1960s film – Page 5 – The Magnificent 60s

Django (1966) ****

You’re not going to get a more iconic opening than a cowboy dragging a coffin up a muddy hill. But just in case you think director Sergio Corbucci is trying to make some high-falutin’ statement, the next few minutes contain nine deaths and a woman whipped and then threatened with being burned to death. What followed resulted in deserved cult status, helped along by a ban from the British censor. Outside Sergio Leone 1960s western quartet, this is generally considered to be the best spaghetti western of the period.

You’ll be familiar with the story, because basically it’s a rehash of A Fistful of Dollars, which in itself was an uncredited rehash of Akira Kurosawa’s Yojimbo (1961).

On the Mexican-U.S. border, two groups vie for control of a tiny town (population: six – one bartender and five whores), one led by ex-Confederate Major Jackson (Eduardo Fajardo) who would be dressed in the red shirts of revolutionaries except that the opposing bunch led by General Rodriguez’s (Jose Badalo) has chosen that color.

Django (Franco Nero) arrives in the town accompanied by the whipped woman Maria (Loredana Nusciak) and the coffin, which contains a machine gun. Django wants revenge on Jackson who killed his lover. But that’s as much a MacGuffin as you need because, really, slaughter is the name of the game, not to mention a gold heist, then a heist of the stolen gold, which is stashed safely in Django’s coffin until it ends up in the quicksand.

This being a spaghetti western naturally there’s mutilation, Django’s hands crushed for the audacity of his theft, someone else forced to eat his own ear, and there’s attempted rape. Mostly, there’s massacre. A humungous heap of bodies provide the entertainment. Jackson and the General are equally intent on killing as many people as possible, Rodriguez having the moral edge because he’s the legitimate revolutionary but it’s a close run thing.

But the good guys are always a hefty massacre away from safety.

For reasons known only to mythmakers, the final shoot-out takes place in a cemetery in Tombstone, which is a heck of a long way (a mere 500 miles) from the Mexican border, but never mind. But there’s a clever ending, especially when you consider how difficult it is to shoot a revolver with a mangled hand.

This zips along with a ton of brio. Franco Nero (Camelot, 1967) resists the temptation to play up those baby blues. He’s virtually deadpan thoughout, quite an achievement in a movie where everyone else overacts. His character is even more down’n’dirty than The Man with No Name and comes across more as a man of the soil than a gunslinger. For such a violent movie, there’s an acknowledgement of politics that’s akin to the skewered morality of The Wild Bunch (1969). The plot takes us all over the place, but it’s so much fun who the heck cares.

The bloodshed (“excessive and nauseating” was the view of the British censor) was way ahead of its time, representing the reality of war and rebellion far more than the cartoonish killing of Leone’s spaghetti trilogy.

Director Sergio Corbucci (The Great Silence, 1968) isn’t trying to sell us a traditional western with sweeping vistas and terrific camerawork. This falls into the nihilistic vein. The huge tranches of mud at the outset set the tone, the land is barren and bleak, a desert of mud. There’s nothing opportunistic or greedy about Django. He’s not intent on playing off two sides for profit. His motive is personal. Where The Man With No Name was fleshed out with a certain amount of charm, there’s no recourse to that here. In a pitiless world, there’s no use for charm. Written by Sergio Corbucci and his brother Bruno.

This spawned as many rip-offs as the Leone versions.

Crossplot (1969) ***

Roger Moore – in his first movie in seven years – almost auditioning for James Bond with his lothario instinct, light touch for dialog, a nice side-line in double takes, and enough action to show that even in his early 40s he was still nimble enough. Not in the Charade (1963) or Arabesque (1966) league and over-reliant on the Swinging Sixties and other “Tourist Britain” clichés and a plot that takes far too long to get going, it takes all the actor’s charm to make it watchable.

After one of his staff Warren (Dudley Sutton) switches the photo of a model in his portfolio, ad-man Gary (Roger Moore) finds himself on the trail of Marla (Claudia Lange), a sometime fugitive hiding out on a houseboat. Meet-cute is prompted when she pushes him into the Thames. On leaving he is knocked out and framed on a dope charge and once he manages to get her into the photographic studio Warren attempts to throw her off the roof, the would-be killer himself eliminated by his boss Ruddock (Francis Matthews) who in a marvelous piece of quick-thinking throws his gun to Gary who instinctively catches it, further implicating himself.

After going all round the houses (including a stately home), evading pursuit via an antique car race and a wedding, Gary finally gets to the bottom of why Marla is in such danger – she overheard a conversation between her aunt Joe (Martha Hyer) and Ruddock. Only problem is – she can’t remember it. And it takes even more time for Gary to figure it out, (not realizing, how could he, that the clue is in the title, in fact two clues in a crossword puzzle). You can imagine how it goes from then.

*This poster takes the easy route by trying to sell the picture on the back of “The Saint.”*

On the plus side is mostly Roger Moore. “I come from a long line of hippopotamuses,” isn’t the sort of line you can deliver without some skill. But Moore’s performance lifts what is for the most part a shaggy dog story, and he’s game enough to do all the running and fighting required, even the heavy lifting (of his eyebrows), to keep the story moving. It’s far from as funny as it thinks and not as funny as it needs to be, but there are still some good stabs at humor, a pistol held to Gary’s head discovered to be a toy gun, Gary turning the tables in a shower on Marla, telling the bride that her groom is a bigamist, and a running joke about the Marla being perennially hungry.

