) The Guns of Navarone (1961). The ultimate template for the men-on-a-mission war picture with an all-star cast and enough jeopardy to qualify for a movie of its own.
(14) Battle of the Bulge (1965). There were going to be two versions, so the race was on to get this one to the public first.
(6) Cast a Giant Shadow (1965). Producer Melville Shavelson wrote a book about his experiences and this and other material relating the arduous task of bringing the Kirk Douglas-starrer to the screen are described here.
(7) Spartacus (1961). How Kirk Douglas sank a proposed Yul Brynner version.
(New Entry) Sink the Bismarck! (1962). Documentary-style WW2 classic with Kenneth Mills with the stiffest of stiff-upper-lips.
(New Entry) Man’s Favorite Sport (1964). Howard Hawks back in the gender wars with Rock Hudson and Paul Prentiss squaring off.
(New Entry). The Bridge at Remagen (1969). John Guillerman WW2 classic with George Segal and Robert Vaughn.
(New Entry). Tora! Tora! Tora! (1970). Richard Fleischer dispenses with the all-star cast in favor of even-handed verisimilitude.
(12) Genghis Khan (1965). A venture into epic European filmmaking with an all-star cast led by Omar Sharif.
(8) Secret Ceremony (1969). How director Joseph Losey persuaded uber glam-queen Elizabeth Taylor to go dowdy in this creepy drama.
(10) The Ipcress File (1965). The other iconic 1960s spy picture that brought Michael Caine fame.
(13) The Biggest Bundle of Them All (1968). Raquel Welch, and release delay controversy.
(New Entry). The Collector (1963). William Wyler’s creepy adaptation of John Fowles’ creepy bestseller with Terence Stamp and Samatha Eggar.
(New Entry) They Shoot Horses, Don’t They (1969) Desperate Depression set drama with Jane Fonda and Michael Sarrazin.
(New Entry) Night of the Living Dead (1968). Zombies rule in George A. Romero horror classic.

Villain (1971) *****

Get Carter, out the same year, tends to get the critical nod over Villain, but I beg to differ. Not only do we have the most realistic robbery yet depicted on screen, but Richard Burton (Becket, 1964), delivering one of his greatest performances, is nearly matched by Ian McShane, flexing acting muscles that would come to fruition in Deadwood (2004-2006) and John Wick: Chapter 4 (2023), and Nigel Davenport’s cop, as cool under pressure as Frank Bullitt.

Where Michael Caine in Get Carter is primarily the avenging angel, Burton’s Vic Dakin is every bit as complex as Michael Corleone. Way ahead of its time in portraying Dakin as a gay gangster in sympathetic fashion, he also has a moral code akin to that of Don Corleone. While the Mafia chieftain drew the line at selling drugs, Dakin despises MP Draycott (Donald Sinden) for his corruption and views with contempt sometime boyfriend Wolfe (Ian McShane) for small-time drugs and girl peddling.

He reveres (as did Don Corleone) family values, bringing his aging mother tea in bed, kissing her affectionately on the forehead, treating her to a day out at the Brighton. But he also rejoices in violence as much as any of Scorsese’s gallery of thugs.

Complexity is the order of the day. Every dominant character, whether operating on the legal or illegal side of the street, receives a come-uppance verging on humiliation. Dakin himself is arrested in full view of his mother. The bisexual Wolfe, who otherwise dances unscathed through the mire, is beaten up by Dakin and humiliated when his male lover shows his female lover, the upmarket Venetia (Fiona Lewis), the door. Top gangster Frank (T.P. McKenna), who attempts to lord it over Dakin, ends up whimpering in agony in the back seat of a car.

Maverick cop Mathews (Nigel Davenport) is brought to heel by internal politics and frustrated at home when his wife is indifferent to the late night shenanigans of his son. Even cocky thug Duncan (Tony Selby), with a quip to terrify victims, is reduced to a quivering wreck under the relentless stare of Dakin.

Unlike The Godfather, mothers excepted, wives and girlfriends are complicit. Little chance of a shred of feminism here. Women are chattels, Venetia is traded out as a “favor” to Draycott, terrified gangster’s moll Patti (Elizabeth Knight) also used in that capacity by Wolfe. Draycott professes little interest in whether the women, procured in this fashion, enjoy sex with him.

So, to the story. Tempted by a tasty payroll robbery, Dakin steps out of his usual line of work, a protection racket, and joins up with two other leading hoods, Frank (T.P. McKenna) and his brother-in-law, the belching Edgar (Joss Ackland). But the robbery goes wrong. The tail is spotted by the payroll car and the victims almost evade capture. But stopping the payroll car renders the getaway vehicle virtually useless, a flat tyre soon flies off and they drive for miles on a wheel rim.

