MINGLE ALL THE WAY (2018)

Molly (Jen Lilley) is looking for investors for her tech start-up, an app called Mingle All the Way. It's not a dating app, but an app for making platonic, companion matches when a plus-one is needed for social or business purposes. Her somewhat brittle mother (Lindsay Wagner) makes it clear that she thinks Molly will not be a success and should come back to the family accounting business (though her father is much more sympathetic). Molly's assistant Tyler suggests that a good PR move would be for Molly herself to use the app and report on her success via a blog to impress their potential investor. Meanwhile, Jeff (Brant Daugherty), an up-and-coming ad man, is hoping for a promotion, but not having a girlfriend is taking a toll on his opportunities to socialize at holiday parties with his boss, and when he hears about the Mingle app, he thinks he might try it. Molly and Jeff meet "not-cute" when they spar over an angel ornament at a decoration store. They have a second awkward meeting when she literally bumps into him on the street, causing him to spill his box of homemade Christmas stockings. But guess who gets matched up on the Mingle app? They decide to make the best of it (with Molly hiding the fact that she is the app's creator), and in the run-up to Christmas, they start to fall for each other. She gives him back the self-confidence that he lost when he broke up with a long-time girlfriend, and he gives her back her love of Christmas, which she lost when her mom decided years ago to spend the holidays skiing in Aspen rather than having old-fashioned family get-togethers. But just when Jeff is ready to tell Molly that he's fallen in love with her, his old girlfriend shows up. And just when that situation is cleared up, Jeff finds out that Molly is the Mingle creator, and he thinks he's been being used this whole time just to sell the app. As per the Hallmark Christmas template, in the last eight minutes of the movie, the two manage to clear things up (on Christmas Day, no less) and share a kiss.

I watched this movie, another one in the Hallmark Christmas in July lineup, for one reason: Brant Daugherty (at left). I discovered him in A Christmas Movie Christmas, an UpTV movie which I caught on Amazon earlier this year and will be reviewing soon. He falls squarely into the blandly handsome leading man mold of TV romance films, but he shows fun flashes of whimsy that are not usually called for in these films, so he stands out in the crowd. He's a bit more tamped down here (UpTV being, apparently, more whimsical than Hallmark), but he's still fun to watch. Lilley is fine as the damsel who needs a man to save her from herself. I hate to put it that bluntly, but let’s face it, that’s pretty much par for the course at Hallmark—though, to be fair, she helps him solve his problems as well. Wagner is perfect as the Grinchy mom (I had quite a crush on her in her Bionic Woman days) who gets her own redemptive moment thanks to Jeff. There's a subplot romance between Molly's friend (Sandy Sidhu) and Molly's assistant (Casey Manderson), but not much time is devoted to that (I could have sworn that the assistant was going to out himself as gay, but it may take a few more seasons for Hallmark to get to that point). There's also a sister and niece for Jeff, to show us what a great family guy Jeff can be, and an actor with the unlikely name Preston Vanderslice gets a couple of good scenes as Jeff's slimy colleague who is out to make Jeff look bad in their boss's eyes. The angel ornament that our couple argue over makes a fitting return near the end. Pretty much standard stuff, with Daugherty supplying just enough of a spark to make this worth catching.

A final note: I predicted the other day that Hallmark might take a bit of a breather this year with film productions stalled by the Covid-19 pandemic, but yesterday I saw a press release from Hallmark announcing a slate of roughly 40 new Christmas movies coming up this fall. I'm guessing that the Canadian film business has recovered more quickly than Hollywood's—that's what happens when your country has a competent leader. A quick scan of the titles and casts doesn't promise that these films will be very different from the past, with perhaps a slight increase in Black cast members, but nothing special in the way of characters (gay or disabled people) or stories (maybe a high-powered businesswoman who doesn't have to leave her job at the end to find happiness).  But I can always hope for a Christmas miracle. [Hallmark]

HYSTERIA (1965)

American Chris Smith (Robert Webber, right) was in a car accident in London several months ago. He has recovered physically from a fractured skull but has total amnesia—Chris Smith is a name given to him by Dr. Keller (Anthony Newlands), who is about to release him. His medical care has been paid for by an anonymous source, and this same source is providing him with a penthouse apartment. (Plot loophole #1: why hasn't Chris or the doctor put a little muscle into finding who this source is, since one assumes that person could help Chris remember who he is?). The only thing found with Chris in the accident, in which the driver was killed, was a photograph of a model torn out of a magazine. (Plot loophole #2: who was the driver? One assumes that digging into the driver's life might help Chris remember who he is.) Chris gets a private eye named Hemmings on the cas and Gina, his nurse at the hospital who has fallen for him, tries to lend a hand. Soon he begins hearing voices arguing in the apartment next to his, but when he investigates finds only an empty unfinished apartment. He discovers that the woman in the photo is a model who was found brutally murdered, but one day she shows up at his place—her name is Denise (Lelia Goldoni); she's been his mysterious benefactor because her late husband is the man who was responsible for Chris's injury.  After having hallucinations of a dead body in the shower, he has a breakthrough and his memory of the crash comes back to him—and it's here that my plot summary should end to avoid spoilers. 

This a nifty little psychological thriller. It's easy to figure out that Chris is being gaslighted (or "diaboliqued," as in the classic 50s French thriller DIABOLIQUE), but by whom and why? Anyone—the doctor, Gina, Denise, the private eye—might be an enemy, or a friend, and this is the quandary that kept me more or less engrossed here. Robert Webber is more known as a character actor (THE DIRTY DOZEN, Blake Edwards' 10), but he does a nice job as the lead here. Interestingly, during the flashback, we learn that Chris was a wanderer and a bit of a jerk, which adds unexpected shades to his character. The lovely Goldoni is a nice combination of aloof and mysterious which keeps us on our toes as far as her motivations. Maurice Denham, as Hemmings, is a little shambling like Columbo, and though he disappears from the film for a while, he plays a surprising role in the climax. This Hammer B-film played in the States strictly as a second feature, and isn't well known, but it makes for a fun viewing for fans of tricky thrillers. [DVD]

JINGLE AROUND THE CLOCK (2018)

The Hallmark Channel is currently running their Christmas in July programming when they dip into their huge catalog of past holiday movies. But the global Covid-19 pandemic is wreaking havoc with virtually every part of our lives, and as movie and TV production has been mostly shut down for the past four months with little sign of significant re-opening before fall, I wonder if there will be any new Christmas movies on Hallmark this year—I suspect that summer is their prime time for production. With the sheer number of past movies (they've produced 30-40 new films every year for the past several years), this may not be a problem. In fact, it might be a blessing, as the Hallmark Christmas movie formula has become stale through overuse and could use a breather. I picked this movie at random to sample their July offerings and it's a nearly perfect example of their Christmas romance genre. 