The politics barely touches on the conspiracy aspects that Hollywood would have pounced upon and made a better fist of, although the idea that Britain could be undermined by civil strife was not far off the mark for the times. It needed some smarter thinking, though, for that element to work.

*A much better attempt at selling a thriller with scenes from the film,*
*including the toy pistol pointed at Roger Moore’s head.*

The rest of the cast are game enough. Claudie Lang (The Gatling Gun, 1968) is no Sophia Loren or Audrey Hepburn but nobody is pretending she is and she just about gets away with the dumb model approach. Martha Hyer (The Chase, 1966) delivers a glamorous villain and the suave Francis Matthews (Rasputin: The Mad Monk, 1966) her ideal match.

There’s quite a supporting cast: Veronica Carlsen (Dracula Has Risen from the Grave, 1968), Gabrielle Drake (Suburban Wives, 1972), Dave Prowse (Star Wars, 1977), Bernard Lee (You Only Live Twice, 1967), Alexis Tanner (The Ernie Game, 1967), Ursula Howells (BBC’s The Forsyte Saga, 1967) and Dudley Sutton (Rotten to the Core, 1965).

If Alvin Rakoff (The Comedy Man, 1964) is in charge of the material he doesn’t have enough material to work with. He does enough to keep it on course but would have benefitted from a a tighter screenplay from Leigh Vance (The Frightened City, 1961). Both had done better in the past, but it is easy to be seduced by the romantic thriller format, almost a mini-genre in itself, assuming it is easier to pull off than it looks. The likes of Alfred Hitchcock (North by Northwest, 1959) and Stanley Donen (Charade) made it look easy but they had the advantage of big stars in Cary Grant and Audrey Hepburn who possessed the ability to make the lightest confection work.

A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum (1966) ***

The funniest thing that happened on the way to turning this hit Broadway musical into a Hollywood movie was that composer Stephen Sondheim (Sweeney Todd, 2007), now denoted a legend, was considered such a poor marquee attraction that the producers cut half the songs of the original production, turning the result into more of a comedy with intermittent songs rather than a full-blown musical in the Rodgers and Hammerstein tradition.

Sondheim had an unusual theatrical development, starting out purely as a writer of lyrics – for West Side Story (filmed 1961) and Gypsy (filmed in 1964). He took on the dual roles of composer and lyricist for this one, which made its Broadway debut in 1962 and ran for three years.

You wouldn’t have Zero Mostel, a year before The Producers (1967), down as much of a marquee name either – he hadn’t appeared in a movie in 15 years, and then in only a bit part. But Broadway has its own method of producing stars and he had become a stage headline act and really there were few contenders for the role of a fat middle-aged Roman hustler.

Contemporary audiences will appreciate the actor breaking the fourth wall and talking directly to the audience, but while it was highly unusual at the time, it had the effect of putting the audience on his side. You might not associate Richard Lester (Petulia, 1968) with musicals but that would only be if you excluded A Hard Day’s Night (1964) and Help! (1965) from his portfolio, though admittedly those would hardly be classed as traditional song-and-dance efforts.

The picture was larded with other top comedic names, Phil Silvers of Sgt Bilko TV fame and legendary silent comic Buster Keaton. It didn’t hinder the movie’s prospects that with the phalanxes of nubile young women on show it might have been considered an audition for actresses aiming no higher than the sobriquet of Bond Babe.

What’s perhaps most unusual of all is that this is a sex farce, not a medium at which Hollywood was renowned. Screwball romantic comedy, yes, farce set in a brothel, no. Luckily, it delivers on all fronts. If you want a hint of what Sondheim could bring to the party, there are seven songs to choose from. If you reckon Zero Mostel provides a distinct brand of comedy you would be proved correct. If you were here for the cheesecake it was in abundance. And if you went looking for laffs there was no shortage, pratfalls included.

The story is slight, if complicated. Slave Pseudolus (Zero Mostel) wants his freedom, young swain Hero (Michael Crawford) wants to win the heart of Philia (Annette Andre). All sorts of obstacles get in the way. Since Philia, a virgin slave, has already been sold to a great warrior Gloriosus (Leon Greene), Pseudolus must convince him that the girl has been exposed to a deadly plague and must be hidden away. He is eventually distracted by an orgy and persuaded that the girl is dead. However, when Gloriosus determines to cut out her dead heart, she is suddenly very much alive.

In the tradition of Shakespearean comedy, there are oodles of mistaken identity and the while the narrative twists itself into various contortions to accommodate the sub-plots, naturally, it all ends happily, Philia turns out to be not a slave at all, and Pseudolus walks off with his freedom and Amazonian temptress Gymnasia (Inga Neilsen) to boot.

It’s all very good-natured fun, bordering on the licentious, but steering well clear of the meretricious and anything so off-putting as nudity or sex.

