ONCE A THIEF

Alain Delon

ONCE A THIEF (1965). Director: Ralph Nelson. Colorized.  

Born in Trieste, Eddie Pedak (Alain Delon), lives with his wife, Kristine (Ann-Margret), and little girl in San Francisco. An ex-con who may have shot a detective, Inspector Vido (Van Helfin), during a robbery -- Pedak was acquitted, however -- he comes under suspicion of a new robbery and murder in Chinatown and now Vido is on the case. Meanwhile Eddie's creepy brother Walter (Jack Palance) and his even creepier associates want Eddie to join them on another job that might net a huge profit in platinum. Eddie resists until he gets fired and discovers he can't get unemployment. But this caper might not go off without a hitch.

Delon with Van Heflin

Jazzed up -- literally -- with a loud, brassy and distracting score by Lalo Schifrin, Once a Thief still can't disguise the fact that its plot is really old hat. The ex-con trying to go straight; the unpleasant family associate who wants to drag him back in; the cop who's out to get him etc. etc. It's all been done many times before and this adds nothing new to the recipe unless you want to count two "sex symbols" in Ann-Margret -- who's not very sexy in this -- and Delon. Halfway through, the movie turns into a caper flick, but the robbery itself doesn't take up that much screen time. There is some excitement during the climax when thieves turn out, and Eddie and Vido turn into unlikely allies when the former's child is kidnapped. 

Ann-Margret with Delon

Delon gives a good performance; Ann-Margret is overwrought (even considering the circumstances) but effective enough; and Heflin turns in his customary professional job. Jack Palance seems more interested in putting on a show than in creating a real character, but on that level he's fine. John Davis Chandler and Tony Musante are suitably repulsive as Walter's unsavory associates, and Jeff Corey is notable as the lieutenant who tries to keep Vido in line. 

Verdict: Despite some interesting sequences and elements, this doesn't quite work. **1/2. 

DRACULA AND HIS PALS

DRACULA AND HIS PALS,

This week Great Old Movies looks at films starring the venerable old baddie, Dracula. You can already find reviews of the original 1931 Dracula with Bela Lugosi, as well as posts on Dracula's Daughter; the first Hammer Dracula film starring Christopher Lee, The Horror of Dracula; and one of the best follow-ups, the excellent Dracula, Prince of Darkness; among many others. Just type in "Dracula" in the search bar above.

Now this week we have Francis Lederer in The Return of Dracula; Jack Palance doing his version of the count for Dan Curtis; Ingrid Pitt doing a turn as Countess Dracula; and even William Marshall as Blacula. There is also Italian director Dario Argento's version of the classic story; among others. Just scroll down to enjoy. And feel free to leave a comment whether you agree with my assessment or not.

Thanks for reading!

DAN CURTIS' DRACULA (1974)

Jack Palance

DRACULA (aka Dan Curtis' Dracula/1974 telefilm). Produced and directed by Dan Curtis.

Jonathan Harker (Murray Brown) travels to Transylvania in Hungary to meet with Count Dracula (Jack Palance of Sudden Fear) at his castle. Dracula needs property in London to carry out his plans, which include meeting up with the reincarnation or lookalike of his lost love, who in this century is named Lucy (Fiona Lewis). Dracula's plans go awry thanks to the interference of Professor Van Helsing (Nigel Davenport), and the hunt is on for the vampire before he can destroy Lucy's friend Mina (Penelope Horner). Well-produced for a TV movie, this version of Dracula still smacks more of sunny California than Transylvania, but its main problem is a slow pace and a general lack of suspense and excitement. Palance has his moments as the evil count, but he is borderline hammy and not as effective as one might have imagined. Lewis is solid, but Simon Ward [The Chosen] generally doesn't bother to work up much emotion in his portrayal of the doomed Lucy's fiance, Arthur. Davenport [Mary Queen of Scots] is okay as Van Helsing, but frankly neither he nor Palance can wipe away the memory of Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing in the same roles. Murray Brown is quite good as Harker, however. This version of the story eliminates the crazy Renfield, there are no scenes of Dracula socializing with his victims as in the Lugosi version, and the supposedly romantic sub-plot (which is not in Bram Stoker\s novel) is entirely out of place. Sarah Douglas plays one of the vampire women who prey upon Jonathan Harker. A more interesting if much less faithful TV version appeared on Masterpiece Theatre in 2006. Dan Curtis was the man behind Dark Shadows, which also had a vampire obsessed with a lost love.

