Arthur Penn's Mickey One is a great example of a film that could have made real waves had it arrived at the right time and found the right audience. Sadly, audiences were perhaps unprepared for this radical new approach to film-making, at least for an American studio, as the film's free-wheeling, care-free attitude and style, heavily influenced by the burgeoning French New Wave in Europe, was a turn-off for critics. Despite attracting attention at the Venice Film Festival, Mickey One bombed hard at the box-office, and has faded into obscurity ever since. Had it arrived a few years later, when Hollywood really started to embrace new ideas and the visions of filmmakers, it may now be more highly regarded, although with its offbeat, freestyle-jazz swagger, Mickey One would still infuriate as much as it would inspire.
Mickey One (Warren Beatty) is a handsome, successful stand-up comic in Detroit enjoying a hedonistic life of alcohol, women and gambling. When a night of over-indulgence causes him to lose a wad of cash at the craps table, he flees the city for Chicago, knowing that the Mafia will be after his head for failing to pay his debts. He lays low, renting a tiny apartment and taking a job washing dishes at a restaurant. Unsatisfied with his situation, Mickey can't resist the lure of the clubs, and is soon in the front row heckling a fellow comic and stealing his laughs. He gets himself an agent and eventually returns to the stage, taking lowly gigs as he remains wary of the target on his back. Mickey can sing, play piano, and spit jokes at the drop of a hat, so it isn't long until he lands a spot at an upscale club called Xanadu. With his paranoia raging, Mickey struggles to decide whether or not to take the job, and the predicament isn't helped by the arrival of a beautiful, yet unwanted flatmate named Jenny (Alexandra Stewart).
Mickey One is a very odd film indeed. Scattershot in style and heavy on visual metaphors, it dazzles and demands your attention, but is about as infuriating as being forced to spend the night in a jazz club when you hate jazz. It introduces Mickey - which isn't even his real name - via a dizzying montage before throwing him out in the cold as he looks to duck any gangsters coming his way. We barely get to know him before being pulled along on his existential journey of self-discovery, and Penn is happy to grind the story to a halt in favour of a long conversation in a room (a la A bout de souffle). Still, its difficult to resist being swept along in its uncompromising rhythm and savouring some of the truly bizarre imagery on show. The sight of people trampolining in front of a bridge comes out of nowhere, as does a demonstration by a man credited as 'The Artist' (played by Kamatari Fujiwara), which involves a huge, self-destructive machine called Yes that quickly catches fire. I have no idea what it all means, but it's delightfully unique. And that about sums up Mickey One as a whole: you probably won't know what the hell just happened, but you'll have a memorable time.
Russ Meyer's keen eye for satire is in full swing in Mudhoney, one of the cult filmmaker's best films, as he explores the extremities on both sides of a topic he spent most of his career pondering and exploiting. Set in the one-horse town of Spooner, Missouri during the Great Depression, its inhabitants seem to spend their time between either a farm owned by kind and respectable old man Lute Wade (Stuart Lancaster) and the local brothel ran by a toothless, moonshine-brewing madame who "ain't turned a trick in fifteen years." Mudhoney bears comparison with Meyer's Lorna, made just the year before, in the way it explores themes of sexuality in an unconventional, and perhaps controversial, manner. Both films also starred Meyer favourite Lorna Maitland.
While making the journey from Michigan to California in search of work, drifter and ex-jailbird Calif McKinney (John Furlong) is approached by Eula (Rena Horten), a buxom deaf-mute girl who takes an immediate liking to the handsome young man. It is suggested Calif travels to Wade's farm to seek out a job, and seeing the ex-con's genuine desire to turn his life around, the old man employs him as an extra hand to help out around the place. Calif also meets Wade's niece Hannah (Antoinette Cristiani) and almost instantly falls in love with her. Hannah is beautiful and kind, but also emotionally beaten down by her monstrous husband and town drunk Sidney Brenshaw (Hal Hopper), who fills his time at the local brothel swigging corn-liquor, when he isn't harassing the town's female occupants with his lecherous behaviour.