Having conquered Broadway, Zero Mostel now conquers Hollywood, doubling down on his fame next year with Mel Brook’s The Producers. Unlike The Devils (1971), any sign of campness is tamped down, helped along by serious players like Michael Hordern (Where Eagles Dare, 1968) taking their roles seriously. Phil Silvers and Buster Keaton keep the show on the road. Future British television and Broadway musical star Michael Crawford (The Jokers, 1967) shows his promise. In small parts you might spot Ingrid Pitt (Countess Dracula, 1971) and Jon Pertwee, the third Doctor Who.

I didn’t go away humming any of the songs, but they were pleasurable enough and for Sondheim lovers more than enough.

Director Richard Lester proves himself adept at this kind of comedy. Written by Melvin Frank (Buona Sera, Mrs Campbell, 1968) and Michael Pertwee (Make Mine Mink, 1960) from the Broadway production by Sondheim, Burt Shevelove (The Wrong Box, 1966) and Larry Gelbart (The Notorious Landlady, 1962) which took its impetus from the work of Roman writer Plautus.

Good fun.

Make Mine Mink (1960) ****

Jaunty little picture full of gags and visual treats pivoting on amateur crooks finding life tough in professional waters. While Terry-Thomas proves once again that he can spin any movie on its head with his own brand of upper-class buffoonery and those very distinct nasal tones, it’s very much a team effort with every one of the gang making a contribution.

The down-on-their-luck lodgers of impoverished Dame Beatrice (Athene Seyler) turn to crime after successfully returning a stolen mink. In the impenetrable logic of such tales, the quartet decide that if they can with military precision carry out a robbery reversal they would be well placed to actually carry out a robbery. Anal retentive Major Rayne (Terry-Thomas) would be a one-man League of Gentlemen except he has to rely on a motley crew of females, the luckless Dame, etiquette tutor Nanette (Hattie Jacques) and generally neurotic nincompoop Pinkie (Elspeth Duxbury). Getting very much in their way is the Dame’s maid Lily (Billie Whitelaw), an ex-jailbird, who wants nothing to do with illegitimate schemes and is romancing, to boot, Scottish cop Jim (Jack Hedley).

Nanette spends all her time puncturing the major’s pomposity, Pinkie spends all her time requiring liquid courage, and the major spends all his time happily barking orders and maintaining strict military order. Most of the time the incompetent crooks get away with their crimes because their victims are equally dense.

There’s a marvellous daftness to proceedings. Dame Beatrice, whose efforts at parking her car have resulted in continuous prangs and scrapes, is only too delighted to visit the local cop shop with the proviso that she needn’t bring along her license because she hasn’t seen it in a long time. The flat-chested Pinkie’s disguise is an inflated bosom. Trying to get rid of their ill-gotten gains to a fence sends Major into uncomfortable territory where being out of his depth is an invitation to a welter of fabulous comedy.

Naturally, they are not proper crooks since their thievery is all in the aid of charity. For a time, when Lily finds out, they are forced to give up, but then opportunity beckons.

There’s no attempt at either the satire that seemed necessary to seed into comedic ventures at the time if one were to achieve any sort of critical acclaim nor the double entendres, saucy innuendo and sex jokes that appeared to more easily to attract an audience. This is good old-fashioned comedy and I found myself laughing out loud a lot, which, to my mind, is the definition of a good comedy.

Here, the characters seem to mesh so well, and the narrative scarcely troubles the imagination that virtually everything works right off the bat, including a homage to The Third Man and those gags where bombs refuse to work. The major’s misplaced confidence, Nanette’s crunching handshake and the whimpering Pinkie all burst out of the screen. Lily is luminous most of the time except when she has to tell off the gang.

Terry-Thomas is a delight. This proved something of a breakthrough role in Hollywood terms and soon he would be tangling with Tuesday Weld in Bachelor Flat (1961) and challenging Peter Sellers as the country’s best comedic export. Hattie Jacques is relieved of the stern matron roles of the Carry On films and there’s something both impish and innocent in her head girl demeanor to the extent of still wearing her school uniform. Terrific ingénue turn from Billie Whitelaw (Twisted Nerve, 1968) and a knowing veteran’s one from Athene Seyler (I Thank a Fool, 1962) purring along in Margaret Rutherford fashion. Elspeth Duxbury, in movie debut, makes the most of a peach of a role.

Directed by Robert Asher (The Intelligence Men, 1965) from a screenplay by Michael Pertwee (Mouse on the Moon, 1963) based upon the stage play Breath of Spring by Peter Coke.

Having complained about the music in The Invite (2026), I would like to point to Philip Green’s (Masquerade, 1965) music here as exactly the kind of score that helps complement the action and establish the moiod..

Hugely enjoyable eccentricity.

The Best Man (1964) ****

Current openness towards mental health issues has bestowed a contemporary vibe on this lively political drama. The other topic raised here has long ceased to be controversial. Not that far removed from Otto Preminger’s Advise and Consent (1961) in terms of dirty dealing and horse trading, flaw is the weapon used to cut opponents down to size.

The two principal candidates seeking their (un-named) party’s Presidential nomination could not be further apart, William Russell (Henry Fonda) a rich intellectual, Joe Cantwell (Cliff Robertson) a self-styled man of the people. Cantwell chases the populist vote with a campaign built on fulminating against immigration and Communism, driving down taxes and spending more on the military. Russell seems unsuited for the cut-and-thrust of politics, too idealistic, too indecisive.

