Prime Time: King Solomon's Mines (1985)

If you’re going to make a movie that hopes to cash in on the success of Indiana Jones then you may as well be as blatant as possible about it. King Solomon’s Mines, based on the old adventure stories by H. Rider Haggard (although I couldn’t say how closely the film resembles them), is about as blatant as can be. That doesn’t matter when the stars get to shine. But there are many sequences when things just aren’t as entertaining as they should be.

Richard Chamberlain is rugged adventurer Allan Quatermain, hired by a woman named Jesse (Sharon Stone) to help find her father. The two travel around Africa, being as respectful and culturally sensitive as you might expect (aka not at all), and they end up heading towards the legendary King Solomon’s Mines, hotly pursued by a man named Dogati (John Rhys-Davies) and a German explorer named Colonel Bochner (Herbert Lom).

Directed by veteran J. Lee Thompson, a man with a filmography crammed full of the kind of movies you may have been forced to watch alongside your grandfather on a Sunday afternoon (hey, I love many of them now, despite slightly resenting them back then), King Solomon’s Mines is, in many ways, enjoyable action fare. The script, by Gene Quintano and James R. Silke, neither of whom seem to have specialized experience in this genre, is crude and clumsy, but there are enough set-pieces dotted throughout to guarantee a certain level of fun. It’s just a shame that you can imagine those set-pieces being improved by the main music from the Indians Jones movies. Or even just featuring Indiana Jones in place of Quatermain. That isn’t the big problem here though. The big problem is a lack of any chemistry between the leads, a lack of any decent characterization for anyone, and nothing to really care about. We’re thrown into the plot with a sequence that allows us to assume some of the backstory, the finale is unsatisfying and unbelievable, so it’s really only the middle section that works as well as it should (especially during a fun action sequence set on a train).

Chamberlain is handsome and charming, which is kind of what he brings to almost every role, and Stone is left to look pretty alongside him, sometimes acting more as the damsel in distress and sometimes being a strong and capable asskicker. It could have been a decent role, but the script leaves her as undeveloped as our hero, only interested in putting them in various perilous situations and then developing some kind of love between the two of them that feels even more fantastical than some of the other plot elements. Rhys-Davies and Lom are fun villains, although the former will keep reminding viewers that you could always just switch this off and revisit those Indiana Jones movies. Ken Gampu and June Buthelezi deserve a mention, playing African characters who are generally treated poorly by the script playing up their “primitive ways”.

If you can look past the rear projection work and the stunt double appearances, there’s some genuinely impressive stuff onscreen at times, from that aforementioned train sequence to a face-off between two airplanes in the sky. There is plenty of dynamite thrown around, some booby traps and big beasties, and even some cannibals that want to boil people in a big pot in a way usually only seen in cartoon depictions of cannibalism.

I doubt anyone involved will look back on this as their best work, even the Jerry Goldsmith score is quite forgettable (although not actually bad), but I hope they don’t view it as their worst. It’s very much of the era, and very much a Cannon film, but it certainly tries to stay entertaining from start to finish.

5/10

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Noir November: Night And The City (1950)

The great thing about the classic film noirs, from my limited experience, is that so few of them seem to be awful. They were movies that could really make the most of their resources, and often had numerous character actors giving some of their best performances. I'm not naive enough to think that every one is a winner, but the hit ratio seems to be a lot higher than other types of movies from this era. And many remain near-perfect viewing experiences. Night And The City is one of the greats.

Richard Widmark stars as Harry Fabian, one of the classic schmucks of film noir. Fabian is a small-time hustler with dreams of the big time. He has a lovely woman in his life (Gene Tierney), who puts up with more than most women would, and he has a network of people who could end up helping him out, if only he'd put his energies to better use. But he knows better, of course, and soon comes up with a scheme to make himself the biggest name in the local wrestling scene. Not by becoming a wrestler, you understand, but by poaching some big names to draw in crowds. He'll put on the best shows, once he sorts out the initial capital investment, which he hopes he can acquire from either Helen (Googie Withers) or her husband, Philip (Francis L. Sullivan). Whoever helps him is going to be upsetting someone else.

