Tag Archives: cinema

Even More Random Film Connections

Posted on by Steve Higgins

Back in the 1970’s. TV presenter James Burke made a TV show called Connections. It was a really fascinating series which connected various historical events to make a sort of chain which led up to something which was pretty unexpected. The episode which stands out in my memory is one about the atom bomb, various unconnected events and discoveries that together, led to the splitting of the atom. I’ve written a couple of posts in which I’ve tried to do something similar but all relating to the world of classic film so here is another collection of film connections which I hope you will find interesting.

In 1954 director Nick Ray made his classic film Rebel Without a Cause. The film remains a cult classic even today because it’s the film James Dean starred in as troubled teenager Jim Stark. The film opens with Jim’s first day at a new school. He tries his best to make friends but finds himself at odds with a gang which includes Natalie Wood as Judy, Corey Allen as Buzz, Dennis Hopper as Goon and quite a few others. The day doesn’t end well for Jim because he ends up in a deadly car race with Buzz in which the two drive towards a cliff edge and the first one to bale out is chicken. Buzz doesn’t get out in time and is killed and his friends want revenge on Jim.

Jim and Judy along with Plato, a teenager profoundly affected by loneliness and a broken family, decide to hide out in a deserted mansion. It was in fact the same mansion used in the film Sunset Boulevard, made years earlier.

Rebel was only Dean’s second film. He was killed in a car crash after his third and final film Giant.

Giant was directed by George Stevens and in it, Dean played Jett Rink, a surly ranch hand on Bick Benedict’s huge Texas ranch. Jett doesn’t get on well with Bick played by Rock Hudson but at least he has a friend in Bick’s sister Luz played by Mercedes McCambridge. When she is killed trying to ride a horse belonging to Bick’s new wife, Jett finds she has willed him a small plot of land on which he later strikes oil.

Bick’s wife was played by Elizabeth Taylor. Liz had a number of husbands but in 1957 she married for the third time to Mike Todd. Todd was an entrepreneur who was involved in various business ventures. He was also a theatrical producer and moved into films producing the classic Around The World in 80 Days starring David Niven as Phileas Fogg. Todd was killed in a plane crash in 1958. His widow, Liz, was devasted and turned to her friends Eddie Fisher and his wife Debbie Reynolds for comfort. Eddie perhaps took comfort a little too far and his friendship with Liz soon turned into an affair and he left Debbie, marrying Liz Taylor in 1959.

Eddie Fisher and Debbie Reynolds had a daughter named Carrie. Carrie was born in 1956 and went on to play Princess Leia in the Star Wars films.

In 1989 Carrie played Marie in the comedy classic When Harry Met Sally. The film follows the slow to start romance of Harry and Sally played by Billy Crystal and Meg Ryan. The two don’t seem to like each other at first but later become friends. They decide to introduce each other to their best friends Marie and Jess, played by Steven Ford, who both hit it off instantly.

The film is a really wonderful comic look at relationships with some sparklingly witty scenes and dialogue. The screenplay was written by Nora Ephron.

Nora later moved into directing and one of her best films was You’ve Got Mail. The film teamed Meg Ryan with Tom Hanks once again, the pair having worked together on Sleepless in Seattle, another Nora Ephron film. Such a pity, from a personal point of view, that Billy Crystal didn’t play the Tom Hanks role in those films. Don’t get me wrong, I enjoyed both of them but I’ve always thought Billy and Meg seemed to just work together so much better. Anyway, getting back to the blog, You’ve Got Mail is a romcom about two people who get involved together in an online chat room. In the chat room they use internet ‘handles’ to hide their true identities and don’t realise that in fact they are business rivals. Tom Hanks’ character owns a big discount bookstore while Meg has a small popular childrens’ bookshop.

In real life, the two are constantly at odds as Tom is opening a massive new discount bookstore just by her small shop. In anonymous cyberspace though, their relationship seems to develop and the two decide to meet but Tom Hanks arrives for the meeting in a coffee shop, peeks through the window and sees who is waiting for him.

