While browsing through the dvds the other night looking for something to watch we hit on a stalemate not being able to choose something that we both wanted to watch. Then we discovered the dvd for ‘Deadly Strangers’ which I had to admit to not being able to remember a damn thing about it. I knew I hadn’t seen it but couldn’t remember what it was about, who was in it or even what precise genre it was. But given that I must have it for a reason we decided to give it a go and hope for the best. Now, I’m not too sure what benefits this can have when watching a film. Obviously we would have no preconceptions about the flick, no expectations etc so it would be difficult to be disappointed, but also, conversely, if it was good would we over-rate it because it came out of the blue.
Anyway, it was a psychological thriller. Hayley Mills misses her train and is forced to hitch a lift. After a narrow escape from a scumbag trucker she is picked up by Simon Ward. It soon becomes clear that one of them is the escaped psychopath that the police are out in force trying to track down and the rest of the film charts their relationship while we try and work out which of them is the nutter.
Full of red herrings, this cross breed of road movies and psycho thriller is nicely crafted and never once gives an apt opportunity to get the kettle on. Mills is adequate in the role (and evidently still doing her best to shed her Pollyanna image by shedding her clothes) but Ward steals the show and is admirably ambiguous. Special mention must go to Sterling Hayden, whose eccentric character is worthy of a film series of his own and completely overshadows the superfluous-ness of his presence. We did guess the identity of the loony but have to admit at getting sidestepped a couple of times, so respect for that.
Of course, as with many of these type of thrillers, a lot of the fun is accidental. The British locations, the old cars and the basic 70s ‘feel’ to the movie add a great deal to the overall ambience of the flick.
While not an undiscovered masterpiece this was a pleasant surprise and a genuinely enjoyable film thatI would heartily recommend it to anyone.
Monday, 30 November 2009
Friday, 27 November 2009
Killer's Moon
Killer’s Moon on the face of it had everything going for it. A busload of schoolgirls break down in the middle of nowhere and are forced to hole up in an old hotel. Meanwhile 4 lunatics have escaped from a nearby hospital. They have been used as guinea pigs in a new therapy and believe they are actually dreaming what is happening, so they don’t care about killing/raping/maiming anybody (although given their pedigrees as lunatics, they wouldn’t care anyway!) and they happen to come across the hotel. A couple of lads who are camping nearby have a go at playing the hero and try and rescue the girls. It was made in the 70s (quite a plus in my book), had dialogue written by the acclaimed author Fay Weldon and had a fair amount of sleaze involved. Sounds like an out and out winner, right? Well no. Not quite. In fact it misfires on most counts which is a real shame. Not that the flick isn’t watchable, it most certainly is, but you get the overall feeling of a missed opportunity.
I do like the general plot point of the lunatics believing themselves to be in a dream and the murders etc just figments of their imagination. But making them lunatics wasn’t the right path to go down. Or multiple antagonists either. It should have been 1 ‘normal’ chap who is the guinea pig, somebody who wouldn’t normally kill, but because it’s only a dream………..
Anyhow, I didn’t make it, Alan Birkenshaw did, and all the faults are his. The highly erratic continuity when it comes to day time and night time stops being amusing after the nth time as it becomes clear that consistency just isn’t cared about. Also, at the lads’ campsite it suddenly switches to woefully obvious studio set with a backdrop of a large lake, which is fine as the location is the Lake District but alas earlier shots prove that there was no lake there at all. This film just keeps falling into Ed Wood territory, and given the fact that it can be quite nasty , it doesn’t have a hope of having the charm of a Wood flick.
This all sounds a bit negative. There are some positives: its heart is in the right place, it really isn’t far away from being a minor cult classic; some of the mood shots also hint at what could have been; there’s a three-legged dog and again, the story isn’t half bad. Oh, and it’s nice to see the British Board Of Certification shot at the beginning branding the film an ‘X’.
I do like the general plot point of the lunatics believing themselves to be in a dream and the murders etc just figments of their imagination. But making them lunatics wasn’t the right path to go down. Or multiple antagonists either. It should have been 1 ‘normal’ chap who is the guinea pig, somebody who wouldn’t normally kill, but because it’s only a dream………..
Anyhow, I didn’t make it, Alan Birkenshaw did, and all the faults are his. The highly erratic continuity when it comes to day time and night time stops being amusing after the nth time as it becomes clear that consistency just isn’t cared about. Also, at the lads’ campsite it suddenly switches to woefully obvious studio set with a backdrop of a large lake, which is fine as the location is the Lake District but alas earlier shots prove that there was no lake there at all. This film just keeps falling into Ed Wood territory, and given the fact that it can be quite nasty , it doesn’t have a hope of having the charm of a Wood flick.