Verdict: Barely acceptable version of the famous story. **.

FLIGHT TO TANGIER

FLIGHT TO TANGIER (1953). Director: Charles Marquis Warren.

Susan Lane (Joan Fontaine), a reporter, arrives at the airport in Tangier only to see a small plane crash in flames. The pilot was supposed to be her boyfriend, Hank (John Picard), but there are no bodies on board the aircraft. Adventurer and war hero Gil Walker (Jack Palance) helps Susan find Hank and stay out of the clutches of sinister Danzer (Robert Douglas), whose girlfriend Nicki (Corinne Calvet) has a hankering for Gil and a few secrets of her own. Accused of murdering a policeman, Gil goes on the run with the two ladies as they all try to find Hank and whatever booty it is that Danzer is after. The first thing you have to wonder about Flight to Tangier is how on earth a classy actress like Fontaine wound up in this Grade C movie that pretty much utterly wastes her talents. Palance [Torture Garden] is fine, as weird as ever, Calvet [So This is Paris] is beautiful and not bad, although she's not quite up to her tougher scenes, and clean-shaven Douglas makes a fairly bland villain unlike his mustachioed bad guy of This Side of the Law. At least half the movie seems to consist of Fontaine and Palance -- an unlikely pairing -- running and running around occasionally scenic views of "Tangier." Murray Matheson has a small but pivotal role as a passenger on the plane who has something important to deliver. Warren also directed Unknown Terror, which is a lot more fun. If this was actually released in 3-D as the poster suggests, the movie apparently does little with the process.

Verdict: A couple of good scenes but this never amounts to much. **.

THE BIG KNIFE

Everett Sloane talks to Jack Palance

THE BIG KNIFE (1955). Producer/director: Robert Aldrich. Screenplay by James Poe from the play by Clifford Odets.

Movie star Charles Castle (Jack Palance) was involved in a hit and run that killed a child, but his p.r. man, Buddy (Paul Langton), took the rap for him. Charles' wife, Marion (Ida Lupino), who is separated from him, swears she'll divorce him if he re-signs with Stanley Hoff (Rod Steiger), who probably helped engineer the deception. Now there's a new complication: Castle had a woman with him in the car that night, Dixie Evans (Shelly Winters), and she's drunkenly shooting her mouth off everywhere she goes. Now Hoff and his associate Smiley (Wendell Corey), want to take care of Dixie -- permanently ... The Big Knife might have worked on the stage, and the Odets original was undoubtedly better than this half-baked adaptation, but the film sinks almost from the get-go. The chief problem is the epic miscasting of Jack Palance. Charlie might have evoked some sympathy in the viewer if he was played by a man who could get across his essential weakness and confusion, but Palance seems incapable of ever displaying the slightest trace of vulnerability. It gives the actor his presence and strength, but he's just all wrong for this picture. His scenes with Ida Lupino are stagey and over-rehearsed and just don't work at all -- both of them are busy "acting" instead of being. We're constantly being told of how wonderful Castle is and of his supposed integrity, but all we see is a corrupt, self-absorbed individual who allowed another man to take responsibility for his actions, slept with the man's wife, and acts like a dickhead throughout. When he protests at the idea of "silencing" Dixie, it's hard to believe that he would object -- he's the last one to take a high moral stance. It's up to the supporting cast to give the film whatever limited stature it has. Rod Steiger has some ferociously effective scenes as Stanley [some might think he's merely showing off]; Wendell Corey underplays beautifully as the slimy Smily; Everett Sloane is as solid as ever as Charles' agent; and Paul Langton has a beautifully and powerfully delivered speech to Castle at the end of the film that is one of the most memorable bits in the movie. As for the women, Ilka Chase offers a dead-on portrait of an oily, if stereotypical, gossip columnist, Shelley Winters is so-so as Dixie, and Jean Hagen fails to impress as Buddy's sluttish wife, Connie. Wesley Addy has a nice turn as the writer Hank Teagle. Oddly, a confrontation between Dixie and Hoff that might have been quite cinematic and dynamic is mentioned but not shown, but the film isn't "opened" up very much. It's hard to like or enjoy a movie in which virtually every character is either unpleasant or annoying. Robert Aldrich was the wrong director for this, as well. For a worthwhile Odets adaptation, see Clash By Night.