But he is a good judge of character whereas Cantwell most decidedly is not and in misreading the intentions of President Hockstader (Lee Tracy) shoots himself in the foot and leaves the nomination wide open, triggering his use of the dark arts, planning to circulate a file on his opponent’s problems with mental illness. Existing on a much higher plane, Russell refuses to fight back, although he has access to a witness claiming Cantwell was gay.

Apart from discussing these taboo issues – this was the first time the word “homosexual” was uttered in a movie – what’s interesting is that Russell’s philandering is not deemed damaging as long as his wife Alice (Margaret Leighton) is seen to publicly stand by him. Despite the fact that Cantwell is as clean as a whistle – doesn’t drink or smoke or have a lover – affairs are seen as such a fact of life of politics that Cantwell’s wife Mabel (Edie Adams) assumes he will have one. Cantwell, very much one to go for the jugular, clearly believes the public takes the same non-judgemental view otherwise he would easily skewer Russell on his marital discord.

In some respects, Cantwell is by far the better candidate if you were to judge him on personal behavior, but he lacks the necessary savvy, “ a tragedy in a man and a disaster in a president.”

As you might expect from a script written by novelist Gore Vidal, sometime political heavyweight, there are plenty zingers: “expect 22 minutes of spontaneity”; “I don’t object to you being a bastard, I object you being a stupid bastard;” and “I won’t throw my mud if you won’t throw your mud.”

It may be artistic irony that determined director Franklin J. Schaffner to film in black-and-white since politics is nothing but various shades of grey, but there was probably a more practical reason, to incorporate footage from conventions.

Somewhat surprisingly, both men are honest with their wives, Russell making a pact to divorce Alice if not elected, their marriage long ago defunct, while Cantwell’s wife is fully aware of the slur on her husband’s name. The women here are well-drawn, not quite the submissive types you might expect, certainly not Alice who has every right, given his infidelities, to act the shrew, instead of which she plays the shrewd card. Mabel proves a loving wife but a little indulged to the extent her teetotal husband has no idea how much alcohol she can shift and she reserves her right to keep him waiting. Alice, it might be noticed, is more vicious than her husband should it come to the down-and-dirty.

And there’s a stack of wannabe power-makers from pushy busybody Mrs Gamidge (Ann Sothern) – so full of her own importance that she fails to see the slight in being told that “talking to you is like talking to the average American housewife” – to walking timebomb Sheldon Bascomb (Shelley Berman).

Not so full of arcane American politics as Advise and Consent, and with a more straightforward narrative, it digs the dirt in compulsive fashion on the dirt-diggers. In questioning whether someone with mental health issues could be a worthy national leader, the movie naturally ignores the narcissism and megalomania that seemed essential criteria for any person achieving high office or excessive business success. It’s probably a subject that remains unresolved, although a good many personalities have admitted to such problems.

Cliff Robertson (The Honey Pot, 1967) takes the acting honours if only because we have seen a version of the Henry Fonda (Battle of the Bulge, 1965) political idealist before in Advise and Consent. Robertson essays a character of Donald Trump dimensions and Fonda is clearly modelled on Kennedy, but Robertson comes across stronger and even Fonda may have been getting fed up with being such a straight-shooter as seen by his later villainous choices. Edie Adams has a more complex part here than in The Honey Pot and Margaret Leighton (The Fighting Pimpernel, 1949) can play ramrod-stiff women till the cows come home.

Hollywood veteran Ann Sothern of Maisie fame is terrific as the interfering Mrs Gamidge and Shelley Berman (Divorce American-Style, 1967), making his movie debut, is one of the most irritating characters you will ever see. Kevin McCarthy (Mirage, 1965) plays Russell’s whip-smart aide with Lee Tracy (Dinner at Eight, 1933) in his first movie in nearly two decades as the wily President.

Audiences were denied the first glimpse of Penny Singleton (the Blondie series) in fourteen years when her part was excised. To make up for that, we get to see Mahalia Jackson sing.

Director Franklin J. Schaffner (The Double Man, 1967) keeps characters to the fore rather than relying on the many twists, and does a decent job, complete with aerial helicopter shots, of opening up Gore Vidal’s stage play. Vidal (Ben-Hur, 1959) had stood unsuccessfully for Congress so had an insider’s viewpoint.

Term of Trial (1962) ***

Notable for the debuts of Sarah Miles (Ryan’s Daughter, 1970) and Terence Stamp (The Collector, 1963) and an ending that even in those misogynistic times was wince-inducing. The halcyon era of dull English schoolteachers being celebrated (Goodbye, Mr Chips, 1939) or finding redemption or even just managing to overcome pupil hostility (The Browning Version, 1951) were long gone, replaced by a more realistic view of the casual warfare endemic in education establishments, not quite in The Blackboard Jungle (1956) vein but running it close, with bullying, sexual abuse and ridicule running riot.

Self-pitying Graham Weir (Laurence Olivier) has failed to achieve his ambitions in part due to alcoholism, in part to antipathy to his conscientious objection during World War Two. And although he has a sexy French wife Anna (Simone Signoret) in the days when any Frenchwoman was deemed a goddess, she is embittered that the future he promised has not materialized. Like To Sir, with Love (1967) his classroom is filled with no-hopers so that he responds to the meek and innocent wishing for educational betterment.