The payroll is well-guarded and several of the villains emerge badly scathed. Worse, the cases containing the cash have anti-theft devices, equipped with legs that spring out and red clouds of smoke. And there are ample witnesses. Edgar is quickly apprehended, and the movie enters a vicious endgame.

Contemporary audiences were put off by the obvious references to the Kray Twins and the Profumo Affair and American audiences had long shown an aversion to Cockneys (though that is not so apparent here) and critics gave it a mauling, the general feeling being that after Performance (1970) and Get Carter, the British public was entitled to the more genial criminal as exemplified by The Italian Job (1969), incidentally another U.S. flop.

There are many superb moments: Dakin’s affectionate stroke of Wolfe’s shoulder, Dakin and his sidekick’s nonchalant stroll over a footbridge as they make their escape, Dakin pushing Draycott into a urinal, Wolfe abandoning Venetia at a country house party so that Draycott can avail himself of the “favor,” Dakin’s love for his mother. Throwaways point to deeper issues, a country stricken by strikes and political corruption.

Dakin, unaware he has made a target for his own back by the unnecessary brutal treatment of an associate, comes up against a cool implacable cop, as confident as Dakin without the arrogance or recourse to brutality, easy with the quip.

A modern audience might appreciate the violence more than the acting, given that a la Scorsese we are supposed to revel in criminal behavior, but it’s the performances that lift the film. Burton had entered a career trough, sacked from Laughter in the Dark (1969), involved in a quartet of financial and critical turkeys – Boom! (1968), Candy (1968), Staircase (1969) and Raid on Rommel (1971) – with only another Oscar nomination for Anne of the Thousand Days (1970) to alleviate the gathering gloom that would see him strike out in his next nine pictures before another nomination for Equus (1977) restored some stability.

So this is a superb character, suited and booted he might be, doting on his mother, but underneath stung by insecurity and unable to rein in his sadistic streak. A marvellous addition to the canon of great gangster portrayals.

Ian McShane, too, provides a performance of great depth, in his element when skirting around the small-time world, out of his depth with the big time, the charm that can hook a vulnerable upper-class lass like Venetia as likely to attract a malevolent mobster, the former under his thumb, the latter controlling. To see him go from cheeky chappie with a winning grin to penitent lover forced to dismiss Venetia is quite an achievement.

Nigel Davenport (Sands of the Kalahari, 1965) is on top form and the supporting cast could hardly have been better – T.P. McKenna (Young Cassidy, 1965), plummy-voiced Donald Sinden (Father, Dear Father TV series, 1969-1972) playing against type, Joss Ackland (Rasputin: The Mad Monk, 1966). Throw in a bit of over-acting from Colin Welland (Kes, 1969) plus Fiona Lewis (Where’s Jack?, 1969) at her most accomplished.

Michael Tuchner (Fear Is the Key, 1972) directs with some style from a screenplay by Dick Clement and Ian La Fresnais (Hannibal Brooks, 1969) working from the novel by al Lettieri.

Ripe for reassessment.

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All-Time Top 40

Not my pick of the flicks, but yours, the films viewed most often since the Blog began in June 2020. Given that the number of hits for the blog has tripled over the last year, you might expect to see an entirely new Top 40. But that’s not been the case. Worth noting that the top five pictures star women. And some films have shown remarkable staying power with some stars – big round of applause for Ann-Margret, Angie Dickinson, Alex Cord, George Peppard, Gene Barry, Jean Seberg, Roger Moore, Alain Delon, Frank Sinatra, Kirk Douglas et al – featuring more than once.

The figures in brackets represent the previous year’s position.

