'60s moments ...

Some new images from some of our favourite Sixties classics:

Joseph Losey directing Monica Vitti as MODESTY BLAISE in 1966, Sarah Miles and Sean Caffrey in County Clare, Ireland in 1965 for Desmond Davis's I WAS HAPPY HERE, and below, Delon and Ronet re-teamed in Deray's glossy thriller LA PISCINE in 1969, with Romy Schneider. 

Below, filmed in 1959 (as was Antonioni's L'AVVENTURA) but on screens in 1960, Rene Clement's PLEIN SOLEIL (aka PURPLE NOON, now with a new lease of life and looking even better on Blu-ray), where Maurice Ronet, Delon and Marie Laforet are all spell-binding, as per my other Plein Soleil posts (see label), and also 1959 again, those LA NOTTE BRAVA boys, Pasolini's young hoodlums as directed and glamorised by Mauro Bolognini - Jean-Claude Brialy, Laurent Terzieff, Tomas Milian. We like Jean Sorel too, as per previous posts on him, very busy in the '60s and '70s, with lots of thriller and giallo genre movies, as well as choice items like Visconti's SANDRA where he and Claudia Cardinale are a stunning couple. Here he is with Carroll Baker, whom he made a few thrillers, such as THE SWEET BODY OF DEBORAH in 1969 ...

Summer movie posters

Some enjoyable summer romps - or Trash Movie Heaven. 
You can find more about these at the labels .....

 

Glynis & Ty in THE CHAPMAN REPORT

Franco in A QUIET PLACE IN THE COUNTRY

1965: movies, magazines & Sylvia

My 900th post !  I can go on if you want - shall we aim for 1,000 ? !

I was down in the garage and pulled out my bound copies of "Films & Filming" magazine for 1965, along with some other magazines from then, and suddenly I am 19 again, living in my room in North London, going to the cinema a lot, these magazines were my companions then, but that was the year I met new friends and began to move around the city a lot .... 

As per other posts here (Magazines label) "Films & Filming" was that essential magazine, not as lowbrow as "Photoplay" or as highbrow as "Sight & Sound" that was well just essential for us then - I even worked there in the '70s for a year and got to know the owner, editor and staff, and had a review or two published myself. Its glory years though was from 1954 when it began through the '60s and '70s, it was a spent force by 1980 but limped on for a while, after the suicide of the owner. 

I like browsing through the back copies, so evocative of those days, a fascinating record of that time, and they are crammed with interesting features and photos - like that interview with Delon (above) on his first years in cinemal and those articles like "Joan Crawford, 40 years a queen" or "Susan Hayward, the Brooklyn Bernhardt" .... and the new pop movies like HELP!, below. essential for young movie buffs then!
 

 Ditto MOVIE and some Sight & Sound issues ....see Magazine label for the contents of this terrific 1965 issue of MOVIE.

Julie & Roland Curram in DARLING

Here is a delicious piece of Hollywood product from 1965: SLYVIA, one of Joe Levine's efforts to make another Monroe out of Carroll Baker.

SYLVIA – One of those Joe E Levine [the Mogul of the Mediocre] mid’60s melodramas which the studios were turning out in a desperate attempt to get with it as the Swinging 60s took off, but ended up looking more dated than ever. Thank heavens the like of BONNIE AND CLYDE were just around the corner. 

Here, old hand Gordon Douglas directs Carroll Baker (in her Harlow phase) as the poetess Sylvia West who is engaged to Peter Lawford (playing a sleazeball as usual) who hires private eye George Maharis to track down the background of the mysterious Sylvia. This is quite enjoyable actually as cue cameos from Edmund O’Brien, Joanne Dru as an ex-hooker who married well, Ann Sothern hilariously overblown, Aldo Ray as Sylvia’s abusive father, Viveca Lindfors as a possibly lesbian librarian, Nancy Kovack as a brassy showgirl and Lola Diamond, a very scary drag queen. Baker is quite nice here as the rose-growing poet untouched by her sordid past, and there is a perfect theme song by Paul Anka. Ok, its trash but in a good way. Its in black and white with that nice mid-60s feel, but maybe should have been in colour. Maharis & Baker look good together, it was one of the last gasps of the old Hollywood studios before that new mid-60s came in. SYLVIA is not as bad as Carroll's HARLOW or THE OSCAR or THE LOVE MACHINE - all at Trash label. Carroll, over 80 now, had a long career, we like some of her European giallo thrillers, particularly with Jean Sorel - she wrote some racy novels too!  THE CARPETBAGGERS is a great Trashy pleasure too now. 

Main 1965 films for me are DARLING, REPULSION, WHATS NEW PUSSYCAT?, HELP!, SANDRA (VAGUE STELLE DELL'ORSA), DR ZHIVAGO, LE BAMBOLE, MARRIAGE ITALIAN STYLE, LE BONHEUR, SHOP ON THE HIGH STREET, THE KNACK, YOUNG CASSIDY, A HIGH WIND IN JAMAICA, and the fun of SHE, SYLVIA, THE PLEASURE GIRLS, THE YELLOW ROLLS ROYCE and the trash of HARLOW and WHERE LOVE HAS GONE ....