Sidney is central to the film's concerns. Dressed in a dirty old suit and cowboy hat, licking his thin lips as he arrives home drunk to rape his poor wife, he is borderline comical in his monstrosity, and Hopper is fantastic in the role. His two stomping grounds - the dingy brothel and the farm he calls home - are two sides of the same coin. One represents sexual freedom, a place a man can get his rocks off without fear of judgement, and the other a breeding ground for violence, born out of Sidney's lust to gratify all of his sexual desires and prove his manhood. The town, which has little to no law and order, shows the risks of unchecked human behaviour. It ends with a lynching, and although there's no suggestion of racial tension, Mudhoney captures how resentment and anger can grow out of loneliness, resentment and sheer boredom, where one angry word from a man in a position of authority can quickly turn into a lynch mob. It's perhaps Meyer's most interesting work and, thanks mainly to Hopper, one of his most entertaining.
The last of three movies directed by exploitation legend and pioneer of the 'nudie cutie' Russ Meyer in 1965, Motor Psycho is one the filmmaker's few 'normal' movies, that is one not filled to the brim with impressively-breasted babes and scrawny, sex-mad males. It instead falls into the biker gang category, one of the many branches of the 'juvenile delinquent' sub-genre which emerged as parents and the media alike voiced their concerns about the increasingly rebellious youth culture of the time. Similar in many ways to one of Meyer's other 1965 movies (and undoubtedly his most popular film), Faster Pussycat... Kill! Kill! (Mudhoney was also released that year), Motor Psycho substitutes the strong, revenge-fuelled gang of women led by the unforgettable Tura Satana for a trio of tortured men, and the result is actually pretty good.
The gang, led by demented Vietnam veteran Brahmin (Steve Oliver), have taken a liking to antagonising the locals of a small town, firstly terrorising a young, beautiful women trying to relax with her passive, hen-pecked husband, before their intentions turns even nastier. They torment veterinarian Cory Maddox (Alex Rocco, who played Moe Green in The Godfather) before raping his wife while he is away from home flirting with a voluptuous horse-breeder. He returns to find his wife battered and abused, but it is "nothing a woman isn't built for," according to the local sheriff (played by Meyer himself). Maddox decides to take matters into his own hands, gradually tracking Brahmin and his cronies as he follows their path of destruction. He comes across Ruby Bonner (Faster Pussycat's Haji), the wife of a man the gang have just murdered in cold blood, and the two partner up to end the gang's reign of terror once and for all.
Any fans of the director going into Motor Psycho hoping to see a collection of naughty vignettes featuring some of his familiar roster of beauties will likely be disappointed, although the film is another fine example of Meyer's skill with editing, cinematography and use of music. A minimal budget rarely hampered Meyer, and Motor Psycho is fast-paced and jazzy, and surprisingly features a handful of decent performances. This was one of the first times a damaged Vietnam veteran had been portrayed on screen, and Oliver has fun going way over the top as the sadistic, angry young leader. For a film dealing with rape (and Meyer takes the subject matter seriously), it is also very funny in places. Most memorable is a scene in which Maddox is bitten by a snake and demands Ruby to suck out the venom. "Suck it! Suck it!" he screams as he forces her head onto the wound. It would seem that Meyer couldn't resist a little playful innuendo. This is a competent little western revenge B-movie, often released under the more eye-catching title of Motorpsycho!.
After Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho (1960) made cinematic waves and raked in the profits as a result, studios were eager to deliver their own take on mad-man horror cinema. Hammer's unique brand of British gothic and literary monsters was begin to wobble as audience's tastes moved on as a result of the leaps and bounds being made in the genre in Europe and the U.S.. Robert Aldrich's What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? (1962) made a success out of bringing a once-Hollywood great, Bette Davis, out of a forced early retirement and turning her into a screen psychopath. Hammer pinched Davis for themselves in The Nanny (1965), and repeated the trick again the same year with Tallulah Bankhead in Die! Die! My Darling!, or to give it its blander, more widely-used alternative title, Fanatic.
American Patricia Carroll (Stefanie Powers) arrives in London to marry her handsome beau Alan (Maurice Kaufmann). After admitting that she has been exchanging letters with the mother of her former, now-dead fiance, she heads off on her own to pay a visit to her would-be mother-in-law when Alan disapproves. Patricia believes that she is doing a nice thing. and the old lady Mrs. Trefoile (Bankhead) seems harmless enough at first, if a little nutty. She is being guilt-tripped into staying the night, and ends up staying much longer than she had planned, as the true extent of Mrs. Trefoile's religious zealotry reveals itself. There are no mirrors in the house as vanity is a sin, lip-stick and red clothing are banned, and the food consists of unrecognisable slop. Just as Patricia is about to leave, she lets slip of her intention to re-marry, causing Mrs. Trefoile to lock the poor young lady away until she learns the evil of her ways.
