Cinema, TV, and Everything in Between
Here’s the latest from The Magnificent 60s Let’s be honest. Like 633 Squadron (1964) and perhaps even, despite its all-star cast, Battle of Britain (1969), many in the audience will only be there for the hardware, the chance to see the flying battle buses that took the Allies to victory...…
Here’s the latest from The Magnificent 60s You have to put out of your mind any thoughts about West Side Story, released the same year and also dealing with teenage gangs in New York. But whereas the musical tapped into Shakespeare and tugged at audience heartstrings with a tragic love story, The...…
Here’s the latest from The Magnificent 60s It might have been better if I’d come to this in a hazy glow of nostalgia. But I’d skipped this back in the day and although I’m a big fan of Arthur Penn I was never sparked to seek this out on VHS/DVD....…
Here’s the latest from The Magnificent 60s Had this emanated from France or Italy or arrived bearing an arthouse imprimatur it might well have gained some critical traction. Not just because it is as far from the screen persona of star Steve Cochran (Mozambique, 1964) as you could get, but...…
Here’s the latest from The Magnificent 60s Style is just about the only weapon in the directorial armory to mitigate against lack of budget. Or you can rely on a narrative twist. But in sci fi you’re inevitably going to come a cropper in this era and on a low...…
Here’s the latest from The Magnificent 60s Young bucks wanting to make a bigger splash are apt to rampage through sacred texts and treat unwary audiences to avant-garde notions. Thus, Jonathan Miller (Take a Girl Like You, 1970), in his debut, set aside all expectations and in fairness purists had...…
Here’s the latest from The Magnificent 60s The technical excellence is substantially under-rated. Not just the aural qualities – the approaching enemy sounding like a train – and the reverse camera and uplifted faces registering awe that later became synonymous with Steven Spielberg, but the greatest use of the tracking...…
Here’s the latest from The Magnificent 60s Unusual crime picture even for the period. Most of these British B-pictures focused on the crime or an innocent caught up in nefarious activity, not just a straightforward police procedural before the term was even invented. In fact, the plodder was more likely...…
Here’s the latest from The Magnificent 60s Superior “lost” horror picture that suffered from minimal initial release and is now rapidly entering the cult dominion. Effective and occasionally very stylish entry to the genre. Apart from Boris Karloff (The Sorcerers, 1967) playing against type, it’s not populated by the usual...…
Here’s the latest from The Magnificent 60s Works a treat. And works like clockwork, the set-up so meticulous, it doesn’t put a comedic foot wrong and even allows space, at exactly the right time, for the ticking timebomb to be sorted out. Gags galore. Sight gags, sound gags and observational...…
Here’s the latest from The Magnificent 60s Somewhere between camp classic, hilarious comedy and bitchiness-on-speed, loaded down with a May-December narrative, too much of the genuine soap opera element of the filming of a soap opera but lifted up by some very touching moments. This started life as a black...…
Here’s the latest from The Magnificent 60s You could hardly get a more prescient movie, almost in the 1984 class in depicting the future. Not dystopian, but the contemporary obsession with filming every inch of a child’s life. You do wonder what kind of reaction this will generate further down the line...…
Here’s the latest from The Magnificent 60s The disaster picture in embryo. Well, the disaster picture without the actual disaster, but setting up the disaster narrative formula of who lives and who dies. But before we go on to that, spot the deliberate mistake – in the poster I mean....…
Here’s the latest from The Magnificent 60s I’ve been revisiting this oddity in the hope that maybe I was too quick to condemn what was, in some respects, one of the quirkiest pictures ever made. Alas, time has been no kinder. One of the biggest-ever movie follies, an overblown vanity...…
Here’s the latest from The Magnificent 60s At the very least I had thought, given the involvement of classy director Stanley Donen (Charade, 1963) that this might go down as a glorious failure rather than just a straightforward glossy dud thanks to the woeful miscasting of Yul Brynner (The Double...…
