Post by kims on Aug 20, 2024 1:34:40 GMT
This was an offering at 2a.m. for Kate Hepburn's day during TCM Summer Under the Stars. I recorded it because I didn't remember ever hearing about this film. Directed by Bryan Forbes (THE L SHAPED ROOM and THE STEPFORD WIVES). John Huston walked off the project a couple of weeks before start of filming because he disagreed with the producer to set the film in contemporary time (1969) instead of during WWII as the play was. The play was about average people rising against Nazi tyranny with the help of the Madwoman. In the film eccentric women thwart the leaders of the Military/Industrial state from drilling for oil inside Paris.
Before the credits a "card" reads "This is a story of the triumph of good over evil. Obviously this is a fantasy." Then the credits starring Kate Hepburn, Paul Henreid, Charles Boyer, Claude Dauphin, Edith Evans, John Gavin, Oscar Komolka, Margaret Leighton, Richard Chamberlain, Yul Brynner, Donald Pleasance, Danny Kaye, Giulietta Maison. Look for a cameo of Michael Wilding pushing a baby carriage. I was excited thinking this must be some great movie. I should have read IMDB first. There critic David Shipman is quoted "perhaps the supreme example in all cinema of the phenomenon known to critics as the cast couldn't save it."
The opening scenes are great at introducing the main characters quickly. Hepburn uses the tip of her parasol to pick up a letter, as she walks down the street two men have pulled measuring tape across the sidewalk. She cuts the tape and continues on her way. She waters some flowers with the water pail of a window washer. Thus she is established as eccentric, but from then on she has no other bits of business to continue that she is eccentric. She comes off as Rosie from THE AFRICAN QUEEN dropped into the wrong film.
Claude Dauphin has a cute bit where he says he is a doctor with his office being an outdoor cafe, later says he's a vet and later still an attorney.
Danny Kaye does a spectacular job as a defendant justifying his capitalist ways.
The leaders of the Military/Industrial state are called the BOARD played by Gavin, Heinreid, Boyer, Komolka & Brynner. The eccentric women are Hepburn, Evans, Leighton and Maison. Pleasance is a new member of the Board whose nephew Chamberlain is a student radical protesting society.
Here's what I found weird: in each scene everyone is doing a great job. The flow of the script and dialogue seem good, but something is not working. I think another editor should have been given a shot. There seems to be a good movie here, but it's not appearing on the screen.
It's worth a one time look to watch great actors doing their stuff. And if you enjoy sometimes looking at a film to decide how you would fix it, here's your movie.
Before the credits a "card" reads "This is a story of the triumph of good over evil. Obviously this is a fantasy." Then the credits starring Kate Hepburn, Paul Henreid, Charles Boyer, Claude Dauphin, Edith Evans, John Gavin, Oscar Komolka, Margaret Leighton, Richard Chamberlain, Yul Brynner, Donald Pleasance, Danny Kaye, Giulietta Maison. Look for a cameo of Michael Wilding pushing a baby carriage. I was excited thinking this must be some great movie. I should have read IMDB first. There critic David Shipman is quoted "perhaps the supreme example in all cinema of the phenomenon known to critics as the cast couldn't save it."
The opening scenes are great at introducing the main characters quickly. Hepburn uses the tip of her parasol to pick up a letter, as she walks down the street two men have pulled measuring tape across the sidewalk. She cuts the tape and continues on her way. She waters some flowers with the water pail of a window washer. Thus she is established as eccentric, but from then on she has no other bits of business to continue that she is eccentric. She comes off as Rosie from THE AFRICAN QUEEN dropped into the wrong film.
Claude Dauphin has a cute bit where he says he is a doctor with his office being an outdoor cafe, later says he's a vet and later still an attorney.
Danny Kaye does a spectacular job as a defendant justifying his capitalist ways.
The leaders of the Military/Industrial state are called the BOARD played by Gavin, Heinreid, Boyer, Komolka & Brynner. The eccentric women are Hepburn, Evans, Leighton and Maison. Pleasance is a new member of the Board whose nephew Chamberlain is a student radical protesting society.
Here's what I found weird: in each scene everyone is doing a great job. The flow of the script and dialogue seem good, but something is not working. I think another editor should have been given a shot. There seems to be a good movie here, but it's not appearing on the screen.
It's worth a one time look to watch great actors doing their stuff. And if you enjoy sometimes looking at a film to decide how you would fix it, here's your movie.