(4) The Swinger (1966). All hail Ann-Margret. Bouncy sex comedy that manages a sprinkling of innocence.
(40) Stagecoach (1966). No prizes for guessing that it’s the presence of Ann-Margret (again) rather than Alex Cord that has hit a chord in this decent remake of John Ford’s famous western.
(1) Jessica (1962). Angie Dickinson as a young widow incurring the wrath of wives in a small Italian town.
(5) Fraulein Doktor (1969). Under-rated World War One espionage tale with Suzy Kendall out-foxing Kenneth More, grisly realistic battle scenes and a superb score from Ennio Morricone.
(New Entry) The Sins of Rachel Cade. Angie Dickinson as African missionary falling foul of the natives and commissioner Peter Finch. Roger Moore in an early role.
(3) Once Upon a Time in the West (1969). Sergio Leone masterpiece featuring the stunning cast of Claudia Cardinale, Henry Fonda and Charles Bronson and that fabulous Morricone score.
(New Entry) Fireball XL5. The famous British television series from Gerry and Sylvia Anderson, now colorized. “My heart will be a fireball…”
(3) The Secret Ways (1961). The first of the Alistair MacLean adaptations to hit the big screen features Richard Widmark trapped in Hungary during the Cold War.
(10) Moment to Moment (1966). Nod to Hitchcock in twisty Jean Seberg thriller set in the South of France. Also starring Honor Blackman.
(New Entry) Vendetta for the Saint . Who cares if it’s two television episodes combined? Roger Moore tackles the Mafia.
(32) Baby Love (1969). Controversy was the initial selling point but now it’s morphed into a morality tale as orphaned Linda Hayden tries to fit into an upper-class London household.
(15) The Sisters (1969). Nathalie Delon and Susan Strasberg in complicated love triangle of love and betrayal.
(7) Pharoah (1966). Polish epic set in Egypt sees the country’s ruler at odds with the religious hierarchy.
(9) Can Heironymus Merkin Ever Forget Mercy Humpe and Find True Happiness? Self-indulgence reaches new heights as singer Anthony Newley invokes his inner Fellini that somehow involves bedding lots of women. Then-current wife Joan Collins co-stars.
(New Entry) The Best House in London (1969). That’s a euphemism for a brothel, let’s get that right from the outset. David Hemmings tries to do right by the sex workers.
(New Entry) Pendulum (1968). The George Peppard (or perhaps Jean Seberg) reappraisal continues. Here he is the cop accused of murdering unfaithful wife Seberg.
(6) Oceans 11. Frank Sinatra heads the Rat Pack line-up, inspiring a couple of remakes and with Tarantino ripping off one scene.
(36) Lady in Cement (1969). Sinatra again as private eye Tony Rome who takes on Raquel Welch (and that’s a stretch?) as a client.
(8) The Golden Claws of the Cat Girl (1968). French cult film with Daniele Gaubert as a sexy cat burglar.
(New Entry) Go Naked in the World (1961). Gina Lollobrigida finds that her profession (the oldest) and true love (with rich Anthony Franciosa) don’t mix. Great turn from Ernest Borgnine as a doting father.
(17) Pressure Point (1962). No escape for racist patient Bobby Darin when psychiatrist Sidney Poitier is around.
(New Entry) A Dandy in Aspic (1968). Cold War thriller with Laurence Harvey as a double agent who wants out. Mia Farrow co-stars.
(22) Deadlier than the Male (1967). Espionage with a sting in the tale as venomous female villains including Elke Sommer and Sylva Koscina target Bulldog Drummond.
(New Entry) Once a Thief (1965). Change of pace for Ann-Margret as working mother whose ex-jailbird thief Alain Delon is forced into another job.
(12) Subterfuge (1968). Gene Barry-Joan Collins spy thriller set primarily in a dreary London.
(14) Fade In (1968). Not at all as bad as rising star Burt Reynolds believed – he disowned it. Romance set on a movie location.
(New Entry) The Girl on a Motorcycle / Naked under Leather (1968). Heavily-censored in the U.S., erotic drama with singer Marianne Faithfull as the titular fantasizing heroine. Alain Delon co-stars.
(New Entry) Some Girls Do (1969). Bulldog Drummond returns and a bevy of villainous women including Daliah Lavi and Beba Loncar await.
(New Entry) She Died with Her Boots On / Whirlpool (1969). Sleazy British film from cult Spanish director Jose Ramon Larraz sees kinky photographer Karl Lanchbury seduce real-life MTA Vivien Neves.
(New Entry) The Misfits (1960). Last hurrah for Clark Gable, fabulous turns from Montgomery Clift and Marilyn Monroe in John Huston tale of losers.
(New Entry) Rage (1966). Glenn Ford and Stella Stevens combat pandemic in Mexican town.
(23) A House Is Not a Home (1964). Not when it’s a brothel. Shelley Winters is the madam. Raquel Welch has an uncredited role.
(New Entry) In Harm’s Way (1965). John Wayne and Kirk Douglas in Otto Preminger WW2 epic set in Pearl Harbor and after.
(New Entry) Istanbul Express (1968). Gene Barry faces Senta Berger in espionage thriller. Shown on television in the U.S., but gained a cinematic release elsewhere.
(24) P.J. / New Face in Hell (1967). George Peppard’s private eye finds client Raymond Burr too tough to handle. Gayle Hunnicutt is the femme fatale.
(New Entry) Beat Girl / Wild for Kicks (1960). Another sleazy British drama. Gillian Hills is the youngster tempted into the striptease game. Christopher Lee puts in an appearance.
(27) The Brotherhood (1968). Brothers at war Mafia-style with Kirk Douglas and Alex Cord.
(New Entry) The Invitation (2022). Gothic conspiracy starring Nathalie Emmanuel from Game of Thrones.
(New Entry) The First Deadly Sin (1980). Frank Sinatra’s last starring role as cop tracking serial killer. Faye Dunaway plays his dying wife.
(New Entry) The Family Way (1966). Hayley Mills sheds the child-star image with a vengeance, shedding his clothes in British family drama. Co-starring father John Mills and Hywel Bennett.