Weir’s only defence against endless indignity is a stiff upper lip and slugs of whisky. His lack of character contrasts with a young lad who takes revenge against constantly being chucked out of his house by his mother’s lover (Derren Nesbitt) by blowing up the man’s sports car.

Spanning the twin cultures of religion and the razor, one falling out of favor, the other holding violent sway, opportunity to rise above kitchen-sink England lies with the self-confident such as thug Mitchell (Terence Stamp) who smokes in class, gives the teachers lip, takes photographs of girls in their underwear in the toilets, physically threatens classmates and when his target is bigger gets older men to give him a good thumping.

A somewhat unlikely development is an end-of-term trip to Paris where the infatuated Shirley (Sarah Miles), who the good-hearted Weir has been giving free private tuition, ends up in the teacher’s bedroom and later accuses him of abuse. The impending court case and threat of imprisonment scupper Weir’s chances of promotion, make him consider suicide, and Anna to leave him.

The court scenes allow a number of famous character actors a moment of acting glory. Laurence Olivier (Bunny Lake Is Missing, 1965) must in part have been attracted to the role by a terrific court monologue. The movie is very downbeat in a country universally known never to enjoy an ounce of sunshine justifying the black-and-white movie rendition. If there is liveliness in the streets, cinemas, shops, it never translates into any of the main adult characters, all determined to uphold ancient values and endure constricted lives.

Exploiting audience expectation for verbal fireworks, the tension in Laurence Olivier’s finely judged performance comes from his untypical, unshowy delivery. You can almost hear him grinding his teeth. Simone Signoret (The Sleeping Car Murder, 1965) also acts against the grain, battening down her inherent sexuality, and her very presence speaks of lost hope, the fact that she was once attracted to Weir indicating he was once a very different prospect.

Sarah Miles excels as the wannabe seducer, that hesitant voice that would become her hallmark, struggling here to turn innocence into lure, expressing her adoration in heart-breaking simplicity, and yet aware that to catch Weir would require more than just the submission a guy like Mitchell requires. While hers is a stunning debut, I’m at a loss to see what marked out Terence Stamp’s typical surly teenager for speedier stardom.

Oscar-winner Hugh Griffiths (The Counterfeit Traitor, 1962) is the pick of the supporting roles. A remarkable scene-stealer, a shift of his head, a flicker of his eyelashes is all he needs while sitting in the background to attract the camera from another character in the foreground. Look out for Barbara Ferris (Interlude, 1968), Derren Nesbit (Where Eagles Dare, 1968), Allan Cuthbertson (The 7^th Dawn, 1964), Roland Culver (Thunderball, 1965) and Thora Hird (television’s Last of the Summer Wine, 1986-2003).

Surprisingly un-stagey direction from Peter Glenville (Becket, 1964) who was far better known as a theater director in London and Broadway. Probably in those days if you were setting a movie outside sophisticated London you had to present a gloomy version of Britain so you can’t really blame him for that and Olivier was hardly a major box office attraction so a budget trimmed of color would be a requisite. Although the older characters display grim determination, the younger ones have not had the spirit knocked out of them in the Saturday Night and Sunday Morning (1960) manner and the location shots reveal a buzzy atmosphere.

Glenville also wrote the screenplay based on the bestseller by James Barlow.

Hannibal (1960) ***

Inconvenient truth never bothered Hollywood scriptwriters when it came to history and here the prospect of solving the “Great Hannibal Mystery” proved irresistible. For in 218 B.C. this invader from Carthage (modern-day Tunisia) had crossed the Alps, battered the Roman army into submission and had Rome at his mercy. But one of the greatest generals of all time did not attack Rome. Why? Love was the answer, according to the filmmakers, following the Romeo and Juliet template.

I have to admit I didn’t have that on my mind. I was seduced by the poster, the involvement of cult director Edgar G. Ulmer (The Black Cat, 1934), the prospect of an action-packed adventure with marauding elephants and the fact that although familiar with the name Hannibal I had no idea who he was and why he crossed the Alps when surely it would have easier to take a ship from Tunisia to Italy. But I guess star Victor Mature (Samson and Delilah, 1949) was also duped into thinking that if an American nobody like Steve Reeves (Hercules, 1958) could make it big in Italy then so could surely the original Hollywood Mr. Muscles. Mixing the new-look sword-and-sandals genre with the old-style historical epic appeared a potential winner. But I should have guessed that the lean running time of 103 minutes meant an “epic” was out of the question.

The British Trade Descriptions Act would have a field day with the way the posters promoted the elephants. The much-vaunted “army” is scarcely seen in battle and the great beasts looked more cuddly than anything, striding along linked trunk-to-tail.

The picture does take a good while to warm up although the movie begins with a sense of the epic, otherwise how to explain the 15 minutes before Hannibal hoves into view, the preceding period of invaders crossing the Alps short of dramatic incident beyond a couple of men falling to their deaths and the elephants becoming a bit restive. Endless lines of soldiers, in this case stretching into the snowbound horizon, almost becomes a motif, too much valuable time wasted on too many marches.