Elle works in Chicago for an advertising agency. A tight group of college friends serves as her family and she is looking forward to their annual Christmas get-together. At work, she is trying to impress her boss with a last-minute job putting together a social media campaign for a cookware line—she has her eye on a big promotion as a creative director and thinks this could put her over. Meanwhile, as she takes on the planning for her Christmas party, she has an awkward meet-cute moment with a handsome Coffee Shop Guy when she spills coffee on herself. It turns out that Coffee Shop Guy is Max, an ad man who usually works at her company's New York office but is in Chicago to help his sweet widowed mom with her Christmas ornament business (what a nice guy, right?). And they wind up partnered up to work on the cookware campaign. Sparks fly, but the course of true love never did run smooth; Max mistakes a cold-weather cuddle with her friend Jay to mean that they are in love. No sooner does that get settled than it turns out that both she and Max are applying for the same promotion and when she overhears him during his interview seeming to present ideas of hers as belonging to him, she's furious. Will Elle's social media ads be successful? Will she be able to make time for her Christmas party? Will she get the promotion? And, most importantly, will she and Max make up in time for a lovely kiss in the snow?

Of course, the answer is "yes" to all of above—no surprise there. But what I liked about this movie was that, between them, the supporting cast almost steals the show. Brooke Nevin (Elle) and Michael Cassidy (Max, both pictured at right) are nice-looking, pleasant people playing nice-looking, pleasant characters and they're fine. But there's a parallel romance which develops between Elle's buddy Jay (Jeremy Guilbaut) and Max's sister Oakley (Andrea Brooks) which is cute. Elle's best friend is played nicely by Lara Gilchrist, and her circle of friends includes some rainbow casting: the Asian-American actor Nelson Wong plays Ryan, and African-American actor Latonya Williams is new mother Kate who flies in from out of town with baby and husband in tow. Elle's boss, played by Catherine Lough Haggquist, defies the Hallmark boss stereotype and is actually a nice person, high-powered in a fairly low-powered way. P. Lynn Johnson is sweet but not overly so as Max's sweet mom. These characters aren't really fleshed out very much, but the point is that I could imagine all of them having lives outside the movie, which may be a credit to both the writers and the actors (Brooke Nevin gets co-writing credit for the original story). There are weaknesses, the worst of which involves the snafu between Elle and Max at the end which could have been solved in seconds except there was still ten minutes left in the movie and these romantic problems are always taken right down to the wire. All the cast members (except Cassidy) are veterans of Hallmark romances, but Andrea Brooks, in particular, was charming and deserves a Christmas movie all to herself. Will Hallmark get any new holiday movies out this year? Maybe not, and maybe that's OK. They can give the cookie-cutter productions a rest and maybe a recharge while fans double-dip from the catalog. In the picture at top left are Nevin, Cassidy, Brooks and Guilbaut. [Hallmark]

ATTACK! (1956)

During WWII, the infantry company known as Fragile Fox is pinned down near a small French town. When Jack Palance radios for back-up, his captain (Eddie Albert), cowardly and a bit befuddled by alcohol, doesn't send help, leading to the deaths of several men. Palance,who survives, holds it against Albert and wants something to be done about him; at the very least, he (and most of the other men) wants Albert booted upstairs into a bureaucrat job. However, Albert has the protection of the battalion commander (Lee Marvin)—Albert and Marvin grew up together, and there's the promise of a cushy job back home with Albert's father when the war's over, so Marvin is reluctant to do anything drastic. As a sop to Palance, Marvin tells him that the word is that the war is practically over and their company is essentially done with combat. Unfortunately, the Battle of the Bulge is right around the corner and history soon repeats itself, with Palance and his men in trouble, and Albert paralyzed by booze and doubt. Many men die, but a badly wounded Palance makes the trek back in order to exact revenge.

This is an atypical studio war film for the era, closer in tone to one of Samuel Fuller's idiosyncratic movies (THE STEEL HELMET), and directed by Robert Aldrich, who was known for his own unusual takes on genre films (WHATEVER HAPPENED TO BABY JANE, KISS ME DEADLY). Basically a psychological character study, it was based on a play and shows at times, but there are a couple of battle sequences that open the film up. The performances are excellent throughout. Albert, mostly known as a comic actor and best remembered today as the bumbling rural husband on the Green Acres sit-com, does extremely well as the drunken villain. Palance, not one of my favorite actors, is good, though in true Palance form he tends to go melodramatically over-the-top. [SPOILER: his death scene at the end is particularly drawn-out.] Marvin is fine as are supporting players Robert Strauss, Richard Jaeckel and, in a central though down-played role, William Smithers. Buddy Ebsen (Jed in The Beverly Hillbillies) appears as a soldier, and it was a little weird to see he and Albert, both of whom would become stars in rural sitcoms of the 60s, together in serious roles here. The staginess of some of the scenes is enlivened by some interesting camera shots and setups. Highly recommended. Pictured are Albert and Palance. [TCM]

DIE! DIE! MY DARLING! (1965)

Pat (Stephanie Powers) has arrived in England to marry her boyfriend Alan, but first she has the somewhat unpleasant duty of paying a visit to the aging Mrs. Trefoile (Tallulah Bankhead). Back in the States, Pat was engaged to Mrs. Trefoile's son but he was killed in a car accident and she feels she owes the woman a courtesy visit. When she arrives at the woman's rural home, she plans on staying just long enough for a chat, but Trefoile asks her to stay the night and attend church the next day. Pat slowly comes to realize that Trefoile is a religious fanatic who doesn't allow mirrors in the house (vanity), won't permit anyone to wear the color red ("The devil’s color!" she snarls when Pat appears in a red outfit), refuses to eat "carnal" foods—in other words, she's a vegetarian—and quotes scripture frequently. Trefoile even quizzes Pat about whether or not she's still a virgin (she's not but she says she is). Thinking that the woman is nuts but harmless, Pat agrees to stay overnight, but when Trefoile finds out that Pat is planning on marrying another man, she hold her prisoner, preparing to cleanse Pat's soul so Pat will be worthy of being her son's bride in eternity.