The film was actually based on another film The Shop Around the Corner, a 1940s classic starring James Stewart and Margaret Sullavan. In the film two employees who work together but don’t get on are actually falling for each other as anonymous pen pals.

James Stewart also stars in one of my favourite films, It’s a Wonderful Life. I love that film and my DVD copy gets watched quite a lot. The film is about George Bailey played by James Stewart who looks forward to an interesting life of travel but then finds obligations force him to stay in the small town where he has always lived. George is beset by problems and even considers suicide but then his guardian angel -literally- arrives to help him.

The secret of this film is, I think, the fact that despite the fantasy premise of the film, everyone plays their parts as if they were in a serious drama. The result is that the drama and emotion of the situation rises to the surface and we are left with a vibrant and dramatic piece of cinema.

Donna Reed plays Stewart’s love interest but another lady who sets her sights on his character, George Bailey, is Violet Bick played by the sultry Gloria Grahame. She made her film debut in 1944 and appeared in a number of films, including many film noir movies. In 1955 she appeared in the musical Oklahoma but afterwards her star began to wane a little.

She created something of a scandal in later life. After divorcing her first husband she married and later divorced one of her directors then later married TV producer Cy Howard. When they split, she married Anthony Ray who was the son of her second husband. The second husband was Nick Ray, who directed James Dean in Rebel Without a Cause.

Hope you enjoyed this interconnected tour of the classic movie world. Have a great weekend and call back next Saturday for another post.

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More Random Film Connections

Posted on by Steve Higgins

Back in the 1970’s. TV presenter James Burke made a TV show called Connections. It was a really fascinating series which connected various historical events to make a sort of chain which led up to something which was pretty unexpected. The episode which stands out in my memory is one about the atom bomb, various unconnected events and discoveries that together, led to the splitting of the atom. I’ve written a couple of posts in which I’ve tried to do something similar but all relating to the world of classic film so here are another collection of film connections which I hope you will find interesting.

Leslie Howard and Gone with the Wind

I thought I’d start with Gone with the Wind and see where it takes me. Gone with the Wind was a major film adaptation of the book by Margaret Mitchell. The book was a huge hit and producer David O Selznick bought the film rights. Production was delayed for a long while as Selznick was determined to get Clark Gable for the part of the roguish Rhett Butler. Another delay was a distribution deal with MGM which couldn’t be finalised until Selznick’s then current deal with United Artists had expired. Selznick used the delay to begin a huge search for an actress to play the part of Scarlett O’Hara, the spoilt daughter of a plantation owner in the deep south of America. Scarlet has a crush on Ashley Wilkes played by British actor Leslie Howard in possibly his most famous role. The film was one of the major hits of 1939 and was the highest earning film up to that time.

Julie Andrews and My Fair Lady

In 1938 Leslie Howard played the part of Professor Higgins in the film production of Pygmalion based on the play by George Bernard Shaw. A musical version was a big hit on the stage in the 1960s. Julie Andrews played the part of Eliza Doolittle to great acclaim on the stage but when the time came to make a film version in 1964, the producers wanted a major star and so the part went to Audrey Hepburn.

Julie Andrews only had to wait a short time for film stardom though. She appeared in The Sound of Music in 1965. The film was based on the true story of the Von Trapp family singers which was also a hit stage musical. Julie Andrews played Maria, a nun who becomes a nanny to the Von Trapp children, eventually falling for the father of the children played by Christopher Plummer. The film was the hit of 1965 replacing Gone with the Wind as the highest grossing film up to that time. The director was Robert Wise who tried to reduce the amount of sentimentality and sweetness which he had seen in the stage production.

Robert Wise and Citizen Kane

Robert Wise had a great background in the film world. He was a former film editor whose first film as a director was The Curse of the Cat People in 1944. In 1941 he was a film editor at RKO Studios and was the editor on the classic film Citizen Kane.

Orson Welles often boasted about the fabulous contract he had when he arrived in Hollywood. In a BBC interview he stated the terms were not financially brilliant but gave him unprecedented creative powers. His first film for RKO was Citizen Kane. The film opens with the death of Kane, a millionaire newspaper magnate. His last words were ‘Rosebud’. The makers of a cinema newsreel decide to find out what or who Rosebud was.