Verdict: A fairly embarrassing mess of Hollywood pseudo-profundity with horribly miscast leads. **.

SUDDEN FEAR

Jack Palance and Joan Crawford

SUDDEN FEAR (1952). Director: David Miller. 

Playwright Myra Hudson (Joan Crawford) thinks that Lester Blaine (Jack Palance) is a fine actor, but he just isn't "romantic-looking" enough for the lead in her new play. But it turns out that the actor is romantic-looking enough for Myra, as she meets him on a train and has a whirlwind romance with him. Myra is convinced that Lester honestly loves her, but she doesn't know about Irene (Gloria Grahame), the woman in his past ... It isn't long before Myra has to use all her skills at plotting to figure out a way to ... well, that would be telling. In the novel by Edna Sherry upon which this excellent suspense film is based, Lester actually looked like a Greek God, and was fired because he'd take attention away from the leading lady. Lester and Myra meet Irene at the same time, when the latter saves her from drowning. The novel has a kind of Eve Harrington/Margo Channing sub-plot which the film eschews, and Crawford's Myra is more likable and attractive than the woman in the book. As for the movie, which is well-directed by Miller, Crawford gives one of her best performances and illustrates the adept pantomiming she learned back in the silent period, and Palance and Graham are also top-notch. While the ending has been significantly changed, softened, from the novel, it's still satisfying, although the original ending might have given the film more bite and controversy. Mike Connors and Bruce Bennett (of Mildred Pierce) have smaller roles but are effective.

Verdict: Watch out Jack -- Joan's in command! ***1/2.

BATMAN (1989)

BATMAN (1989). Director: Tim Burton.

"I am the world's first fully-functioning homicidal artist." -- The Joker.

In Gotham City there are rumors of a bat-like creature preying on criminals. A mobster named Jack Napier (Jack Nicholson) falls into a vat of chemicals while battling this creature -- Batman (Michael Keaton) -- and turns into the grotesque Clown Prince of Crime, the Joker, who causes numerous deaths by poisoning various cosmetics and household supplies. Batman must then stop his nemesis from not only slaughtering thousands of Gothamites at a celebration, but must rescue his lady love, reporter Vicki Vale (Kim Basinger) from the Joker at a climax in a cathedral. Batman, whose human dramatics are awkwardly written and played, is more a campy black comedy than anything else, and is a bit slow and dull to boot. The movie is overlong and over-produced, although it gets points for its striking scenic design if little else. Keaton is miscast, and Nicholson walks off with the movie, although his psychotic Joker is never really scary. There are some moments that are dumber than anything in the old Batman serials. The climax, which may or may not have been intended as a homage to Vertigo's bell tower sequence, is stretched out to a tedious degree. Jack Palance and Michael Gough are good as hoodlum Grissom and Alfred the butler, respectively.

Verdict: All too typical of movies that pay more attention to production design and FX than they do to story and character. **.