This Hammer movie is part of a popular cycle of films in the 60s that involved older actresses becoming "scream queens" in Gothic horror films (WHATEVER HAPPENED TO BABY JANE, STRAIT JACKET). Bankhead, for as famous as she was back in the day, was mostly a stage star and made few movies—her last one had been in the mid-40s—so it's nice to have this available, even if her role is a departure from the more racy, sophisticated parts for which she was known. She does a fine job in a role that might have served as a model for Piper Laurie when she played a similar prudish fanatic as the mother in CARRIE. Her performance is strong but for the most part, she resists the temptation to overdo it. For me, her best moment is when Mrs. Trefoile, who was a sinful actress in her youth, is tempted briefly to apply lipstick, something she has judged Pat harshly for doing. Ultimately, despite the Biblical trappings, the character is less a religious fanatic (FANATIC is the movie's title in England) and more like Psycho's Mother Bates. Powers is OK, though modern audiences may tire of the way she keeps kowtowing to Trifoile in the first half of the film. There are other characters at the house who help Mrs. Trefolie keep Pat from escaping, and you’ll recognize a young Donald Sutherland as the drooling, metally handicapped farm worker. The musical score, oddly jaunty at times, isn't great, and the look of the movie is dirty and gloomy—as befits the atmosphere. But this is at heart a two-person narrative in the same way that BABY JANE is, and worth seeing for Bankhead. Pictured above is Bankhead with a portrait of her son. [Amazon Prime]

DAREDEVILS OF THE RED CIRCLE (1939 serial)

Convict 39013 (Charles Middleton) has escaped from prison and has begun a criminal reign of terror against Granville Industries because he blames the owner (Miles Mander) for his imprisonment. One evening at an amusement park that Granville owns, the three Daredevils of the Red Circle are performing their act: Gene (Charles Quigley) is an acrobat and diver, Tiny (Herman Brix) is a muscleman, and Bert (David Sharpe) is an escape artist. But their act is sabotaged by 39013's goons and a huge fire breaks out. The three Daredevils manage to save themselves, but Gene's kid brother dies in the hospital the next day due to injuries from the fire, and the three (accompanied by the kid's smart dog Tuffie) go to Granville and his daughter Blanche (Carole Landis) and offer their services in stopping 39013. What they don't know is that kindly, elderly Granville is actually 39013 in disguise, and he and his henchmen are keeping the real Granville locked up in a basement room. 39013 wants Granville alive to see the collapse of his companies, but has a device at the ready that will release poison gas in the room if 39013 ever fails to make his daily visit. Among the villain's plots: to blow up a gas plant, to wreck a chemical plant, to use a death ray, to flood a highway tunnel, etc. The Daredevils (and Tuffie) manage to foil most of the plans, getting help from an unknown person who knows 39013's plans and leaks them to the men via handwritten notes with a red circle on them—the identity of this person is played up with much mystery, though you'll figure it out long before the final chapter. But can they stop 39013's final coup—the poisoning of Granville?

I have detailed my problematic relationship with movie serials before, and this one doesn't completely escape the problem of repetition inherent in the genre (short 15-minute chapters with little room for character development and predictable cliffhangers at the end of each—in this one, the heroes usually wind up locked in a room). But this is easily the best serial I've ever seen. First of all, the Kino Lorber DVD contains a beautiful print, which always helps—the serials released on VHS back in the early days of home video were almost always spliced up and murky. The three leads are youngish, handsome and energetic, especially David Sharpe who made a living for four decades as a stunt man—he's the guy in the suit who's dragged through the dirt in Blazing Saddles. The Daredevils, though not exactly fleshed-out characters, are individualized enough so each one stands on his own. The fisticuffs scenes, one or two per episode, are very well staged, even if the cliffhanger escapes are just average. Because the death of the kid in the first chapter goes against expectations, we're kept on guard a bit for other possible surprises. The low-budget effects are pulled off well, though none can compare with the flooding tunnel at the end of the first chapter.

Charles Middleton (39013) is better known as Ming the Merciless in the 1930's Flash Gordon serials so you might expect him to be at his evil best here, but actually it's the normally unflashy Miles Mander who takes the acting honors, as he has to play essentially three roles: the frail Granville who 39013 is disguised as, the less frail real Granville who is kept imprisoned, and the conniving 39013 when he still in disguise as Granville—and he is sometimes seen onscreen in both parts at once, though each episode has a shot of Mander ducking down to take off his disguise and Middleton appearing so we don't forget who's who. Landis, as is par for the course for these serials, has little to do besides worry, though she does shine briefly in the final chapter. Though I found Sharpe the best-looking of the Daredevils, all three are appealing as characters and as dashing fellows. Brix, who played Tarzan in a 1935 serial, later changed his name to Bruce Bennett. This is possibly the only serial I've seen that I might make a point of watching a second time, and that's pretty high praise. In the photo at top left are, in order Sharpe, Brix and Quigley. [DVD]

IT'S A BIKINI WORLD (1967)

On a sunny day at Malibu Beach, we meet Mike Samson, the local chick magnet who loves playing the field; when we first see him, he's lolling on the beach with three bikinied women clinging to him. His hulking buddy Woody has a girlfriend named Pebbles, and she brings a visiting friend, Delilah Dawes, to the beach. Mike hits rather aggressively on Delilah but she spurns him, which he's not used to, and he takes this as a challenge. When Mike overhears Delilah tell Pebbles that she prefers intelligent guys, he decides to pose as Herbert, Mike's glasses-wearing book-reading nerd brother, and winds up hitting it off with Delilah. Meanwhile, Daddy, the beatnik-ish manager of a beach night club called The Dungeon, makes an alliance with magazine publisher Harvey Pulp who wants to start a magazine called Teen Scream: Pulp will sponsor a series of contests using customized products of Daddy's. The first contest is a skateboard race which Delilah decides to enter in order to teach Mike a lesson. Mike-as-Herbert helps her learn the ropes, but on race day, she comes in second to Mike. This just fires her up to enter more contests. Meanwhile, she and Herbert grow closer, even though Woody manages to show up at the wrong time and messes up an evening which Mike hoped would be a makeout session. Just before the climactic event, a cross-country race involving skateboards, cars, swimming and even camels, Delilah discovers that Herbert is actually Mike and she's even more determined to whup Mike's ass.

This is a fairly listless late entry in the mid-60s beach movie genre, filmed in late 1965 but not given a wide release until spring of '67. Most of the beach movies were relatively low budget B-films, and this is among the lowest, even though there are a few nice stylistic touches. Delilah's first walk on the beach is seen reflected in the sunglasses of a number of beach bunnies, and there is a very funny (and surreal) gag during the skateboard chase involving a giant pane of glass that Mike and Delilah manage to skateboard through as no there was no glass there, but which someone else runs through and shatters. It's in widescreen and shot on real locations, but the colorful gloss of the American International beach flicks (with Frankie and Annette) is sorely missed here. I like Tommy Kirk, a Disney kid actor and star of a handful of other beach movies, but he's more goofy-cute than handsome, and certainly not the studly hunk that his character is supposed to be; in fact, he's much more believable as Herbert. As Kirk is a second-string Frankie, Deborah Walley (as Delilah) is a second-string Annette and has little chemistry with Kirk. Bob Pickett is amateurish as Woody, but his main fame is as Bobby "Boris" Pickett, writer and singer of the huge 1962 novelty hit "Monster Mash" which still gets airplay around Halloween. Famous cult actor Sid Haig (Captain Spaulding in the Rob Zombie movies) is amusing as Daddy, though some comic relief stuff involving Pulp's sidekick McSnigg falls flat.

