ARABESQUE (1966)

An Egyptologist named Ragheeb is getting his eyes examined by a substitute doctor named Sloan. Ragheeb is nervous, understandably, as it turns out that Sloan is no eye doctor—he kills Ragheeb, takes off the man's glasses, and finds a bit of microfilm hidden in the frame with a message in hieroglyphics. Sloan then approaches Prof. David Pollock (Gregory Peck), a hieroglyphics expert, asks him to meet with his boss, Arab shipping magnate Beshraavi. David declines, but is later shanghaied into a car by Arabian prime minister Hassan who asks him to go through with the meeting to find out what dastardly plan Beshraavi is up to. Beshraavi, living in a mansion owned by his mistress Yasmin (Sophia Loren), wants David to translate the hieroglyphic message. But Yasmin meets with David in secret and tells him she is sure the message is a deadly one, so David takes the message and 'abducts' Yasmin (who is appears to be being held a prisoner in her own home), beginning a wild chase involving assassination and betrayal and ambiguous identity. Many critics deride this film, a mid-career effort from Stanley Donen, as convoluted (I agree) and poorly acted (I disagree). It actually added to my enjoyment of the film to hear in the TCM introduction that the movie was written with Cary Grant in mind, and that Gregory Peck had doubts that he could pull off the mix of charming humor and deadly action. There are times when you can tell that a particular line would have been perfect for Grant ("If I could find my head, I'd go get it examined!") but Peck generally pulls it off well. The lovely Loren is also quite good as the woman who may or may not be a femme fatale. The supporting actors tend to get overshadowed by the heat of the leads; for the record, Alan Badel and John Merivale are fine as the chief villains. The movie is stylishly shot, like a lesser Hitchcock effort (though frankly, I'd rather sit through this again than the slogfest of the master's North By Northwest). My favorite exchange: Peck, to a cab driver: "Follow that car!"; the driver: "All my life I've been waiting for someone to say that." [TCM]