Here’s the latest from The Magnificent 60s British giallo sets tough London cop Bill Rowan (Gilbert Wynne) hunting a Jack-the-Ripper type serial killer who has slaughtered his wife (Linda Marlowe). Chief suspect is leering cocky jack-the-lad Pete (Donald Sumpter) of the wham-bam-thank-you-ma’am school of seduction. In an era when pornography...…
Here’s the latest from The Magnificent 60s Something of a feminist icon with middle-aged single woman choosing her lovers. I should warn you that there’s a May-December trope, which was very common at this period, as older female stars, engaging on romance with younger males, catch up with the unchallenged...…
Here’s the latest from The Magnificent 60s Aliens, would be your first guess these days should you happen upon strange disturbances emanating from underneath the earth’s surface, citing the examples of War of the Worlds or an iteration of Transformers, whereby creatures from outer space had remained dormant buried in our habitat for...…
Here’s the latest from The Magnificent 60s Some big-name director, especially these days, would have seen the potential, injected some action and jeopardy, a good dose of awe and maybe more of a hint of a romance. You can’t help but feel this would be exactly the kind of enterprise...…
Here’s the latest from The Magnificent 60s Cynical and opportunistic Swedish oil executive Eric Erickson (William Holden) blackmailed into World War Two espionage finds redemption after witnessing first-hand the horrors of Nazi Germany. Two extraordinary scenes lift this out of the mainstream biopic league, the first Erickson witnessing an execution,...…
Here’s the latest from The Magnificent 60s A gangster trend hit the mean streets of Hollywood at the start of the 1960s. But in the absence of big box office hitters like James Cagney, Humphrey Bogart and Edward G. Robinson, these were all B films with unknowns or low-ranked stars...…
Here’s the latest from The Magnificent 60s Well-structured thriller – especially given the short running time – that allows time for the story to blossom and, given the supernatural tinge, in a somewhat unusual fashion. Worth noting, too, the gender fallibility in keeping with the time, the wife who will...…
Here’s the latest from The Magnificent 60s Audiences were likely disgruntled to discover that out of a heavyweight cast boasting the likes of Omar Sharif (Doctor Zhivago, 1965), Yul Brynner (The Magnificent Seven, 1960), Rita Hayworth (Circus World/The Magnificent Showman, 1964), Senta Berger (Cast a Giant Shadow, 1966) and Stephen...…
Here’s the latest from The Magnificent 60s Richard Greene had been a childhood idol as that dashing hero Robin Hood in long-running British television series (The Adventures of Robin Hood, 1955-1960) and movie Sword of Sherwood Forest (1960) so I was rather at a loss to discover that his career appeared to...…
Here’s the latest from The Magnificent 60s This big-screen version of a small-screen hero is as pleasant a diversion as you can get. Nostalgia pretty much gives it a free pass and in any case the action, which punctuates the drama at regular intervals, was always going to be budget-restricted....…
Here’s the latest from The Magnificent 60s Excellent comedy western mixing dry wit and occasional slapstick to joyous effect. The wedding between Spanish duke Don Aldrea (Alain Delon) and Louisiana belle Phoebe (Rosemary Forsyth) is interrupted by her previous suitor Yancy (Stuart Cottle) who is killed in the resulting melee....…
Here’s the latest from The Magnificent 60s The easiest ways to acquire cult status are a) to be impossible to find and b) in a genre piece add in the unexpected. In this case, although originally devised as the support feature to They Came from Beyond Space (1967), in an Amicus sci...…
Here’s the latest from The Magnificent 60s Except for an ingenious escape attempt and Paul Newman spoofing his Cool Hand Luke (1967) persona, this World War Two POW number falls into the “sounded like a good idea at the time” category. Harry Frigg (Newman), the American army’s most notorious escapee (though from...…
Here’s the latest from The Magnificent 60s Decoding the emotional life of mathematics professor Sebastian (Dirk Bogarde) lies at the heart of a spy thriller mainlining on loyalty and trust. The presence of a flotilla of potential Bond girls has opened this picture up to charges of being a spoof,...…
Here’s the latest from The Magnificent 60s Not surprising since French critics worshipped Alfred Hitchcock – the only ones who gave him their wholesale approval in the 1960s – that a French director would attempt to pick up his mantle. But where Hitchcock majored on mystery and suspense and generally...…
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