The 90-minute movie is fairly well-paced until the end when the cross-country race, presented in nine phases, goes on for an excruciatingly long time. But fans of 60s' one-hit-wonders may enjoy the musical performances by the teenage group The Gentrys (their top 5 hit was "Keep On Dancing" though that's not the song they do here) and The Castaways (who perform their big hit "Liar Liar"). Eric Burden and the Animals—who had several hits—sing "We Gotta Get Out of This Place" though Burden seems fairly uninterested in trying to convincingly lip-sync. At one point, the kids see a double feature of Attack of the Crab Monsters (a real movie which we see a clip from) and Gorgonzilla (uh, not a real movie but cute joke). In his bachelor pad, Herbert puts up a pop-art poster that is a blow-up of a frame from the famous comic strip Terry and the Pirates, of interest to me as I am currently watching the Terry and the Pirates 1940 movie serial on TCM. This is not something I'd recommend to everyone, but until the last 15 minutes, it's fairly painless. My main complaint: not enough genuine beefcake on the beach. Pictured are the two faces of Tommy Kirk. [TCM]

A GAME OF DEATH (1945)

Don Rainsford (John Loder, at left), a famous hunter and author, is on a small ship that is nearing Vancarra Island, also known as Man Trap Island. At one time used as a pirate hideaway, and famous for its dangerous coral reefs, it would seem to be deserted now. The island's reputation has the crew a little jumpy, and when a misplaced line of buoys leads the pilot astray, the ship founders and sharks kill off everyone except Rainsford. He gets to the island and soon makes his way to the large pirate fortress, now occupied by the mysterious but quite civilized Erich Kreiger (Edgar Barrier), a big game hunter who is familiar with Rainsford's books and is excited to have him as a guest, joining two other people, Ellen (Audrey Long) and her brother Bob, also recent shipwreck survivors. After having become bored with hunting, Kreiger turned the island into a hunting reserve stocked with what he calls "the most dangerous game in the world." He doesn't say that that might be, and he keeps his trophy room locked up, but he and Rainsford share philosophical ideas about hunting and a pleasant time is had by all. That night, Ellen warns Rainsford that Kreiger seems a bit unbalanced—a scar on his forehead from a hunting accident frequently throbs and causes Krieger visible discomfort—and also tells him that other shipwrecked "guests" have since vanished. Bob breaks into the trophy room and discovers that it's lined with human heads. Yes, the dangerous game that Kreiger is hunting is humans, and the three "guests" realize that the misplacement of the channel lights is deliberate; the shipwreck survivors are being released and hunted down by Kreiger, and certainly, these three are next.

This is based on the famous short story "The Most Dangerous Game" by Richard Connell, and it's also a very faithful remake of the 1932 film of that title. The title change gives a different meaning to "game"; originally it referred to humans as game to be hunted, but here it becomes a game being played by Kreiger. Both meanings work, I suppose, though GAME OF DEATH would seem more appropriate for an Agatha Christie-type mystery. The two films are so similar, it's difficult not to compare them, and as is usual, the remake suffers, though this version is certainly watchable. This is distinctly a B-movie with a B-level cast, whereas the 1932 version had the up-and-coming stars Joel McCrea and Fay Wray as the leads. John Loder is a reliable supporting actor, and he's fine here, but he doesn't have the energy and charm of McCrea. The same can be said of Audrey Long versus Fay Wray. Leslie Banks, in the original, can't be beat for simmering sinister madness, and Edgar Barrier doesn't try, which was probably wise but still diminishes the character's impact. The one actor who bests the original is Russell Wade as Bob. In the 1932 film, the brother is an alcoholic mess, overplayed a bit by Robert Armstrong; here, Bob just pretends to be drunk to put Kreiger off his guard, and Wade does a nice job. Some footage from the older movie is used in the later scenes where Krieger hunts Rainsford and Ellen but it's blended in fairly well. The sets might even be the same; certainly, this film uses the same grotesque bestial wall hanging on the staircase that was used in 1932. There is a nicely full-blooded fisticuffs scene at the end. If you only watch one version of the story, the Joel McCrea film is the one to see; this one, directed by Robert Wise, sustains tension well but, aside from changing the villain from Russian to German, seems unnecessary. [YouTube]

THAT MAN FROM RIO (1964)

As a French museum closes for noon lunch, two mysterious men break in, shoot a worker with a poison dart, steal a statuette of the ancient Maltec civilization—one of three in existence which supposedly can be used to find a hidden treasure in the Amazon—and kidnap museum archeologist Professor Catalan. At the same time, Adrien, a private in the Air Force, arrives in Paris on a one-week leave to visit his girlfriend Agnes. But their reunion is short-lived—she is kidnapped as well, her connection being that her late father worked with Catalan to unearth the Maltec figures, and the villains assume Catalan and Agnes may know where to find the other statues. Adrien chases her on foot and finds that she has been drugged and flown to Rio. He manages to get on the same flight, follows them, and sets out to rescue her. He does, and together they rescue Catalan. A rich Brazilian businessman named De Castro owns the second figure and only Agnes knows that the third one is buried somewhere on her late father's property. But not everyone is quite what they seem, and to give any more plot summary would spoil the fun.

This movie was marketed (and is still sometimes described) as a parody of the James Bond films, but that's not quite accurate. Adrien is not a spy, just a fellow dragged into a dangerous adventure, rather like a Hitchcock hero from The 39 Steps or North by Northwest. Actually the film seems equally inspired by Hitchcock, by silent film escapades (one moment, pictured at left, conjures up a famous scene in Harold Lloyd’s classic Safety Last), and by the cliffhanging adventure serials of the 30s and 40s. But the movie that RIO most conjured up for me was Raiders of the Lost Ark, made twenty years later, with its hero plunging into and escaping from one tight squeeze after another (including a rip-roaring bar fight) while searching for a valuable ancient artifact. At the climax, we discover that the three statuettes, combined with sunlight, reveal the hidden treasure, as in Raiders. This all may not be accidental, as Steven Spielberg has noted his high esteem for this film. (The director, Philippe de Broca, acknowledged the Tintin series of adventure books as a major influence, and Spielberg made a Tintin movie in 2011.)