It may not be the most memorable entry into the fleeting 'psycho-biddy' fad, but Die! Die! My Darling! has its fair share of moments courtesy of a tight and witty script by Richard Matheson, and a fiery performance by Bankhead, in what turned out to be her final appearance (she died the following year). Powers cuts a likeable but frustrating lead, as she fails time and time again to make any real attempts to escape outside of making the occasional feeble struggle. Any in the audience used to the hardened, capable heroines we tend to get nowadays will no doubt be shouting at the screen. There's a terrific supporting cast, which includes husband-and-wife servants Harry (Peter Vaughan) and Anna (Yootha Joyce), and a young Donald Sutherland as the simple-minded Joseph. You may not have the desire to see it more than once in your lifetime, but it makes for a cosy Saturday afternoon B-movie.
The crews of two giant interplanetary ships. the Galliott and the Argos, head to an unexplored planet shrouded in fog and mystery after intercepting a distress signal. When landing the two crafts lose contact with each other, and the Argos, lead by the experienced Captain Markary (Barry Sullivan), lands safely after some brief but heavy turbulence. Upon arrival, the crew of the Argos inexplicably attack each other, with only Markary able to resist the strange urge to kill. After they've been knocked out of their trance-like state, they travel to the nearby Galliott to find the entire crew either missing or dead. They bury the dead they find and set out to explore the vast wasteland, but Tiona (Evi Marandi) keeps having visions of the walking dead.
Though far more experienced in horror, gialli and sword-and-sandal pictures, the great Mario Bava turns Planet of the Vampires into the most gorgeous sci-fi of its era. The planet, Aura, is desolate but strangely beautiful. Using bold primary colours and going overtime on a smoke machine, Bava infuses the planet with a suitably otherworldly atmosphere, which helps distract from the relatively formulaic plot. The director's love for horror can barely be contained as the crew start to rise from the dead. Placed in makeshift tombs and wrapped in a plastic sheet, they rise like blue-faced ghouls. Free from any distracting edits and backed by Gino Marinuzzi's eerie score, it is the most visually arresting moment in the film.
It often gets cited as one of the inspirations for Ridley Scott's Alien (1979), though Scott and writer Dan O'Bannon claim to have never seen it prior to making the film. While Markary and his crew's discovery of giant humanoid skeletons does bring to mind the space jockey found in Scott's masterpiece, the two share little else in common. Behind the visual splendour, Planet of the Vampires suffers from a cheesy script and wooden acting, the common bane of the B-movie. Aside from an exciting set-piece involving an escape from a locked room having its oxygen sucked out, the film is actually quite plodding when it forces us to spend time with its collection of cut-out archetypes. Beautiful, certainly, and perhaps inspirational, but mark this amongst Bava's more mediocre efforts that are still worth checking out.
Somewhere around the middle of the 1950's the teenager became an autonomous commodity in the west, garnering their own, distinctive "movements". In Britain - before The Beatles - the majority of youth identities were extracted from American sub-cultures. In Guy Hamilton's The Party's Over, the youthful group, or gang, are heavily influenced by the beat generation whose poetry and writing confronted political and social change through nihilistic, non-conformist characters and ideologies. Known in popular culture and the media as Beatniks (the "niks" added later in America to codify the group with communist affiliations - the nik was taken from the Sputnik, the Russian satellite that was launched in 1957), Oliver Reed's gang leader, Moise, guides his group through the hedonistic party scene of early 1960's London, opening with a shot of the Albert bridge in the early morning as the partied-out gang mope zombie-like, with Annie Ross's dour theme tune playing on their mournful souls. But what the film seems to focus the majority of its attentions on is the damaging consequences of both group mentality and heavy, prolonged partying. It's a moral tone that both reflects British society.