To do so they research Kane’s life; his inheritance of a huge fortune, his takeover of a newspaper, his great wealth, his power and influence, his marriage and divorce and ultimately his death.

The cinematographer was Gregg Toland, one of the film industry’s top photographers. Toland asked to work on the film and Welles replied ‘Why? I don’t know anything about making films.’ Toland countered that was exactly why he wanted to work on the film because a film by a newcomer would produce something new and original.

There are some fascinating elements to Citizen Kane, especially in the special effects department. A famous one is where the camera flies through a rooftop sign and then drops down through a skylight into a restaurant. The shot was done with a sign that came apart as the camera approached and then a fade from a model shot into the restaurant set disguised in a flash of lightning. Citizen Kane was and is a classic of the cinema.

Orson Welles and Rita Hayworth

Orson Welles in a way experienced his film career in reverse, he started at the top and steadily worked his way down, ending up as an overweight although always entertaining raconteur doing voice overs for Carlsberg TV advertisements.

Welles married Rita Hayworth in 1943. She was one of the great stars of Hollywood’s golden years. She appeared in one of her husband’s films The Lady from Shanghai in 1947 but the film that was considered her greatest success came the year before in Gilda. According to Wikipedia, the film made her into a cultural icon as a femme fatale.

Welles and Hayworth grew apart and finally separated. Rita said that Welles had no idea about married life or even settling down. When she suggested buying a house together, a natural move for a married couple, Welles said he didn’t want the responsibility.

Rita Hayworth as Gilda

After splitting with Welles, Rita became involved with Prince Aly Khan, son of the Aga Khan who later became a Pakistani diplomat. Aly was a socialite and man about town. He and Rita married in 1949 and had a daughter Princess Yasmin Aga Khan. Rita gave up her film career to be with Aly but Khan’s womanising proved fatal to the marriage. Rita moved to Nevada with her daughter in order to set up a legal residence and begin divorce proceedings. The two were finally divorced in 1953. Khan offered Rita a million dollars for her to bring up their daughter as a Muslim but Rita declined.

After her divorce Rita had no income and was forced to return to film acting. Her comeback picture was Affair in Trinidad in which she starred with Glenn Ford. Rita was contracted to Columbia Pictures and fell out with Columbia boss Harry Cohn on numerous occasions during the filming. She was even placed on suspension for a while, however the picture was very successful. Her last picture for Columbia was in 1957 when she starred in Pal Joey with Frank Sinatra. She married again, this time to singer Dick Haymes who was in severe financial trouble. The marriage lasted only a couple of years and ended when Haymes struck her in the face in a Hollywood nightclub. Rita packed her bags and left him.

In the mid 1970’s, Rita’s behaviour began to become erratic. She drank heavily and was even once removed from a TWA flight because of her drinking. It was eventually found that her symptoms were masking the real issue which was the early onset of Alzheimer’s disease. In 1981 when her condition had deteriorated, she was placed under the supervision of her daughter and the two moved into adjoining apartments together in New York. She died aged 68 in 1987. Her former husband Orson Welles, spoke of her in his very last interview, recorded the day before his own death. He called her ‘one of the dearest and sweetest women that ever lived.’

David Niven and Leslie Howard

Just to backtrack a little, in 1958 Rita appeared in Separate Tables. The screenplay was by Terence Rattigan and concerns a group of residents at a small hotel in the south of England. David Niven plays a disgraced former army officer who has been found guilty of apparently sexually harassing young women at a theatre. A news story in the local paper highlights this and he tries to stop the others from finding out, without success. Niven won an Oscar for his performance.

David Niven is one of my favourite actors and he wrote what I’ve always considered to the best book about the golden age of Hollywood, Bring on the Empty Horses.