Based on a novel by Gerald Kersh, Night And The City is both a painful character study and also, as the title suggests, a look at how the world can be a very different place for those who don't stick to the 9-5 daytime hours that so many others aim for. Director Jules Dassin keeps things balanced between bleak and mesmerising, helped in no small part by the great cast, and also the script by Jo Eisinger. Fabian is a central character who seems destined to fail from the opening scenes, yet he's someone that you can still root for when the odds start to really stack up against him. He's a hustler and a con artist, but he's often honest about it. Certainly more honest than some who end up resenting his ambition.

Widmark is superb in the central role, not exactly oozing charm but certainly putting a positive spin on his own failings until he starts to get more desperate. Tierney's role is a relatively small one, but she's as great as ever. And the sweetest person in the whole movie. Withers and Sullivan are both pretty fantastic, always turning things up a notch whenever they appear to continue the secret game of chess that they're playing against one another, and Herbert Lom is a credible threat as the powerful man that Fabian ends up butting heads with. The great performances don't stop there, however, and I need to also praise Hugh Marlowe, Stanislaus Zbyszko, Mike Mazurki, Charles Farrell, Ada Reeve and Ken Richmond. I think that covers all of the main players.

If you're new to film noir then there are many other classics that are easier to enjoy, films that make for more comfortable starting points, but this remains a real gem. Not just a look at one unsavoury character, it takes viewers on a journey into a world where the unsavoury characters hide and thrive. Fantastic stuff.

9/10

http://www.amazon.com/Night-Criterion-Collection-Richard-Widmark/dp/B0006Z2NE0/ref=sr_1_1?s=movies-tv&ie=UTF8&qid=1415130541&sr=1-1&keywords=night+and+the+city

The Phantom Of The Opera (1962)

A version of the classic Gaston Leroux tale that never seems to receive much love from fans, Hammer take on The Phantom Of The Opera and provide horror fans with a delightful interpretation of the famous story.

Herbert Lom, obviously masked for most of the runtime, plays the Phantom this time around. Eschewing the doomed romance at the heart of the classic tale, the Phantom till ends up after a young singer named Christine (Heather Sears) to make her into an unforgettable star of the stage. Christine, for her part, seems nice enough. When she's not being uncomfortably chatted up by Lord Ambrose D'Arcy (Michael Gough) she is developing a relationship with the handsome Harry Hunter (Edward de Souza). But the Phantom has a habit of reminding people that he's around.

Directed by Terence Fisher, The Phantom Of The Opera is as lavish and baroque as you'd expect, at times. The main opera being performed is all about the life of Joan Of Arc and the sets and design are both wonderfully theatrical and also nicely settled within a typical Hammer budget. In fact, there are only a few sets used in the movie, or it at least seems that way, but each one is so carefully put together and made into such a nice showpiece that the relatively small scale of the production is covered up, and even turned into an asset.

The script by Anthony Hinds takes the classic tale and adds some nice twists to it, making it fresh while never betraying the essence of the material. This has never been my favourite of the beloved horror classics and, personally, I enjoyed the changes that were made. Perhaps the fact that this is overlooked so often tells me hat other Phantom fans didn't like the changes as much as I did.

Sears is fine in the role of Christine, and de Souza is an okay leading man, but this movie belongs to two men, Lom and Gough. The former gives a great physical performance, and also does sterling work in a pre-Phantom flashback sequence that reveals the backstory of the character and the cause of his rage, while the latter has so much fun being nasty to everyone around him that this ends up being one of his best roles. Michael Ripper has a VERY small role (billed, I believe, as Cabbie #1) and Patrick Troughton steals his main scene, playing a callous and carefree ratcatcher.

Give this one a go sometime, especially if you've forgotten about it while catching other interpretations of the story. You might just end up liking it as much as I did.

7/10

http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-Phantom-Opera-Region-Hammer/dp/B001MZXAZE/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1381237284&sr=8-1&keywords=the+phantom+of+the+opera+1962

The Ladykillers (1955)

When, years ago, I was eagerly trying to communicate to someone just why I loved The Ladykillers so much I said the following: "imagine if the Reservoir Dogs were stuck in a house with a little old lady and they kept trying to get her out of their way, but failing." Now, that was perhaps a silly and flippant way to describe it, but I was trying to do two things. First, I was trying to describe the plot in one sentence while highlighting what a brilliant blend it was. Second, I was trying to show how truly timeless it was. I may have failed to do either of those things, but at least I tried.