1955 musicals: Tony & Janet, Ella, Peggy Lee, Jayne + Eileen and Lola Diamond !

Two rarities from 1955: IT'S ALWAYS FAIR WEATHER may be my favourite musical from that year (as per post on it recently), I had not seen PETE KELLY'S BLUES before but its a fascinating oddity now, not a musical as such as its a gangster drama about a jazz band with musical interludes, nice that it captures Peggy Lee and Ella Fitzgerland at their '50s peak - Peggy actually is very effective as the gangster's moll who sinks into alcohol and mental illness. Janet Leigh is somewhat wasted as the rich flapper who inexplicably falls for band leader Pete - Jack Webb at his most mono-syllabic. I never saw his DRAGNET series but he plays it so impassive and deadpan here, his directing is interesting too - dialogue scenes are long takes with no cutting or editing to closeups, so the actors have long scenes to get right.

The 20s atmosphere is nicely evoked and the drama is provided by racketeer Edmond O'Brien wanting a take of the band's money and imposing his singing girlfriend on them - but boy can she sing! Pete (Webb) has a nice insult to the gangster - that he had rubber pockets so he could steal soup! Lee Marvin is also in the band and plays a nice guy for once, one is glad when he returns and Martin Milner is the young hothead whom one knows will end up in a hail of bullets in the rain! There is a terrific shootout at the end in a deserted dance hall where the glitterball plays a major role!

Interestingly, the next year 1956 saw O'Brien sending up his gangster persona as another hood with a blonde girlfriend he wants to turn into a singer, she is Jeri Jordan (Jayne Mansfield) in Tashlin's riot THE GIRL CAN'T HELP IT - Jayne also has a small part here as the (brunette) cigarette girl ... but hardly registers here. Great Warner Bros production values too.

SO THIS IS PARIS: Janet next went on to another favourite musical of that year: MY SISTER EILEEN (musicals label) so she and husband Tony Curtis were both singing and dancing that year! One hardly thinks of Curtis as a song and dance man but his brash enthusiasm is admirable in SO THIS IS PARIS - a studio bound musical from Universal and it comes across now as ON THE TOWN for simpletons as its a grotesquely simple-minded show about 3 sailors on the loose, also with touches of AN AMERICAN IN PARIS (cue cute kids...) Tony, in his bio, says it was made in 21 days!

Tony, Gene Nelson and Paul Gilbert (the Jules Munchin role here) are the three gobs who dock at Le Havre (a quaint little village here) and after wrecking a taxi end up in a studio Paris, where Tony falls for chanteuse Gloria De Haven and Gene for playgirl Corrine Calvet, while Mara Corday takes care of whatshisname. Nelson also choreographs and hoofs in the style of that other Gene ... its all simple-minded fun as Tony ascended the ladder to TRAPEZE, SWEET SMELL OF SUCCESS etc. Janet of course is totally enchanting in MY SISTER EILEEN where Bob Fosse and Tommy Rall fight over her - directed too by Richard Quine, also also directs this PARIS farrago before going on to the likes of BELL BOOK AND CANDLE with his muse Kim Novak.

A question: what do the 3 sailors dancing in their underwear/shorts by the pool wear underneath to hide any suggestion of genitalia - its like everything must have been strapped down (ditto Randolph Scott in MY FAVOURITE WIFE), as a jockstrap would suggest a bulge.... and of course there is no chest hair, just like Holden had to shave his for PICNIC! (and of course navels were not allowed either - all those gals like Joan Collins, Anita Ekberg etc had to have a jewel glued on down there. That's the '50s - a decade later it would all be hanging out!

and Lola:

thanks to my pal Jerry for reminding me that Paul Gilbert (the third sailor) re-appeared as that terrifying butch drag queen Lola Diamond in the 1965 opus SYLVIA - one of Joe Levine's trash classics ....(review at Carroll Baker/Trash labels).

A mixed bag ...

KITTEN WITH A WHIP - A delicious 1964 farrago with the then rising Ann-Margret who is the sole reason to see this one. She is the wild teen running away from reform school who takes up residence in nice but dull guy John Forsythe's suburban home while his wife is out of town. Instead of calling the police the very wooden Forsythe tries to help her! Life with Ann is a rollercoaster as her mood swings drive Forsyth (a long way before DYNASTY) around the bend as he tries to get rid of her before family and neighbours find out. Ann then invites her teen hood friends to the party, including Skip Ward (the bus driver from NIGHT OF THE IGUANA) and then they all go slumming to Tijuana over the Mexican border... as they all cheat and double-cross each other to a fitting finale. Its certainly one to laugh at, now has anyone got a copy of Ann's THE SWINGER or BUS RILEY IS BACK IN TOWN?