Though this is a French film with a leading man right out of 60s New Wave cinema (Jean-Paul Belmondo as Adrien), it is not "avant-garde" in the slightest, and as long as you can deal with subtitles, it can be enjoyed by any fan of Hollywood light-hearted adventure. However, it's not quite as light as the New York Times found it in 1964—their review notes that despite all the villainous menacing, no one gets hurt, but in fact at least two characters do die. Despite being set in Brazil, there are no important native characters except a young street urchin (who actually lives in an interesting little shed) named Sir Winston—possibly an inspiration for Short Round in Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. The stunt set pieces, including chases in cars and planes, are amazing, and it's obvious that Belmondo does much of his own stunt work. Belmondo is athletic, sexy and charming, and Françoise Dorleac, sister of Catherine Deneuve, as Agnes holds her own with the same qualities. (Sadly, Dorleac would die at the age of 25 in a car accident only three years after this film was released.) Jean Servias is Catalan and Italian actor Adolfo Celi (later the bad guy in the Bond film Thunderball) is De Castro. This movie is colorful with lots of interesting location photography, and if you can suspend disbelief over how far Adrien is able to go with no money or resources, you'll have a lot of fun. [TCM]

PUSHOVER (1954)

We watch a methodically planned bank robbery carried out by Paul Richards and his partner, though at its end, they shoot and kill a security guard. That evening, in a seemingly unrelated scene, we see young and beautiful Kim Novak leave a theater and have trouble getting her car started. Kindly bystander Fred MacMurray helps her out, they hit it off, and end up spending the night together. Soon we discover Novak is the mistress of the bank robber and MacMurray is actually a cop assigned to watch her. But in the tradition of film noir, he falls for her which complicates matters. When he comes clean to her, she suggests that, when Richards eventually shows up with the bank money, the two of them take off with it. But MacMurray is part of a three-man stakeout taking place across the street from her apartment; she is under visual surveillance and her phone is tapped, making things dicey for the couple. For a while, MacMurray pulls it off, playing it cool with his partner (Phil Carey) and his boss (E.G. Marshall), but soon Carey gets mildly involved with Dorothy Malone, a neighbor of Novak's, and when Malone sees MacMurray where he shouldn't be, the screws tighten for everyone.

If you've seen DOUBLE INDEMNITY, you can't help imagining MacMurray’s character, Paul Sheridan, as an older version of Walter Neff, gray and ashen and worn down by life but still letting lust lead him into trouble. Neff is a more rounded character than Sheridan, who remains something of a blank here, and this movie is nowhere near the classic that INDEMNITY was, but it's still a fairly compelling film noir. The clever script limits itself to basically three locations: Novak's apartment, Malone's apartment, and the stakeout room across the street. That sounds like a potentially dull set-up more appropriate for a live 1950s TV drama, but it rarely feels static, and in fact helps to ratchet up the tension. MacMurray is good, as is Novak—this was her first featured role and the critics were not kind to her, but I think she's just right. Her character isn’t as devious as Barbara Stanwyck's in INDEMNITY—she seems to want to escape from Richards and genuinely has feelings for MacMurray—so she's not really a classic noir femme fatale, and that could be what some viewers react to rather than to her performance. Carey is excellent—I wanted to know about his character, and was rooting for him and Malone to work something out, even though the relationship begins in a creepy voyeuristic way (he watches her from across the street when nothing's happening in Novak's place). Allen Nourse is fine in the small but key role of an older policeman eager for retirement—he's got "poor bastard" written all over him from the start. A solid noir. Pictured are Malone, MacMurray and Novak. [Criterion Channel]

THE LADY IN THE MORGUE (1938)

At a downtown hotel, a young woman is found hanging in the closet of her room, an apparent suicide, and she is taken to the morgue to await identification. A gangster thinks she might be his mistress, but the wealthy Courtlands think she might be their daughter who had written a letter in which she sounded suicidal, and they hire detective Bill Crane to investigate. But when the body disappears from the morgue and an attendant is found dead, it's clear that there is more to this than a lonely suicide. Crane gets an elevator operator to let him into the hotel room to snoop around, and he quickly deduces that she must have been killed by someone and hung up as a cover-up. When the cops arrive, Crane sneaks out the window and pops into another room, occupied by a young woman who is taking a shower, who turns out to be married to Sam Taylor, a musician who was the last person to have seen the dead woman alive. I think you can sense at this point that the plot is going to get a bit too convoluted for its own good, something that happens with some frequency in B-mysteries. Indeed, the gangster's moll is still alive, as is the Courtland daughter. How is the lady in the shower (who may not actually be married to Sam Taylor) involved? And, of course, who was the mystery woman and who stole her body?

This is one in a series of Crime Club mysteries made by Universal, all based on books published under a Crime Club imprint. It's short—about 70 minutes—and is shot with some interesting B-style, with lots of camera swipes as transitions between scenes, but otherwise it's par for the course for the genre. Preston Foster is acceptable as the detective, and he works well with Frank Jenks, his sidekick; their banter keeps the movie's tone lightweight. Patricia Ellis is fine as the somewhat mysterious Courtland daughter. The Courtland brother is played by Gordon Elliott, later to be a B-western star under the name "Wild Bill" Elliott. Gordon Drew, who played Prince Barin in a Flash Gordon serial, is Sam Taylor. Barbara Pepper (pictured with Foster) adds some spice as a saucy blonde. Aside from the occasionally flashy camerawork, the low-budget production is fairly bare bones; there is no musical score, the sets are on the cheap side, and the script could have been tightened up. The two most interesting scenes are set at a penthouse cocktail party and a cemetery. It all moves fairly quickly to a satisfying “roomful of suspects” ending. [YouTube]

WICKED WOMAN (1953)

The opening theme song for this movie gives us some idea of the lay of the land in terms of how women will be viewed: "When the love that you're receiving / From her lips is so deceiving / How come her hands can mold you into clay?" Blonde totsy Beverly Michaels gets off the bus one day, sashays into town—catching the eye of weasely tailor Percy Helton—and gets a room in a cheap boarding house, with Percy as her across-the-hall neighbor. He tries to put the moves on her, but she prefers lying about decoratively in her room with the door open, reading a horoscope magazine and listening to her favorite record, "Acapulco Nights"—though she is perfectly happy to hit the guy up for dinner when she smells the steaks he's frying in his room. Bar manager Evelyn Scott gives her a job as a barmaid and she's very good with the (mostly middle-aged) male clientele. But soon Michaels comes on something fierce to Scott's beefy bartender husband (Richard Egan). He manages to resist for about five seconds, but soon they're sharing stolen moments and idly planning to go on the run, maybe to Acapulco. She suggests that Egan sell the bar, take the money, and leave with her, but this necessitates fooling Scott, a half-owner, into selling, which she has no plans to do. Michaels decides to pose as Egan's wife for the lawyers, forge a signature, and when the money comes through, skedaddle (Scott is an alcoholic and Michaels encourages her drinking habits to keep her off guard). But we all know about the best laid plans of mice and men—and this plan isn't particularly well-laid out.