aka Mr Chow (2023) ****

Pop quiz: name the only brother and sister who appeared in the same James Bond film. Hint: You Only Live Twice (1967). You might be more familiar with Tsai Chin (The Face of Fu Manchu, 1965, and three sequels) than Michael Chow. Though he had a bigger role in Joanna (1969) and The Touchables (1969) he was never more than a bit player, and often uncredited (55 Days at Peking, 1963). He also appeared in The Brides of Fu Manchu (1966) and there’s a fair chance you might remember him from Modesty Blaise (1966).

But HBO isn’t noted for devoting a documentary to a bit part player, not even one who can recite the opening of any film you care to mention. This film begins with such a recitation – encompassing the likes of North by Northwest (1959). If ever there was a more arresting opening to a documentary, this is it.

If you’re a fashionista or restaurant fan or gulled by celebrity photos, you’ll more likely know him by the name of Mr Chow, under which he established a chain of spectacularly successful eateries in London, New York and Los Angeles. He wasn’t even a chef, an understandable subject for a docu, what with all the creative endeavor that involves. But there’s no doubt he was creative, if only in reinventing himself. Born Zhou Yinghun, he chose the name “Mr Chow” because it meant people addressing him such manner rather than treating him with a racist epithet.

He might well have deserved a documentary for other reasons. He was the son of one of most famous Chinese opera stars, who reinvented the genre, and he escaped the cull of the intelligentsia instigated by Chairman Mao. His father was imprisoned for years and his mother was “beaten to death.”

The young Chow was living in England at his point, having been sent at a young age to a boarding school there, where racism of course was endemic. He attended art school but when his paintings didn’t sell he made a living from bit parts in movies – he was the child mown down by a car in Violent Saturday (1960), for example.

A Chinaman wanting to set up a business in London in the 1960s had two options: a laundry or a restaurant. But Chow didn’t want to imitate the ubiquitous Chinese restaurant. His artistic side came to the fore via interior design. His venture, in the staid world of the restaurants of the era, was a culture shock. Everything about it was different – no chopsticks and Italian waiters and no dressing for dinner (wear what you like), an anomaly in a high-end operation at the time. But since he attracted more than his fair share of celebrities presumably what they wore was highly acceptable.

An abundance of charm and connections gained through the movie business provided the funding. But it soon became the “in” place, and every evening was a performance.

By the time HBO came to make a documentary about him – and perhaps this fitted in more with that streamer’s agenda – he had become a proper artist. So much of the film, and indeed a good chunk of the opening section, is devoted to his modernistic artworks which often involved blowtorches, sheets of plastic and a rubber hammer. He exhibits under the name “M” so if you are familiar with the art world that might strike a better chord.

In the fashion of the current docu style, the makers seduce you with interesting material then hit you with a couple of blows you didn’t see coming. The “Shanghai trouble” is one such, which saw both parents killed. But there was also AIDS. His third wife Tina, a famous model, divorced at the time, died of that disease, contracted through a lover, not Chow, and she was one of the first non-homosexual people to be linked with the illness, and one of the first celebrities.

Abandoned, as he saw it, by his mother (in sending him to boarding school) family meant everything and you get the sense that the restaurants were as important as the various wives in creating a loving world. But he is also quite matter-of-fact about the personal calamities – you move on is his doctrine. The racism he endured cut deeper. Even as a famed restaurateur standing outside one of his own restaurants he found it hard to get a taxi to stop.