Along with the iconography of youth gang, with the tribal costuming - contrary to the idea of individuality and non-conformity, it's ironic that these ideas are scuppered by the entourage to the central trend-setting leader, - the film is about the changing political and social setting of Britain. In the still war-torn London of the early 1960's, an American businessman, Carson (Cifford David), has been sent over the Atlantic in search of his fiancee, Melina (Louise Sorel), who has been enveloped by the Chelsea set gang. Carson has been sent over by her father, a rich and powerful businessman himself. The gang, co-ordinated by Moise, send Carson on a cat and mouse chase around London, in search of the girl whom seems to be either an enigma or a skillful evader. It seems to be no accident that the American character is suave, sophisticated, smart and in control of his life, whilst the gang members are rough and without moral values. Britain was losing its Empire, and America was becoming the dominant super-power. The juxtaposition of the two transatlantic male central characters shows the parallel between the optimism of the new power and the degrading attitudes of the dying empire. As Carson begins to move deeper into the gangs secrets and situations, the dark and jarring truth changes everyone around them.
The Party's Over was an incredibly controversial film at the time, and inevitably, the film was problematic for the British Board of Film Censors. At the centre of this contention was a particular scene at a party. Melina is seen laying at the edges of the dance floor. Members of the gang stand over her, mocking her, claiming that she is unable to handle her drink. The scene quickly turns to sinister and depraved areas, which become even harder to swallow once we discover that Melina was in fact dead. The gang, like vultures, dive onto her, pulling her clothes off. A young member of the gang, Phillip (Jonathan Burn), mounts Melina in this scene, kissing and fondling her - an action that he later fatefully regrets. This scene is shown from different perspectives, much like Akira Kurosawa's Rashomon (1950). Unfortunately, due to its very suggestive nature, the British censors cut around 18 minutes from the film, and was overlooked on its release. In the cut released in 1965, the power of the film is totally lost, as these scenes are central to both the films themes and narrative. These cuts also lead to director Guy Hamilton (who would later make his name on several Bond films) and producer Anthony Perry removing their names from the credits.
But it is Reed's central performance that dominates the screen. It is not a large step away from a previous role in Joseph Losey's The Damned (1963), but his brooding, antagonistic presence is illuminating. He mocks and berates at those sycophants around him, bleating at them like a sheep, laughing at their following natures. He does however, respect those who defy him, despite his later moral maturity. In one sense the film offers an insight into the decay of post-Empire Britain, and a glimpse into the moralising of the newly dominant America. But also the film highlights what many youth films tend to forget. These youth movements (particularly in the 1960's - including the later "Hippie" movement) are fundamentally entrenched in privilege. Therefore, whilst the films young characters are rough, violent, self-absorbed, these are the future Representatives of the British class system. Perhaps more the reason for the BBFC's attack on the film: it may well have been a different release if the gang members were from the other side of London, the East-end, as opposed the West.
When a group of photographers and models sneak into an apparently abandoned castle to do a photo-shoot, they are immediately asked to leave by the castle's inhabitant, Travis Anderson (Mickey Hargitay). But when he recognises his ex-fiancé Edith (Luisa Baratto) amongst the group, he changes his mind and gives them the freedom of the castle. Lurking in the castle's dungeons, where the group have set up, is the preserved body of an executed serial-killer named The Crimson Executioner, and when his coffin is disturbed, his spirit is released and enters the body of Travis. Soon enough, bodies are dropping like flies while the 'hero' Rick (Walter Brandi), desperately attempts to save them.
Former Mr. Universe Mickey Hargitay made a moderately successful career for himself after appearing in the excellently madcap Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter? (1957) with his wife Jayne Mansfield. He was mainly employed in B-grade Italian horror movies such as the twisted Delirium (1972), and he is just about the only good thing is Bloody Pit of Horror, also known as The Red Hangman, A Tale of Torture, and most hilariously, Some Virgins for the Hangman. Although his role is completely ridiculous, he has a hulking presence that brings a likeability to Travis, even when he is wide-eyed, tightening the hold of a rack. Plus I couldn't imagine anyone else being able to pull off those red, spandex pants.
The sets have a bright, technicholour warmth about them, reminiscent of some of the classic Hammer horrors and Roger Corman's Poe adaptations, that give the film a nicely gothic, if slightly camp, feel. But ultimately it is as effective as wrapping a ribbon around a turd, failing to cover up the sheer atrocity of its direction. It is so over-the-top and silly that the film ends up feeling like a cartoon, containing torture scenes that include a woman stuck in a giant web with a spider so badly constructed, I don't know if it was meant to be real or not. That said, I still found this quite fun, but I don't feel good about it.