This all sounds a bit negative. There are some positives: its heart is in the right place, it really isn’t far away from being a minor cult classic; some of the mood shots also hint at what could have been; there’s a three-legged dog and again, the story isn’t half bad. Oh, and it’s nice to see the British Board Of Certification shot at the beginning branding the film an ‘X’.
Thursday, 26 November 2009
The Strange Affair
The Strange Affair is an aptly named film from 1968, although the double meaning irony hits home when you find the main protagonist’s name is Strange.
When we first meet Strange it becomes clear he is a disgraced policeman, and the film quickly falls into flashback, to his first day on the force and catalogues how this idealistic young copper ended up going down for a stretch.
But there’s more stories that weave themselves around the hapless Strange. One of his colleagues is embittered Detective Sergeant Pierce, hell-bent on bringing down the Quince family, a family no-good drug-dealers and all-round bad eggs, headed up by ex policeman Jack Watson.
On his off-duty Strange gets involved with the free-spirited and young Fred (Susan George) who introduces him to her uninhibited life and bizarre Aunt and Uncle. It transpires that the Aunt and Uncle like to film their niece in the throes of passion and then sell the film on the black market. Fred is seemingly unaware of this side to her family. This has a disastrous effect when DS Pierce finds photos of Strange and Fred in flagrante and uses this to bully and blackmail Strange into planting drugs on Quince in a desperate attempt to get him locked up.
Written down it seems like a straightforward tale but the director manages to film it as a series of bizarre events that crash into a man’s life leaving him bewildered as to what is actually happening to him. Of course, reflecting on it, it is basically the bad choices and decisions that Strange made that lead to his downfall, not helped by the on-the-edge-of-sanity DS Pierce’s bullying ways.
The copy I watched wasn’t the most wonderful copy (this is a film that has basically disappeared and to my knowledge has never been released on Video and definitely not on DVD) but it still looked good enough to capture the gritty streets of 1960’s London in realistic detail – no sunny, swinging sixties kitsch was involved in the making of this film. The best way I can describe this drama is ‘off-kilter’ , in a good way and with a dose of 60’s realism that you don’t see all that often.
When we first meet Strange it becomes clear he is a disgraced policeman, and the film quickly falls into flashback, to his first day on the force and catalogues how this idealistic young copper ended up going down for a stretch.
But there’s more stories that weave themselves around the hapless Strange. One of his colleagues is embittered Detective Sergeant Pierce, hell-bent on bringing down the Quince family, a family no-good drug-dealers and all-round bad eggs, headed up by ex policeman Jack Watson.
On his off-duty Strange gets involved with the free-spirited and young Fred (Susan George) who introduces him to her uninhibited life and bizarre Aunt and Uncle. It transpires that the Aunt and Uncle like to film their niece in the throes of passion and then sell the film on the black market. Fred is seemingly unaware of this side to her family. This has a disastrous effect when DS Pierce finds photos of Strange and Fred in flagrante and uses this to bully and blackmail Strange into planting drugs on Quince in a desperate attempt to get him locked up.
Written down it seems like a straightforward tale but the director manages to film it as a series of bizarre events that crash into a man’s life leaving him bewildered as to what is actually happening to him. Of course, reflecting on it, it is basically the bad choices and decisions that Strange made that lead to his downfall, not helped by the on-the-edge-of-sanity DS Pierce’s bullying ways.
The copy I watched wasn’t the most wonderful copy (this is a film that has basically disappeared and to my knowledge has never been released on Video and definitely not on DVD) but it still looked good enough to capture the gritty streets of 1960’s London in realistic detail – no sunny, swinging sixties kitsch was involved in the making of this film. The best way I can describe this drama is ‘off-kilter’ , in a good way and with a dose of 60’s realism that you don’t see all that often.
Thursday, 12 November 2009
Night Child (1972)
Night Child (or Night Hair Child or What The Peeper Saw or Diabolicas Malicia or Child of The Night)is a 1972 British thriller starring Mark Lester (he of Oliver) and Britt Ekland (she of The Wicker Man [apart from her arse, which wasn’t in that]. Elise (Ekland) is married to widower Hardy Kruger, who has a 12 year son, Marcus. Marcus seems to be very sexually interested in Elise and Elsie slowly starts to think that Marcus is suffering mentally because of his mother’s death. But then, what of his mother’s death? Was it an accident? Is her own life in danger? A power struggle begins between step-mother and step-son, but how far will they take it?