[Spoilers ahead!] This showed up on TCM's Noir Alley, and though it has some film noir elements (the femme fatale, the horny adulterous hunk, the scheme to get money), it doesn’t really play out like one. Michaels and Egan (pictured) operate as a B-movie MacMurray and Stanwyck (Double Indemnity) or Turner and Garfield (The Postman Always Rings Twice), but despite the sexual tension and greed, it's a bit of a letdown when a murder plot fails to crop up, even though at one point, Michaels expressly wishes that Scott were dead. Basically, Helton messes things up when he overhears the two plotting and blackmails Michaels into getting some hanky-panky. In the middle of that, Egan walks in, calls her a tramp and calls off the deal. We're not sure how Egan and Scott will reconcile, but Michaels leaves town like she came in, on a bus, aiming to snag another hapless man. The two leads are very good, with Michaels oozing sex (as a weapon) and Egan tied up in knots of lust. Helton, whose claim to fame in my eyes is as the drunk Santa in the beginning of MIRACLE ON 34TH STREET, is queasily right as the greasy blackmailer—at one point, Michaels calls him a runt and he warns her not to say that, to which she screams, "Runt, runt, runt!" There aren't really any likable people here—Egan's drunkard wife is, if not awful, at least unpleasant. An online critic at Cinema Sojourns notes that "the look and feel of the movie captures the lurid quality of trashy pulp fiction covers," and that is probably its best quality, even though it isn't able to deliver on that promise. Not quite a gem, but one to catch as it doesn't show up too often. [TCM]

THE DEFEAT OF THE BARBARIANS (1962)

Beware: this summary (for reasons detailed later) may not be accurate. The Bavarian Prince Rudolf is caretaker to the royal heir, 10-year-old Albert. Baron Berthold is sent off to deal with Manfredi, a possible threat to Albert, who rules in Italy. However, Manfredi will have none of this; he sends the Baron back to Rudolf while keeping his daughter Grenda hostage to ensure that Rudolf will not send troops against Manfredi. But Grenda turns out to be happy where she is with Manfredi. Meanwhile, Manfredi's deputy Riccardo, who has his own dreams of power, sees Grenda on the sly and soon hatches a plan to make Manfredi think that Albert has died. Manfredi soon discovers that, not only is this a lie, bur Rudolf's men are on the move against him. In the middle of all this royal intrigue, we meet the lowly but hunky Astolfo (Ken Clark, pictured) who has worked his way up to become a squire to Manfredi. For half the movie, I had assumed that Manfredi was the villain, but come to find out, he's actually the good guy—and after he gets killed in battle, we find out that Rudolf may not have Albert's best interests at heart. Luckily, Astolfo becomes our moral compass, and over the course of a couple of distinctly lackluster battles, Riccardo and Grenda are defeated, Albert is crowned king, and Astolfo becomes the royal protector.

Trying to give this movie a fair review is impossible. The original print ran nearly 90 minutes, but the only print available (on YouTube) is just 68 minutes. From what I can figure out, the movie never got a theatrical release in the U.S. This version, which is presented with the title "Scourge of the Barbarians," appears to be a TV edit, made to air in a 90 minute slot. It's also a pan and scan print, though it doesn't actually pan—there are scenes in which two people are talking and we see neither one of them, only the landscape between the two. I'm not sure what's been cut, but big chunks of the movie are gone, which may be why I initially misidentified the good guys and the bad guys. I'm guessing that a lot of Ken Clark's performance wound up on the cutting room floor since he is first billed but is basically a supporting performer with less screen time that Manfredi, Riccardo, or the Baron. Clark, whose high point in Hollywood was probably as the tall blond sailor Stewpot in SOUTH PACIFIC, has developed a minor cult following for his work in B-movies—sci-fi, adventure and spy films. So it's disappointing that he gets relatively little screen time in this bastardized print of what may have been a perfectly fine Italian adventure movie. If a complete print ever shows up, I'll be more than willing to revisit my review, but until then, I can't recommend this odd little mess of a movie. [YouTube]

D-DAY THE SIXTH OF JUNE (1956)

The men of Special Force Six are heading for Normandy to be among the first soldiers to make the D-Day landing. The leader, British officer Richard Todd, interacts a bit awkwardly with American Robert Taylor. As we soon discover, the two have something in common besides a dangerous mission: they are both in love with the same woman. In a first brief flashback set in 1942, Todd is having a short visit with his gal, Dana Wynter, whose father is a brusque brigadier (John Williams) who is not happy about 1) being put out of commission after being injured at Dunkirk, and 2) the rowdy behavior of American soldiers in England. Todd and Wynter part sadly, making promises of love. Then we're in Taylor's flashback; a married newspaper publisher back in the States, he is stationed in England as an assistant to Lt. Col. Edmond O'Brien. When word gets to O'Brien about an altercation between some Yanks and the unfriendly brigadier, Taylor is sent to smooth things over and winds up striking some sparks with Wynter, now working a nurse and who suspects that Todd may have been killed in a North African mission. Though he's honest about his marital status, the two slowly begin a romantic relationship. Eventually a wounded Todd gets sick leave and returns to see Wynter, but he overhears two nurses referring to Wynter's American boyfriend, and is soon put in charge of Special Force Six when O'Brien suffers a breakdown. Back to the sixth of June, when actions on the beach may determine the outcome of the romantic triangle.

Notice that I barely mention D-Day in the above summary. Odd, given that the military operation is the title of the movie. But, in fact, this isn’t really about D-Day; it's a wartime romantic melodrama sold falsely as a combat film. Yes, we see some action on the beach in the last 15 minutes, but it's over and done with fairly quickly. If this film had a different title, the lack of war scenes might not be so bothersome. However, even taken as a war romance picture, it has problems. The biggest is that the wooden Robert Taylor is the focus of the film. Poor Richard Todd, a handsome and capable actor who is second billed to Taylor, is left with scraps; he seems to get less screen time than supporting actor Edmond O'Brien, whose storyline is not terribly involving and often feels like padding. Though Wynter and Taylor have little chemistry, she does a nice job almost single-handedly making us care about the couple. Williams is fine in a brief but showy role, and other good support comes from Jerry Paris, Ross Elliott, and Robert Gist. I admit I like the ending, which, despite the death of one of the two men, doesn't actually (in my reading) resolve the triangle completely. Pictured are Todd and Taylor. [TCM]

THE JUNGLE PRINCESS (1936)

In the jungles of Malaysia, an elephant stampede destroys the village of the young girl Ulah, and her father dies saving her from a tiger. Fifteen years later, Ulah (Dorothy Lamour) is a solitary jungle dweller (think female Tarzan but in a sarong rather than a loincloth) with a pet tiger she calls Limau. Her tiger has become something of a legend among the natives, for whenever it appears, the sound of soft laughter is heard nearby. It's called the Tiger Who Laughs, but we see that it's really Ulah, hiding in the trees, who laughs. A small British expedition is about to leave before the rainy season sets in, but Chris (Ray Milland) wants to stay and work on his book, which irritates his fiancée Ava (Molly Lamont). While Chris in the jungle, the laughing tiger appears and starts to attack Chris, whose leg is injured. The native guides run away but Ulah stops and helps him, taking him to her cave and attending to his leg while the two of them, despite their language differences, flirt up a storm. Chris's party looks for him but assumes he's dead and take off, leaving Chris and Ulah to get cozy in the jungle. Time passes, the expedition returns, and Chris feels duty-bound to return to Ava, but Ulah and Limau accompany him. Despite the obvious closeness of Chris and Ulah, Ava insists on holding Chris to his promise of marriage. But eventually, between these romantic entanglements and the belief among the natives that Ulah is a witch, problems ensue.