A handful of celebrities – hardly an all-star cast – pay tribute from Oscar-winning producer Brian Glazer (A Beautiful Mind, 2001) to LL Cool J and author Fran Lebowitz. But the pictures tell a story – Jack Nicholson, Mick Jagger etc are caught on camera having fun. I have to say the one time I went to the LA branch – as the guest of the publisher of Variety magazine – there was not a celebrity in sight (but it was lunch not dinner), though we were seated at Table No 1.

Cunningly directed by Nick Hooker (Agnelli, 2017).

As fascinating a docu as you will come across.

https://www.hbo.com/movies/aka-mr-chow

Mysterious Island (1961) ****

It’s the Ray Harryhausen Show. You’re not here for the story, surely, or the characters. You’re just waiting patiently for the monsters to appear. The only element that’s ever wrong with this kind of picture is that in-built delay. The need to set up the story and establish the oddities of the world before the behemoths trundle into view.

Doesn’t matter whether the creatures already live in an accommodating global ecosystem like Jason and the Argonauts (1963) or One Million Years B.C. (1966). Or whether you are going to come across them by the simple device, most famously, of dropping through a rabbit hole (Alice in Wonderland) or via a cupboard door (The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe) or a rockface cracking open (Prehistoric Women / Slave Girls, 1967) or a time warp (Wonder Woman, 2017).

Here, it’s a bunch U.S. Civil War soldiers who need to break out of their prison and commandeer a handy hot-air balloon that can fly thousands of miles to the uninhabited volcanic island occupied by giant beasts. So we’ve got a monstrous crab, giant bees, chicken, gigantic octopus. And the success or failure of the picture relies not so much on whether our heroes can overcome these than that they look realistic.

And, boy, they are just brilliant. This is fairly early on the Harryhausen catalogue but if his stop-motion animation was still going through an experimental stage it’s hardly noticeable. Enhanced claws and beaks are just dandy for trapping humans, having them wriggling madly to avoid being split open with one snap. And the bee is pretty cunning, filling in the hole the invading humans have created in the massive honeycomb.

And should, perchance, your mind be wandering director Cy Endfield (Zulu, 1964) has a bout of sequel-itis, throwing in Captain Nemo from author Jules Verne’s 20,000 Leagues under the Sea (1954), and prequel-itis – the pirates from his In Search of the Castaways (1962) – plus, to add the romantic touch, a couple of shipwrecked damsels and, for the climax, volcanic eruption.

No doubt you’re dying to know about the characters you couldn’t really care less about who are encountering this legion of beings. So, we’ve got the grizzled Capt. Harding (Michael Craig), young Herbert (Michael Callan) who will express his romantic side, Sgt. Pencroft (Percy Herbert), Corporal Nugent (Dan Jackson) and Gideon (Gary Merrill). There are joined by posh English lady Mary Fairchild (Joan Greenwood), who happily buckles to and is handy with a rifle, and her niece Elena (Beth Rogan) who decides laziness is the better option when she’s not canoodling with Herbert.

Their job is to squabble, beat off the monsters, adapt a local geyser for cooking purposes, set to building a boat to escape, and await the next monster/person who’s going to upset their plans.

Captain Nemo certainly makes an impression, his ship, the Nautilus, stranded under the volcano and the man himself taking a break from the world since he doesn’t believe he is such a good fit. Turning up out of the waves in an improvised aqualung isn’t quite an entrance on a par with Ursula Andress in Dr No (1962), but it runs it close, though bikini tops rubber-suit all the time.

The pirates are just a menace and I wouldn’t be surprised if you came away with the notion that they are rammed into the tale just so their sunken ship, scuttled by Nemo, can miraculously rise from the waves thanks to the sailor’s ingenuity.

Time has been kind to Harryhausen. What was once viewed as appealing only to children and the childish wondrous aspects of adults has now become cult viewing. And no wonder. In the age of CGI, it’s quite astonishing what he has managed to achieve with what appears the most rudimentary of techniques.

Of the actors, British star Michael Craig (Doctor in Love, 1960) has his hands full to stop the picture being stolen by rising American actor Michael Callan (The Interns, 1962), a grumpy Gary Merrill (A Girl Named Tamiko, 1962), an almost avuncular Herbert Lom (The Frightened City, 1961) and a delightful turn by plummy-voiced Joan Greenwood (The Moon-Spinners, 1964).

You wouldn’t think this was the ideal movie to set you up for Zulu, but Cy Endfield does a good job of keeping the story moving and keeping out of the way during the Harryhausen sections. Screenplay by John Prebble (Zulu), Daniel B. Ullman (the television writer’s only movie of the decade) and veteran Crane Wilbur (The George Raft Story, 1962).

Huge fun. All hail King Ray.

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