Hannibal turns out to be a clever commander, wanting to conquer Rome more by fear than battle, reckoning that if the Italians believed he possessed an unstoppable force they would rush to the negotiating table rather than engage in open battle and risk the destruction of their cities. He sends the captured niece Sylvia (Rita Gam) of Senator Fabius (Gabriele Ferzetti) back to her uncle with frightening tales. This doesn’t fool Fabius who views the woman as a traitor and realizes the pitfalls of surrender. Hannibal and Sylvia getting it together causes discord not just in Rome but in the Carthaginian camp, the delay in attacking the city put down to their romantic dalliance.

The initial battle scenes come up short, presented primarily in montage, little snippets of fighting here and there, rather than opposing forces facing each other, no sign either of elephants striking terror into the hearts of their opponents. But the later battle more than recompenses. One of the greatest assets of historical and war pictures is the detail given over to strategy. And if filmed properly, you can see plans executed. Hannibal demonstrates his genius by drawing the main Roman phalanxes into a trap, attacking them from both sides and forcing them back towards a river from which there is no escape. Superbly filmed, it’s a bloody conflict (for movies of the period), arms hacked off, faces and bodies weeping with blood. There’s a tragic end to the romance.

*Oh, and by the way, Hannibal loses an eye – but it’s not in battle but from conjunctivitis.*

I should point out, having done my own digging, but there was a sounder reason than love for Hannibal not advancing on Rome. Simply put, he lacked the machinery to do it. The only way to conquer a city was by siege and to achieve that you needed siege machines which Hannibal lacked. But no matter how much he later tried to draw the Roman armies into the open, he was denied that opportunity by the wily Fabius who, instead, waged a war of attrition.

Hannibal was, in fact, an irritant to Rome for a decade, so this tale is heavily truncated. Although the tale of the strong man brought to his knees by passion is a Hollywood trope – look no further than Samson and Delilah – the lovers fail to strike the necessary sparks, in part because initially Hannibal views Sylvia merely as a tool to achieve a political end and in part because their time together is too limited. This is no grand passion in the vein of Doctor Zhivago (1965).

And that’s a shame because despite (or perhaps because of) his muscles, Victor Mature was no slouch in the romantic sweepstakes, having dallied in the past with the like of Janet Leigh (Safari, 1956), Susan Hayward (Demetrius and the Gladiators, 1954) and Jane Russell (Las Vegas Story, 1952). Here, Mature is better as a leader than a lover. The svelte Rita Gam (The Thief, 1952) – first wife of director Sidney Lumet – was the opposite of the more voluptuous Italian screen queens of the Sophia Loren/Gina Lollobrigida variety and her career had not really taken off, only eight films prior to Hannibal and only two in the next decade. Paradoxically, she is better battling her uncle and accepting her fate than a woman in the grip of passion.

Gabriele Ferzetti (Once Upon a Time in the West, 1968) makes the most of a complex character. Look out for Rik Battaglia (Sodom and Gomorrah, 1962) as Hannibal’s brother and, as Fabius’s son, Terence Hill (God Forgives…I Don’t, 1967) and in a smaller role his future sidekick Bud Spencer.

Directorial credit was split between Ulmer and Carlo Ludovico Bragaglia (Amazons of Rome, 1961) with Mortimer Braus (The Son of Dr Jekyll, 1951), Sandro Continenza (The Inglorious Bastards, 1978) and Ottavia Poggi (Queen of the Nile, 1961) involved in the screenplay.

A Matter of Innocence / Pretty Polly (1967) ***

Dramatically undernourished coming-of-age tale over-reliant on “authentic” travelogue and continuing the transformation of Hayley Mills from child to adult star, although that change had been clearly wrought by her previous outing in The Family Way (1966) which had contained her first nude scene. While there’s definitely way more sex here it’s all off-screen.

In Singapore, family black sheep Robert (Trevor Howard) tries to stifle romance blossoming between his ugly duckling niece Polly (Hayley Mill) and local king of the fixers Amaz (Shashi Kapoor), to quote from list of the clichés the screenplay happily summons up. Polly is the bespectacled, dowdy, shy travelling companion to snippy aunt (Brenda de Banzie) – Robert’s sister not wife – who resides in a magnificent suite in Raffles Hotel, consigning her niece to a hovel of a room. When said aunt drops dead in the swimming pool, Polly, wasting no time on mourning, is free to turn butterfly, channeling her inner Brigitte Bardot with bouffant hairstyle and tight red dress.

The genial Amaz is on hand as a guide, in sexual matters as well as tourist, until huffing-and-puffing plantation manager Robert threatens to intervene and smarmy American Critch (Peter Bayliss) attempts to sweep her off her feet. And that’s about it, plot-wise. The meandering story provides insights into different aspects of local culture – Whicker’s World was the only globe-trotting television series available at the time so all this would probably have entranced moviegoers rather than, as now, bored them to death.

Perhaps what’s most interesting is what’s left unsaid or never dwelt upon, of the posh English girl having sex with a native of Singapore. In previous movies – Bhowani Junction et al – miscegenation would have been the sole plot point with Brits up in arms at the suggestion of it. Here, the only objection to Amaz is that he’s a bit of a Casanova, practised seducer in the main of older women. While Amaz falls in love, Polly is considerably more objective, viewing their relationship in terms of rite-of-passage, rather an un-British approach, more in keeping with the attitudes those bold females exhibited in pictures like The Group (1966).