Despite having the predictable structure and trappings of the average jungle adventure, this feels a little brighter and more fun than the Tarzan movies of the same era, largely due to the chemistry between Lamour (in her first movie) and Milland. She's charming, if mostly called upon to give a one-note performance, and he is still young and vigorous, and it's fun to watch their relationship develop. Though this was made after the imposition of the moralistic Production Code, it has the feel of a pre-Code movie: it's made very clear that Milland and Lamour are having a physical relationship without the benefit of clergy, so to speak, not to mention the specter of forbidden "miscegenation," with the Anglo Chris and the native Malaysian Ulah (with Lamour in what I call duskyface). Another thing this has in common with the Tarzan films is that the rest of the cast, here including Akim Tamiroff and Lynne Overman, makes little impression. There's not a lot of action until the climactic attack of the flying (sort of) monkeys which is pulled off nicely. A fun 30s adventure. [DVD]

IT'S LOVE AGAIN (1936)

Raymond, a producer of London musicals, is ready to cancel his latest due to a lack of talent. Parading around his apartment in a hooded robe (!), he vents about entering a monastery and more or less ignores young Elaine Bradford (Jessie Matthews) who has come for an audition. Woolf, a musician who apparently lives with Raymond (!) plays a cute little song Elaine has brought called "It's Love Again" which manages to rhyme "chop suey" with "fooey" and "screwy," and "heifer" with "zephyr." She has a nice voice and does some interesting high-kick dancing, but Raymond naps through her performance, waking up only when his former star Francine arrives; she left for Hollywood but is back and Raymond agrees to put her in a show. (When a frustrated Elaine asks what Francine has that she hasn't, Woolf replies "Hardening of the arteries.") On her way out, Elaine meets gossip columnist Peter Carlton (Robert Young); they dance for a moment before she goes on her way. Peter and his sidekick Freddie (they also are roommates), tired of scraping the streets for tidbits, decide to create a new celeb, the mysterious Mrs. Smythe-Smythe, and make up reports about her for the paper. London goes crazy for her even though she lives in India and has never been seen in town, and Elaine gets a "brainwave": she decides to pose as Smythe-Smythe, goes to a nightclub, and grabs everyone's attention by dancing with a gigolo friend of hers. Her appearance is a hit, and soon she is in cahoots with Peter and Freddie to play their fictional star for real. Things go swimmingly for a while until rival reporter Montague catches on and plans to expose their charade.

Jessie Matthews was a big stage and screen star in pre-war England, though she never really caught on in the States. If American film buffs know her, it's probably for her lead role in 1935's FIRST A GIRL which was based on the same source material used years later for VICTOR/VICTORIA. She reminds me at various times of Ruby Keeler, Loretta Young, Ginger Rogers, and, when she high-kicks, Charlotte Greenwood. I find her inoffensive but not terribly exciting—she can act better than Keeler but she is much less lively than Rogers. But this movie is cute, and I mean that in a good way. Matthews, like her character, soldiers on through all the sticky situations she gets into and you can't help rooting for her. The chemistry between Matthews and Robert Young (both pictured above) is pretty flat, but oddly she sparks with Warren Jenkins as the possibly gay Woolf and with Sonnie Hale as Freddie (understandable as Hale was her real-life husband). Shakespearean actor Ernest Milton is great fun as the flamboyant director Raymond. The production numbers aren't as glossy as the ones you'd find in a Hollywood musical, but they work just fine. Perhaps not a classic but one you can't help but like. [TCM]

THE TRAIN (1964)

In August of 1944, as the Allies close in on Paris to declare it an open city, Nazi officer Paul Scofield (pictured at left) is emptying out a museum full of valuable art that he has acquired (i.e., stolen) during the war and shipping it all into Germany on a train. Burt Lancaster, head engineer of the railroad heading out of town, is asked to work with the underground to stop Scofield's plan. Reluctant at first (he thinks there are more important sabotage activities in which to engage), he is eventually brought around to help. The acts of sabotage are small at first, though still risky, and manage to slow down the train's departure. Finally a kind of  'Mission: Impossible' trick is pulled: the train is essentially sent in circles, not leaving France, but signs along the road are changed to make Scofield and his men think that the train is in Germany. The deception works to a point, but when Scofield finds out what's going on, he threatens to kill a truck full of French hostages if Lancaster doesn't give up. At over two hours, the tension here slacks off on occasion, but if you like to see trains running, derailing and crashing, this is the movie for you. The physical production by director John Frankenheimer is quite impressive, and Lancaster and Scofield are excellent as the protagonists who we figure will make this a duel to the death. Jeanne Moreau is underused in the small role of a innkeeper who crosses paths with Lancaster. Despite being a WWII movie, there is no battlefield action here, but chase and train action should satisfy war film buffs. [Blu-ray]

A DAMSEL IN DISTRESS (1937)

Lord Marshmorton's servants enter a gambling pool run by Keggs, the chief butler, to predict whom his daughter Lady Alyce (Joan Fontaine) will marry. They all pick names out of a hat—with Keggs cheating to pick Reggie, a pleasant but unappealing hanger-on whom Alyce's aunt Caroline is pushing on her—but by the time teenage servant Albert gets to pick, the names are gone, so he picks "Mr. X," any currently unknown man who might enter the picture. So who enters the picture? American musical star Jerry Halliday (Fred Astaire). Alyce meets him briefly in London when he lets her share his cab. When Albert hears of the incident, he writes Jerry a letter, signed Lady Alyce, saying she's in love with him and inviting him to swing by the castle sometime. So he does, accompanied by his manager (George Burns playing a character named George Burns) and his scatterbrained secretary (Gracie Allen playing a character named Gracie Allen). Of course, Jerry and Alyce begin to fall in love for real. Because Aunt Caroline continues to push for Reggie, the ornery Lord Marshmorton connives with Jerry to ensure his victory. But complications ensue: for one, Alyce is apparently interested in another American she met in Switzerland. And when George gets a PR piece published implying that Jerry is a playboy and Alyce is just another conquest, Alyce turns Jerry away. But as this is a Hollywood musical comedy, we know the couple will have a happy ending.

