Two films on designated mutually assured nuclear annihilation out in 1964: FAIL SAFE for ‘squares’ & the painfully earnest, and, for bleakly ironic hipsters & cineastes, the darkly hilarious DR. STRANGELOVE. That dichotomy echoed in a pair of post-Korean War thrillers on after-effects from POW psychological manipulation where the sharp dramatic talons & comic menace of THE MANCHURIAN CANDIDATE/’62 were proceeded by an adaptation of this well-meant ‘well-made’ B’way play*; producer Richard Widmark & Richard Basehart stepping into roles Arthur Kennedy & Richard Kiley had on stage. Basehart, a confessed collaborator during his imprisonment; Col. Widmark not sure he should be charged with any crime at all, suspecting that the man is covering for other POWs all speaking & acting in suspicious lockstep as if programmed. With convenient plot turns and coincidences forcing complicated issues into neat little stacks of expedience & conscience, the play was never going to amount to much (it's basically a courtroom drama set in a Colonel's office), but might have worked simply as an actors’ showcase with someone other than Karl Malden megging, his one & only directing gig. One memorably bad camera angle turning a punch into a punchline for the ages. (Our poster immortalizes the moment.) Partial saving grace is little known Dolores Michaels, delightful & dishy as Widmark’s assistant. Malden’s one clever camera placement a setup for Martin Balsam to make a sexist joke on her to debuting Rip Torn, a witness so guilt-free you just know he’s hiding a guilty secret when not chewing the scenery.
ATTENTION MUST BE PAID: *The two films even share bald Korean military villain Khigh Dhiegh.
WATCH THIS, NOT THAT/LINK: Next time Widmark self-produced, he got smart and hired Phil Karlson, one of the best budget-minded directors in the biz, for THE SECRET WAYS/'61. https://maksquibs.blogspot.com/2021/04/the-secret-ways-1961.html
No comments:
Post a Comment