Polly is a pretty cool-headed kid, with a good head for booze, not staggering in gutters or throwing up after imbibing too much, alert to the intentions of Critch and more than capable of putting her uncle in his place. Despite her delight at enjoying sex Polly is more independent than you might imagine and the film’s actually a character study of a woman refusing to be defined – or trapped – by love and its obvious consequence marriage and viewing this new freedom as merely the starting point of her life.

For Hayley Mills fans, of course, her career divides sharply into Disney and post-Disney. Few child stars ever manage to take the first steps to an adult career never mind sustain one, but the actress made a good stab at throwing off her previous precocious screen persona by taking on challenging roles that perhaps upset her core followers. But the film would have benefitted from a better storyline and minus the distracting tourist elements been a lot tighter.

The career of Trevor Howard, long-time second male lead, was on a bit of an upswing after sterling roles in Von Ryan’s Express (1965) and The Long Duel (1967) and although he remained the scowler supreme he brings more vulnerability to this role. Bollywood heartthrob Shashi Kapoor had come to prominence as far as the English-speaking countries were concerned through arthouse director James Ivory’s The Householder (1963) and Shakespeare-Wallah (1966) but this was his mainstream debut. He certainly has a screen presence and enjoys the best character arc, going from the cynicism of sex to the innocence of love. I’m sure the title is intended to refer to Polly but she is innocent, in screen shorthand terms, for about two seconds. Pretty Polly, the title of the short story on which the film is based, was not usable in certain countries because the name was the trademark of a popular brand of hosiery.

This was the final film of Brenda de Banzie (The Man Who Knew Too Much, 1956) and the second for British television stalwart Patricia Routledge (Keeping Up Appearances, 1990-1995), while for Chinese star Kalen Liu (Welcome to Hard Times, 1967) it was both her second and last picture.

This was perhaps an odd choice for director Guy Green (A Patch of Blue, 1965) but he was mired in the on-again off-again saga of proposed MGM roadshow epic Forty Days of Musa Dagh and compared to those travails this may have been welcome light relief. Keith Waterhouse and Willis Hall (Lock Up Your Daughters, 1969) developed the screenplay from Noel Coward’s short story.

The Blood of Fu Manchu / Kiss & Kill (1968) **

Three stories in one, except only one tale remotely holds our interest. So what compelled producer Harry Alan Towers and director Jess Franco to sideline the titular character and devote more time to a young explorer Carl Janseon (Gotz George) and bandit Sancho Lopez (Ricardo Palacios). You could probably guess that the physical involvement of Fu Manchu (Christopher Lee) would be in any case limited once you grasped the crux of the narrative which saw ten girls sent out into the big wide world to kill his ten most hated enemies. You’ll probably be surprised to learn that he had only ten major enemies, but since one of them is his old nemesis Nayland Smith (Richard Greene), then you can be sure that that aspect is going to suck up a good deal of what time remains after the subplots concerning the explorer and the bandit.

Which is a shame because neither explorer not bandit employ the kid of evil little grey cells that would allow them to come up with a plot that any of the James Bond villains would be proud of in their bids for global domination. Fu Manchu has located an ancient poison which is transmitted by women in the form of a kiss. It originates in certain snakes and although the women are “kissed” by the snakes, they are apparently impervious to its venom, so the first gender-specific poison in history.

And that’s about it. As usual Towers has rounded up a bevy of young beauties, no doubt sold on the idea that he’s going to turn them into the next big female star, as carriers of the deadly poison. Not all are so keen on the idea, but since he’s got them chained by the neck in a Brazilian cave that passes for his stronghold and with his daughter Lin Tang (Tsai Chin) to threaten them with torture, it’s not surprising they are complicit.

In any case the female assassins are one-trick ponies. The minute they accomplish their deed, they are bumped off. Smith is the first victim (apart from a prisoner selected to demonstrate the efficacy of the poison) but he doesn’t die immediately. Instead he is struck blind, although he is aware he hasn’t got long to live unless an antidote can be found.

Naturally, that puts him on the track of Fu Manchu and, of course, into sudden danger. The Fu Manchu-Nayland Smith had proved a decent cinematic tug-of-war for three previous episodes beginning with The Face of Fu Manchu (1965), so it was somewhat surprising that tension was diminished by spending so much time playing up explorer and bandit, especially as the latter is determined to play out all the cliches, including laughing like a hyena.

There is some occasional visual humor such as when the bandits go on the rampage and the crew emerge from bandits bearing such prizes as a bishop’s mitre and when a governor, having imprisoned Jansen, suggests they while away their time with a game of chess.

It’s odd that part of the disappointment for certain viewers in this opus is the lack of trademark Jess Franco sleaze. There’s barely any nudity and although the girls are kept in prison (until released to wreak havoc) there’s none of the tawdriness of WIP epics such as his 99 Women (1969) which is replete with brutality and sex.

Despite the cultural appropriation, Christopher Lee (The Devil Rides Out, 1968) is, as ever, solid as Fu Manchu, speaking in clipped tones and towering over everyone else, though his main role appears to be to deliver exposition, explain the foul plot and its consequences and so on. It’s left up to Tsai Chin (You Only Live Twice, 1967) to carry the sadism.