The great Alec Guinness gets, arguably, his best ever role as Professor Marcus, a criminal mastermind with a new scheme that seems so stupid it could be a stroke of genius. He rents a room in the household of kindly Mrs. Wilberforce (Katie Johnson) and then invites his gang along to join him, only they're masquerading as a musical quintet. Cecil Parker, Herbert Lom, Peter Sellers and Danny Green play his cohorts and not one of them puts a foot wrong. Unbeknownst to Mrs. Wilberforce, she is crucial to the whole plan. Will everything go smoothly? Well, that wouldn't be any fun now, would it?

It's hard for me to know where to begin in my praise for The Ladykillers. I want to mention every actor, every scene and every great line of dialogue, but I don't want to be some rambling bore (for anyone who rolled their eyes and thought that I'd already made that my specialty . . . . . . . . how dare you). For the sake of brevity, let's just assume that I've already heaped enough praise upon Guinness,  Johnson, Parker, Lom, Sellers, Green, Jack Warner (who plays a superintendent), Philip Stainton (who plays the sergeant) and Kenneth Connor and Frankie Howerd, who both have small, but memorable, roles. And let's assume that I mentioned the many wonderful scenes and the many wonderful exchanges in the script and then repeated myself for hours on end. There. I think that should do it.

The screenplay by William Rose really zips along from start to finish and the direction by Alexander Mackendrick takes each separate element and puts them together perfectly, but it's the cast that makes the movie the timeless classic that it is. If you don't believe me then just watch the remake by the Coen brothers. Actually, don't. I'd never forgive myself for recommending it to anyone, even as a joke.

People who know my taste know that I enjoy movies across a very, VERY broad spectrum, but watching a film like The Ladykillers serves as a wonderful reminder of why I have, and always hope to have, a passion for film. It's easy to pick a number of worthy films that people should see and enjoy for a variety of reasons (technical accomplishments, acting prowess, etc. etc.), but it's also just as easy to pick a number of films that people should see just to be provided with flawless entertainment from start to finish. Films like this one.

If you haven't seen it yet then rectify that oversight ASAP.

10/10

http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-Ladykillers-Blu-ray/dp/B0042FPSLA/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&qid=1361640680&sr=8-4

Mysterious Island (1961)

Another great adventure movie featuring the work of Ray Harryhausen, Mysterious Island is yet another movie that I can't view without a warm cloak of nostalgia draping itself around me. These movies make up the main threads, the strongest ones, that hold together the patchwork of movie memories from my childhood. Even after trying to wipe the rose tinting from my glasses, figuratively speaking, I can't help but still view these as really good films. People may accuse me of being unable to look at the films subjectively nowadays. Or there's a chance that, y'know, maybe many of these films that made use of Harryhausen's creations are just really good films.

Set during the American Civil War, the plot sees some POWs grabbing hostages and escaping from their prison in a hot air balloon. They then find themselves at the mercy of the elements until eventually landing near to the titular island. Working together to survive, the men find themselves in unexpected danger from a giant crab, some huge bees, pirates and more. Thankfully, they also welcome a couple of women into their group after they are washed up on the shore, and they seem to receive a helping hand from someone else who chooses not to show himself.

Based (VERY loosely) on the novel by Jules Verne, Mysterious Island has a decent script from John Prebble, Daniel B. Ullman and Crane Wilbur, and solid direction from Cy Endfield. The cast - Michael Craig, Joan Greenwood, Michael Callan, Gary Merrill, Herbert Lom et al - also do a good job. Whether they're battling that aforementioned giant crab or being terrified by a huge chicken monster beastie (to use the technical term), they react appropriately and somewhat convincingly. They may also, for the most part, be a group of people rather than memorable individuals, but one or two main characters (including, of course, a certain Captain Nemo) just manage to do enough to stand out. Just.

While this is, obviously, a better movie for those wanting to see some more work from Harryhausen, the fact that it has many enjoyable moments without any creatures involved makes it a more wholly satisfying experience than some of his other outings. Lovers of the book may take offence at the numerous changes, but they work well in terms of making the whole tale more exciting and cinematic.

Not one of the absolute classics, but a very, very good film.

8/10

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Mysterious-Island-DVD-Michael-Craig/dp/B000071WJ1/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1368552106&sr=8-1&keywords=mysterious+island