TROOPER HOOK - I really liked this 1957 western when I saw it as a kid so nice to see it again 50 years later. I like Barbara Stanwyck's other '50s westerns too (CATTLE QUEEN OF MONTANA, THE MAVERICK QUEEN, THE FURIES, 40 GUNS), this is a nice black and white one made the year after THE SEARCHERS and is also about a woman being rescued from living with the indians - here though its a mature woman with her son by the Apache chief Nanchez (Rudolfo Acosta). Joel McCrea is the Trooper Hook of the title who has the task of taking Cora and her son back to her husband as they travel though Indian territory on a stagecoach which also has Senorita Susan Kohner, cowboy Earl Hollimann, and the splendidly venal Edward Andrews on board). Stanwyck is very compelling as Cora and plays it mainly silent as she re-adjusts to civilisation. Nanchez is also in pursuit as he wants his son. John Dehner is the husband who wants his wife back but not her half-breed child ... its tense and nicely resolved and its one of Stanwyck's better '50s films, all wrapped up in 80 minutes and there is even a Tex Ritter theme song!

RAW WIND IN EDEN - Another delicious farrago from 1957 this sudser has playgirl Esther Williams (though she seems rather mature...) and Carlos Thompson crashing their plane in a remote Italian island where mystery man Jeff Chandler lives with the locals including Helen of Troy herself Rosanna Podesta. Esther and Carlos move into their shack and its a mystery how Esther has a never ending supply of clean clothes and makeup. She and Jeff eventually get together and it all gets rather steamy. Esther's career was practically over by this time (she made one more little regarded melodrama) but Jeff had a good run in the '50s squiring those ladies like Loretta Young (BECAUSE OF YOU), Lana Turner (THE LADY TAKES A FLYER), June Allyson (STRANGER IN MY ARMS), Kim Novak (JEANNE EAGELS) and Susan Hayward (THUNDER IN THE SUN) as well as adventures like SIGN OF THE PAGAN, MAN IN THE SHADOW, 10 SECONDS TO HELL and YANKEE PASHA. He died in 1961 after complications following an operation... Esther later wrote in her autobiography that Jeff was a cross-dresser with a penchant for polka-dot dresses, but it seems it was not true.

THE SPANISH GARDENER - 50+ years later this is still a compelling drama, from a A J Cronin bestseller, and is a nice look at the Costa Brava in the '50s as stuffy minor diplomat Michael Hordern and his neglected son Jon Whiteley (the little boy in MOONFLEET) arrive, following the father's divorce. Dirk Bogarde is the gardener hired by the father who soon forms a bond with the lonely boy who has no friends as he and the father move around a lot. The father though soon grows jealous of the friendship between gardener and boy - is he jealous of his son or of the gardener? Hordern excels as the buttoned-up repressed man unable to express his feelings. Things take a melodramatic turn as the father forbids his son to continue associating with Jose, the gardener, and the servant (Cyril Cusack) engineers a theft for which Jose is blamed. Soon Jose is on the run with Nicholas (Whiteley) seeking him out and the father now humbled and sorry for his actions in pursuit as it is all nicely resolved. Director Philip Leacock made some interesting movies before moving into television.

NO WAY TO TREAT A LADY - Jack Smight's 1968 black comedy was a treat back then and is still so now, as serial killer Rod Steiger dons different disguises to con his way into the homes of lonely middle aged women ... it of course boils down to his mother complex! Rod runs a theate so has access to lots of disguises as we see him in turn as an Irish priest, a Polish plumber, in drag as a woman scared to go leave a bar, and hilariously as a camp hairdresser! George Segal is Mo Brummell, the harrassed Jewish detective on the case - plagued by his very Jewish mother Eileen Heckart who is great fun here. Lee Remick is the girl who may provide a clue and she is charming here making something special of the standard girl role. Just one quibble: wouldn't the mother fixated killer go after Segal's mother rather than his girlfriend? It's got a nice late '60s feel .... below, right: Steiger in drag with another victim...

PARANOIA, or A QUIET PLACE TO KILL - a friend into those Italian giallo thrillers lent me this Umberto Lenzi thriller from 1970 and its a whole lot of fun as the melodramatic plot twists and turns as racing driver Carroll Baker crashes her car on the circuit and ends up slightly wounded in hospital. During her period of recovery, she accepts to stay at her ex-husband (Jean Sorel) and his new wife's mansion. Two attractive women and one handsome guy in one house can only result in extended sequences of sexual intrigue, double-crossing and conspiracies to murder, particularly when the precocious daughter of the second wife arrives with a plot of her own. Baker and Sorel excelled as this kind of thing and Carroll frequently disrobes to add to the sexual tensions. It all rises to a crescendo and a final twist that leaves one dazed !