Richard Greene (Sword of Sherwood Forest, 1960) does his best in a role of declining returns. You might spot among the cast Towers’ wife Maria Rohm (Five Golden Dragons, 1967) and Shirley Eaton (The Girl from Rio, 1969).

Of the women expecting a major career break, Loni von Friedl had scores of parts including Doppelganger/Journey to the Far Side of the Sun (1969). But Frances Khan only enjoyed three more roles and or Isaura de Olivera this was the beginning and end of her movie career.

Written as usual by Peter Welbeck (Five Golden Dragons) – aka Harry Alan Towers – and Franco based on the novels of Sax Rohmer.

Promising idea ruined.

The Bramble Bush (1960) ***

The secrecy business was working overtime in small-town America according to the Peyton Place template. And that wouldn’t be so bad here except returning big city doctor Guy (Richard Burton) has a few of his own in the locker but more importantly the unfolding of so many secrets detracts from the time available for the main dramatic premise which is an absolute corker.

We might as well account straight-off with the secret Guy drags around behind him like a two-ton weight thus explaining his general surliness, tight-lipped demeanor and occasional flashes of temper. As a twelve-year-old he told his father he had caught his mother in bed lover with Stew (James Dunn) which prompted his dad to chuck himself off a cliff.

The other big secret, dealt with fairly promptly, is that local nurse Fran (Angie Dickinson), who held a torch for Guy, now makes do with district attorney Bert (Jack Carson), that clandestine affair coming to light not so much in flagrante but in full beam when the illicit couple require treatment following a fire in a hotel bedroom.

The unravelling of both secrets impacts on Guy’s emotional state. The fire leads to Fran admitting her feelings to Guy, happy to have him use her for sex if love is not possible, “I love you so much I have no shame,” she proclaims, to no avail, but the hotel business also makes her fall prey to blackmail by local newshound Parker (Henry Jones), a budding amateur photographer of the unsavoury kind. Recounting his personal tragedy results in a Guy having a one-night stand with the married wannabe artist Margaret McFie (Barbara Rush).

But here’s the brilliant twist. Margaret’s husband Larry (Tom Drake) wants her to end up with Guy – but after his death. Larry, Guy’s best friend from childhood, is dying, the doctor scuttling back to a town that harbours too many bad memories in order to act as his personal physician. Larry’s never going to recover, he has the incurable illness Hodgkin’s Disease. His dying wish is that Guy marry Margaret.

Margaret is revolted by the idea, “I don’t want to be beautiful for anyone but Larry,” but unable to cope with his with illness is living on a cocktail of drink and drugs. And although Guy, who distrusts any woman, is similarly ill-inclined, Margaret becomes dependent on his medical ability, treating both husband and wife. Larry turns out to have another crazy idea – he wants Guy to kill him, medically speaking of course, some extra, illegal, doses of morphine would do the trick.

This incredible bucket list provides Guy with a huge dilemma, never mind what to do with Fran throwing herself at him and having to put up with the hypocritical Bert, and Stew, now the town drunk, begging for forgiveness, and Larry’s father Sam (Carl Benton Reid), who, for reasons unspecified, hates the doctor.

There’s more twists to come, just in case you thought you had everything worked out. But you can see the problem over-complication creates. The euthanasia-please-have-sex-with-my-beautiful wife combination would have set the movie up nicely from the get-go. Guy wouldn’t need to have a deep secret to find himself in very deep waters. How he would react to either or both outcomes, how Margaret would equally react to the possibility of ending her husband’s suffering in a quick and painless manner, would be more than enough to provide the dynamic the picture required. The movie then pivots on Guy being charged with murder.

It’s certainly interesting enough but Guy is too buttoned-down to incur sympathy and his revelation, devastating though it is, doesn’t suddenly make him an instantly more attractive screen character. In fact, it’s Fran who elicits the greater sympathy, the woman bedding someone who views her only as a sex object, yet willing to become a sex object for someone she does love if that’s all she can have. Eventually, the two key issues are put in the spotlight, which certainly puts a spark in the picture. But the poster promises a passion that just doesn’t exist.

Richard Burton (The Spy Who Came in from the Cold, 1965) plays this character in a lower register than his screen persona, the sonorous voice toned down, and although the look of someone who doesn’t want to be back rings true the performance lacks variety and there are only occasional glimpses of the fiery actor. Barbara Rush (Robin and the 7 Hoods, 1964) has her own legitimate reasons for being dispassionate and the vibrant character her husband married never really gets an airing. Angie Dickinson (Jessica, 1962) comes across as a more human character with, in emotional terms, a greater flaw, and a more tragic figure, even though there is nothing life-or-death about her circumstances. Two veterans are showcased: Jack Carson (Mildred Pierce, 1945) and James Dunn (Bad Girl, 1931).

Television director Daniel Petrie (A Raisin in the Sun, 1961) was making his movie debut. The screenwriting team of Milton Sperling and Philip Yordan (Battle of the Bulge, 1965) drew on the bestselling novel by Charles Mergendahl.

Hard to find DVD so Ebay is the best source.