Pretty far as it happens. I would suggest that out of all the films Mark Lester made this was probably his favourite to make. He was about 14 when he made it but gets to snog Britt Ekland, watch her slowly strip bare and even share a naked passionate embrace when she climbs (naked again) into his bed (this part I should mention is part of a drug fuelled hallucinatory dream. Even this film has some boundaries). How can a 14 year old not like that.
Unfortunately a good premise quickly gives way to dodgy film-making and on reflection I think the main reason for this is the miscasting of both Lester and Ekland who constantly prove themselves to be not able to provide their roles with the necessary depth and realism. Ekland is particularly at sea and even occasionally seems to miss her cues, which either of the two directors (two directors – rarely a good thing) seem to care about either.
The music, while enjoyable as a separate entity, more often than not seems at odds with the underlying menace. Of course it could have meant to be ironic but who knows.
I will say that I liked the twist at the end and that it caught me off-guard for a moment (I really should have seen it coming) and at least made the journey to the end worthwhile. As so often with these type of films, worth a watch once but not a lot there to tempt you back for a second viewing.
Pretty far as it happens. I would suggest that out of all the films Mark Lester made this was probably his favourite to make. He was about 14 when he made it but gets to snog Britt Ekland, watch her slowly strip bare and even share a naked passionate embrace when she climbs (naked again) into his bed (this part I should mention is part of a drug fuelled hallucinatory dream. Even this film has some boundaries). How can a 14 year old not like that.
Unfortunately a good premise quickly gives way to dodgy film-making and on reflection I think the main reason for this is the miscasting of both Lester and Ekland who constantly prove themselves to be not able to provide their roles with the necessary depth and realism. Ekland is particularly at sea and even occasionally seems to miss her cues, which either of the two directors (two directors – rarely a good thing) seem to care about either.
The music, while enjoyable as a separate entity, more often than not seems at odds with the underlying menace. Of course it could have meant to be ironic but who knows.
I will say that I liked the twist at the end and that it caught me off-guard for a moment (I really should have seen it coming) and at least made the journey to the end worthwhile. As so often with these type of films, worth a watch once but not a lot there to tempt you back for a second viewing.
Wednesday, 11 November 2009
Satan's Slave (1976)
I was really looking forward to Satan’s Slave. I had read it was about the best of the Norman J Warren horrors, it was written by Pete Walker’s collaborator, David McGillivray, starred that bundle of cute that is 7os moppet Candace Glendenning and , like, you know, it’s called Satan’s Slave!
However, I was destined to be disappointed. The whole film is unfortunately a disjointed mess. Practically any 5 or ten minutes could be cut from the film altering it not one jot. Michael Gough simply walks through his role and I would be surprised if he was more than 1 day on set. The look of the film varies wildly, no doubt down to the fact that there are four cinematographers credited. The script asks you to take for too much for granted and in the end the sheer amount of stupid implausibilities ruin it. For example, 2 minutes after her parent’s were killed, Michael Gough tells Candace that she go and get some sleep to which she calmly acquiesces. No trauma at all about the sudden and very violent death of her beloved parents then? No. Right. This is what we are looking at here. Forget plausible, whatever is needed to move the film on is what goes, regardless of how stupid it may be. Once or twice can be forgiven in this type of film, but come on.
But, it took no effort to stick with it and I didn’t switch it off before the end, and Candace was looking rather nice and the locations were very nice. I didn’t exactly waste my 90 minutes, I just didn’t want my expectations dashed that badly.
However, I was destined to be disappointed. The whole film is unfortunately a disjointed mess. Practically any 5 or ten minutes could be cut from the film altering it not one jot. Michael Gough simply walks through his role and I would be surprised if he was more than 1 day on set. The look of the film varies wildly, no doubt down to the fact that there are four cinematographers credited. The script asks you to take for too much for granted and in the end the sheer amount of stupid implausibilities ruin it. For example, 2 minutes after her parent’s were killed, Michael Gough tells Candace that she go and get some sleep to which she calmly acquiesces. No trauma at all about the sudden and very violent death of her beloved parents then? No. Right. This is what we are looking at here. Forget plausible, whatever is needed to move the film on is what goes, regardless of how stupid it may be. Once or twice can be forgiven in this type of film, but come on.
But, it took no effort to stick with it and I didn’t switch it off before the end, and Candace was looking rather nice and the locations were very nice. I didn’t exactly waste my 90 minutes, I just didn’t want my expectations dashed that badly.
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