This is the first movie Fred Astaire made without Ginger Rogers since hitting the big time with her back in 1933. It's not a bad movie, but, aside from the mistaken identity romance at the center of the plot, it doesn't bear much resemblance to the movies Astaire had been making with Rogers so it was a commercial disappointment. First of all, the splashy art deco trappings of the earlier films are gone; it's still set among the rich and famous, but in an old English mansion. Fontaine is pleasant enough, and she's not a passive insecure ninny as she would be in some of her later movies (REBECCA, SUSPICION), but she's not Ginger Rogers. She and Astaire only share one dance and, though Fontaine is OK, the scene generates none of the romance or humor that a number shared with Rogers would have. What the movie does have is the slightly surreal humor of Gracie Allen and her husband George Burns. In fact, they are the reason for watching. Every time I see Burns and Allen in a movie or a TV clip, I think I won't find them funny anymore, but I always wind up laughing at Gracie's exquisitely daffy timing and George's generous straight-man routine. Not only are they the high point of the film, they even get, with Astaire, the two best dance numbers, a long bit in an amusement park and a shorter one with whisk brooms as props. The wonderful Reginald Gardiner is perfect as the obnoxious Keggs, Montagu Love has a nice light touch as Fontaine's father, and child actor Harry Watson is a fun Albert. At 100 minutes, it's really too long—the last 15 minutes feel like an hour—but even second-rate Astaire is enjoyable. Pictured are Astaire, Allen and Burns. [TCM]

THE HASTY HEART (1949)

At a military hospital camp in Burma in 1945, the soldiers have just learned that the war is over. Most are excited to be going home, but one group of men is stuck there a while longer while they recover. The group (with men from England, Africa, Australia and New Zealand) is joined by a Scottish soldier, Lachie McLachlen (Richard Todd), complete with bagpipes. But he is a sullen one—in addition to being someone who hates small talk and, by his own admission, has no friends, he is upset that he is being kept in Burma even though his back wound has healed. What the doctors haven't told him is that he lost one kidney, and his other one is defective and will soon give out on him: he only has a few weeks to live. Margaret, the nurse (Patricia Neal, pictured with Todd), knows his situation and tells his roommates, asking them to accept Lachie and help make his last days bright. But Lachie remains unfriendly and combative, ready to get angry over any perceived slight. The Yank (Ronald Reagan), who is the unofficial leader of the group, has to work very hard not to punch Lachie in the face at times, but eventually, the men and the nurse get Lachie, who hasn't had a pleasant life, to accept their friendship. He even enjoys his surprise birthday party at which he receives a kilt, the first one he's ever had. Lachie owns a bit of land in Scotland and he tries, one by one, to talk the men into coming to live with him after they're released. He even stammers out a marriage proposal to Margaret, who has indeed come to feel an attachment to him. But after he collapses and learns the truth about his situation, he turns against everyone, feeling betrayed. Will anything cause Lachie to realize that these people have actually come to care about him?

This is based on a stage play and it shows, though it's been opened up a bit like THE MAN WHO CAME TO DINNER was, with an opening that sets up some context before settling into the single setting that dominates the rest of the picture. But it never feels static, and even if the general trajectory of the narrative is predictable, the writing and acting make it worth seeing. Todd is excellent as a man you love to hate—and eventually to pity and to warm to; sometimes you want to punch him and sometimes hug him. Though Lachie is in his mid-20s, this is basically an emotional coming-of-age story and Todd expresses Lachie's growth and backsliding very well. Ronald Reagan and Patricia Neal are top-billed, but this is Todd's movie all the way, and indeed he was nominated for an Oscar for best leading actor. The other soldiers are pretty much cultural stereotypes—and the African character, who speaks no English except the word "Blossom" which is what the men have named him, is less a real character than a climactic plot point. Ultimately, I found the movie charming and moving, and even humorous, with a running joke about what Scottish men wear under their kilts providing a kind of punch line for the film. Recommended. [TCM]

CODE 7, VICTIM 5 (1964)

In Cape Town, South Africa, we see a New Year's parade of people in skull-face make-up dancing through the streets. One man wends his way through the crowds, looking a little fearful, and sure enough, we see him duck down an empty street only to be confronted by men in distorted clown masks who stab him to death. The dead man was the butler (and good friend) to a rich copper mining honcho named Wexler (Walter Rilla), and when Wexler decides that solving the crime is beyond the ability of the local police, he hires American private eye Steve Martin (Lex Barker). Martin arrives in Cape Town and is picked up by Wexler's loyal (and lovely) secretary Helga, but they find themselves followed by a car that eventually tries to run them off the road—though ultimately, it's the chaser who winds up careening down a cliff to fiery death. At Wexler's, we meet Gina, his stepdaughter; Paul, Wexler's doctor who is dating Gina; George, the gruff mines overseer, who seems to have a thing for Helga. We also meet Inspector Lean (Ronald Fraser), a rather homely fellow who somehow has a way with the ladies—honestly, the sexual attraction mapping in the movie is a little unclear, or a little all over the place, so I was not always sure who was serious about whom. Near the body of the butler, Lean found a photograph of four men, taken years ago in a POW camp; one of them is the butler, who has a large X marked across him, and one of the other men is Wexler. Wexler is reluctant to be helpful, but when another one of the men in the photograph is killed, he starts to open up about what happened in the camp, how it led to his current riches in the copper mines, and who might be stalking him.

This film was marketed as a secret agent movie (the not-very-subtle reference to Agent 007, James Bond, in the title, which was originally VICTIM FIVE) but it's not. It's a detective thriller with some adventure elements and attractive, sometimes bikini-clad, young women. As such, it works well as an example of the faux-spy thriller of the 60s—I don't really know if there are enough movies like this to constitute a genre, but it feels quite familiar. Barker is passable in the lead; he is, in his late 40s, perhaps a shade past his prime, but you don't need too much suspension of disbelief to buy him as a two-fisted hero. The Danish Ann Smyrner (as Helga) and the French Veronique Vendell (as Gina) are attractive, and better actors than they need to be for their rote roles. I didn't like the mild but somewhat silly comic relief of Ronald Fraser in the beginning, but he grew on me. Smaller roles are well played by Dietmar Schonherr as Dr. Paul and Howard Davis as Rawlings. The plot keeps you on your toes, with an unexpected twist involving one of the later victims, but it's easy to follow. The location shooting is nice. The action scenes are a bit underwhelming (a tired-looking lion on the attack, an ostrich stampede) but it was hard to dislike this bit of 60s crime fluff. Pictured are Vendell, Smyrner and Barker. [Blu-Ray]