In 1942 Niven was in England having left Hollywood to sign up with the army. He was asked to appear in what was a propaganda film at the time; The First of the Few, a story about R J Mitchell, the designer of the famous WWII aircraft, the Spitfire. Niven was under contract to Sam Goldwyn at the time but he allowed Niven to appear, in exchange for the US rights to the film. Niven played Squadron Leader Geoffrey Crisp who tells the story of his friend Mitchell beginning with the Schneider Trophy aircraft race of 1922. Later Mitchell visits Germany and sees how the Nazis are rearming and so resolves to design a powerful fighter for Great Britain. Mitchell died just as the government ordered the Spitfire into production and Niven as Crisp, ends his story just as he and his fellow pilots are scrambled into action.

Leslie Howard played the part of Mitchell as well as producing and directing. He was killed when the KLM flight he was aboard was shot down by the Luftwaffe in 1943.

Howard of course played Ashley Wilkes in Gone with the Wind which brings our connections full circle.

Thanks to Wikipedia creative commons for the use of the pictures in this post.

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Transformations

Posted on by Steve Higgins

I hit on the theme of transformations whilst watching a film that I haven’t seen for years. It was My Fair Lady so without further ado, let’s get cracking.

My Fair Lady starred Rex Harrison and Audrey Hepburn in the story of how Professor Higgins, an expert in phonetics, tries to turn working class flower girl Eliza Doolittle into a lady. The film is based on the play Pygmalion by George Bernard Shaw. The rude and bombastic Higgins played so well by Harrison enters into a wager with colleague Colonel Pickering played by Wilfrid Hyde White. Higgins boasts that he could pass the lowly flower girl off as a princess and embarks on a wearying schedule of training so Eliza can improve her speech and deportment.

I’m not a great fan of musicals but I’ve always rather liked this film. The songs for the most part are wonderful and the performances excellent. Audrey Hepburn was a controversial choice for the film as the part had been played on the stage by Julie Andrews and as this was before she shot to fame in The Sound of Music, the producers wanted a big star in the role.

The story had been filmed before of course. There was an earlier version, a non-musical version made in 1938 starring Leslie Howard. Howard is probably most famous for his portrayal of Ashley Wilkes in Gone with the Wind but his version of Higgins was to me, much superior to Harrison’s although I love both. Wendy Hiller plays Eliza Doolittle and she is much more believable as Eliza, no disrespect to Audrey Hepburn in My Fair Lady and Howard is a bright, eccentric Higgins. What is interesting from researching the film on the internet is that a controversial (at the time) line was included in the film: Eliza saying ‘Not Bloody Likely!’ This made Wendy Hiller the first person ever to swear in a British film. Dear me, how times change! That I suppose is a transformation in itself, the language of the cinema becoming ruder and coarser by the day with the F word becoming more and more prominent in film dialogue. These days, ‘Not bloody likely’ is hardly worth a second thought.

The main transformation in both Pygmalion and My Fair Lady is that of Eliza Doolittle from common flower girl to well-spoken princess. She is the butterfly that emerges from Professor Higgins’ training although the experience does not necessarily make her happy. She returns back to Covent Garden and no one recognises her there. She is dressed differently, she speaks differently and no longer resembles the woman she used to be. Her father recognises her though as he has been transformed too. Higgins was so impressed by Alfred P Doolittle that he has written to an American millionaire advising him that Doolittle is one of the great wits and philosophers of the day and the millionaire bestows a large amount of money on him. The result is that friends and family have appeared out of the woodwork all intent on eliciting financial support from Doolittle and the tables have been turned on him. Instead of his previous happy but poor existence, now the the worries of supporting others lay heavily on his shoulders.

I of course have experienced transformations too. Some years ago, I was in full time work, now I am retired. I made the transition slowly. I first opted for semi-retirement and went from working a shift pattern of six days on and three days off, to one of three days on and six off, a much more agreeable working pattern. I had thought that the new working pattern would give me more time to myself, more time to get acclimatised to retirement. Instead, it actually made my working life more difficult. In our hi tech emergency control room, things were constantly changing and I was not always up to speed. I was using old templates when I should have used new ones, using codes that were now obsolete and so on. I missed updates and briefings that happened on my six days off. Looking back, I should have just retired fully and looked for some part time job to top up my cash flow. Anyway, now I am transformed, a retired former civil servant, writing blogs and making YouTube videos.