It's easy to forget that beneath all the controversy and hullabaloo that has surrounded the majority of Roman Polanski's post-The Tenant (1976)career, Polanski was once one of the most exciting and formidable film-makers in the world. He could once stand up amongst the true greats of World Cinema, and even directed one of the greatest American films ever made in Chinatown (1974). It could be argued that his career remained strong after he was charged for underage sexual abuse, and he did even win an Oscar for 2002's The Pianist, but to me, he was never quite the same. He was once truly exceptional, and 1965's Repulsion is one of the best examples of his work.
Carole Ledoux (Catherine Deneuve) is a Belgian manicurist living in London with her sister. Although she is beautiful, she is extremely timid and quiet, and seems to have an unhealthy fear of men. She is being wooed by Colin (John Fraser) but she repeatedly stands him up. When her sister Helen (Yvonne Furneaux) and her boyfriend Michael (Ian Hendry) leave for Italy, Carole is left alone in her apartment. She begins to hallucinate about cracks appearing in the wall, and that a faceless man waits in her bed to rape her every night. As her mental state declines, she is paid a visit by Colin who is worried about her reclusiveness.
I put on this film without knowing at all what it was about, and after the first 45 minutes, it was still unclear. It felt like I was being teased and slowly drawn in by the atmosphere and beautiful black-and-white photography, only to be suddenly yanked into to this nightmarish world. Polanski and his director of cinematography Gilbert Taylor make the most out of the ordinary looking apartment. They turn it into the mind of Carole - cracks shockingly appear in the walls, arms grope her from the walls, and a skinned rabbit lays rotting and rancid in her living room.
Deneuve is a revelation here. She barely utters a word in the whole two hours, and instead lets her face do the acting. But the real star here is Polanski, who manages to keep a tight grip of the proceedings for the entire two hours and never lets up, and doesn't make it easy for you. Is Carole's mind tortured by her fear of what men are capable of? Or is she driven mad by suppressing her psycho-sexual fantasties? Either way, Repulsion is beautiful, horrifying, gripping and thrilling.
Set in 1960's 'Swinging' London, The Pleasure Girls follows a group of free-spirited bohemian-type girls who share a flat. Sally (Francesca Annis) is a new arrival, and soon hooks up with bad-boy Keith (Ian McShane) and the two begin to fall in love. One girl has to put with her gambling-addicted husband who pawns a brooch heirloom for a poker game and ends up losing the money amongst other things. And another girl dates the successful and rich flat landlord Nikko (Klaus Kinski) who gets himself into trouble with a gang of thugs. And that's pretty much it really.
Released as part of BFI's 'Flipside' collection that has recently come to DVD and Blu-Ray, the collection is there to show an alternative side to British filmmaking. Alternative they most certainly are; good they are generally not.I watched The Pleasure Girls a couple of days ago and can barely remember a scene. The film certainly serves as an interesting time-capsule, and it's nice to see a more innocent and forward-thinking time where style dominated the youth and sexual liberation was in its early stages. It also has two promising young actors in McShane and the incomparable Kinski. But overall, the characters are annoying, the plot plodding and uninteresting, and a title that was a titillating disguise for a rather desperately dull film.
Mickey One (Warren Beatty) is a handsome, successful stand-up comic in Detroit enjoying a hedonistic life of alcohol, women and gambling. When a night of over-indulgence causes him to lose a wad of cash at the craps table, he flees the city for Chicago, knowing that the Mafia will be after his head for failing to pay his debts. He lays low, renting a tiny apartment and taking a job washing dishes at a restaurant. Unsatisfied with his situation, Mickey can't resist the lure of the clubs, and is soon in the front row heckling a fellow comic and stealing his laughs. He gets himself an agent and eventually returns to the stage, taking lowly gigs as he remains wary of the target on his back. Mickey can sing, play piano, and spit jokes at the drop of a hat, so it isn't long until he lands a spot at an upscale club called Xanadu. With his paranoia raging, Mickey struggles to decide whether or not to take the job, and the predicament isn't helped by the arrival of a beautiful, yet unwanted flatmate named Jenny (Alexandra Stewart).