THE SPY IN THE GREEN HAT

THE SPY IN THE GREEN HAT (1966). Director: Joseph Sargent. 

The Spy in the Green Hat was the European theatrical version of the two part Man from U.N.C.L.E. episode "The Concrete Overcoat Affair." Thrush has decided upon a crazy plan to turn Greenland into "Thrushland" and is planning to use deadly missiles in their scheme. Louis Strago (Jack Palance) is the person Thrush has assigned to this plan and he is assisted by a sadistic secretary/assassin played by Janet Leigh. While investigating the operation, UNCLE agent Napoleon Solo (Robert Vaughn) is caught in the bedroom of a pretty young Italian girl , Pia (Leticia Roman). Her relatives, prohibition mobsters who are now elderly men (Eduardo Ciannelli; Allen Jenkins), go after Solo to force him to marry her, but wind up teaming up with him when they learn that Pia has been taken captive by Strago. Jack Palance's performance is just a little over the top even for this kind of material, but Janet Leigh strikes just the right note as the psychotic hit woman and she has a nifty (if too brief) cat-fight with Letitia Roman. Ludwig Donath is the ex-Nazi who is working with Thrush and even Elisha Cook shows up as another petty, aging mobster. This is an entertaining UNCLE movie, with the usual quota of excitement and humor. "The Spy in the Green Hat" turns out to be Mr. Thaler, an emissary from Thrush Central, who comes to see Strago carry out the operation successfully. Thaler is well played by Will Kuluva, the actor who was first chosen to play the head of UNCLE [Mr. Allison] before it was decided to go with the better known Leo G. Carroll. [Kuluva also appears in the first UNCLE film To Trap a Spy.] Vaughn and David MaCallum are in good form as Solo and his fellow agent Illya Kuryakin. 

Verdict: As theatrical telefilms go, this isn't bad -- if you're an UNCLE fan. ***.

TORTURE GARDEN

TORTURE GARDEN (1967). Director: Freddie Francis. Screenplay by Robert Bloch. 

Several people go backstage at a sideshow exhibit and are given glimpses of their possible futures by Dr. Diabolo (Burgess Meredith.) The first man has his mind taken over by a cat after he murders his wealthy uncle; a blindly ambitious young actress discovers the secret of a handsome, seemingly ageless actor to her regret; a jealous piano -- no, that's not a misprint -- apparently possessed by the spirit of his dead mother torments a woman who's fallen for a famous classical pianist; and -- in the best of the four stories -- Jack Palance and Peter Cushing -- both of whom are terrific -- trade off as collectors of rare and expensive Edgar Allan Poe memorabilia. But Cushing tells Palance that he has the ultimate Poe collector's item in his basement ... With the exception of this final tale most of Robert Bloch's stories are fairly lame, but the film is entertaining in spite of it. 

Verdict: You have to see that piano go on the attack to believe it! **1/2.

SECOND CHANCE

SECOND CHANCE (1953). Director: Rudolph Mate.

Clare (Linda Darnell) used to be the girlfriend of a mobster, and has been on the run since the cops asked her to testify against him. A hit man (Jack Palance), who is infatuated with her, has been sent to kill her or bring her back. In the meantime, Clare has fallen for Russ (Robert Mitchum), a boxer trying to make his way back to the big time. The actors aren't able to do much to bring these one-dimensional characters to life, and most of the film is pretty dull and routine until the final quarter -- which is almost a knock out. The three principals and several others get trapped in a cable car dangling high over Mexico. Will Mitchum be able to swing to the nearby mountain and bring help before the cable completely snaps and they crash to the ground? Will Palance manage to knock off Clare in front of a police officer? Will there be a mile-high confrontation between Mitchum and Palance (anyone who can't answer that has never been to the movies). The climax is harrowing, to say the least; it's like you're watching a completely different movie. This was released in 3D, but the camera doesn't seem to take the slightest advantage of the process.

Verdict: Entertaining in spite of the many dumb moments. ***.