Age has transformed me too. In the picture over on the right you can see me as I was when I was aged 19 or 20. It was taken in France by my best friend Chris. Now I am older, at least older on the outside. On the inside I’d have to say that I haven’t really changed that much. You might think that now I’m probably much wiser with different ideas and different thoughts. Actually though, I’m pretty much the same on the inside with similar ideas and similar thoughts.

Here’s another film with transformations at its heart, Silence of the Lambs. It was the first horror film to win a best picture Oscar and it was about a serial killer nicknamed Buffalo Bill by the press. The FBI are trying to catch him and send rookie officer Clarice Starling to visit Hannibal Lector, a psychiatrist and murderer, currently detained in a high security prison in the hope that he might give some insight into the current murderer. Lector agrees to talk but only on his terms.

Jodie Foster plays agent Starling. She wants to work in the Behavioural Science Unit of the FBI and Lector, chillingly played by Hopkins, finds her interesting. He seems willing to give his information and insights about Buffalo Bill but in return he wants information about Clarice herself. He initiates a quid pro quo, he gives her information and observations about Bill and in return she must reveals snippets of information about herself, her background and her life. When Starling reveals the murder victims have something inserted into their throats Lector correctly guesses the item is a butterfly. Buffalo Bill, says Lector, wants to transform himself, in his twisted way into a female.

Much of the content of the film is terrifying but at the same time, it is a compelling film and comes together in an exciting climax. Silence of The Lambs won five Oscars.

I wrote in a previous post about another type of transformation, one achieved by using imaging technology to transform one’s own appearance. Using image editors today, it is possible to smooth wrinkled or pock marked skin and to trim away unwanted flesh. Over on TikTok recently I seemed to be bombarded on one particular day by endless videos of women using a filter for video that made them all seem younger and more glamourous.  Here’s an example below from YouTube.

The best transformation though are perhaps the ones that we make ourselves, the transformations that occur on the inside.

Floating in Space was a great achievement for me. I had always wanted to be a writer and finally completing and publishing my book was something very exciting for me. Of course, Floating has never come near to the best seller charts and is not ever likely to. If it did, I can imagine another transformation from quiet part time writer to international author. I could swap my Skoda for a Porsche. Buy some new clothes for my media interviews and join the international jet set. That might be a fun transformation but with my bad back and sore neck, I might have trouble getting into that low slung Porsche. Then there’s my strong northern accent. Would TV viewers be able to understand me? Would I need some vocal training?

Perhaps I should be looking for a Professor Higgins to help me?

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Another James Bond 007 Post

Posted on by Steve Higgins

James Bond has been in the news this week. The books by Ian Fleming are apparently being rewritten as they might be considered offensive to a modern generation of new readers and the producers are still looking for a new actor to play their famous secret agent. OK, time for another James Bond 007 post.

The publishers of the Bond books have decided that it’s time for a reissue of the best selling series with a disclaimer telling readers that the novels use language that may be considered offensive by modern readers. Of course the books were written in the late fifties and early sixties and reflect attitudes of the time. I have the entire collection of Bond books and most of them have a reference on the back saying they are outrageously entertaining, which they are, but take away the outrageous part and they are no longer outrageously entertaining but perhaps just somewhat entertaining. Of course if we begin to tamper with books written in the past where do we stop? Roald Dahl’s books are also in the news as they have been updated by ‘sensitivity readers’ although I’m not sure how these well-read children’s books can upset anyone. James Bond of course is a different matter and any sensitivity readers might have a problem with a book like Live and Let Die which is partly set in Harlem and Ian Fleming uses most of the unpleasant racial epithets which were in use at the time.

I started reading the Bond books when I was a schoolboy and unfortunately the very first one I read was the only one they had in our local library – ‘The Man With The Golden Gun’, one of writer Ian Fleming’s worst Bond books. Fleming used to write his initial drafts of the novels and then write a second one, adding in all the details which make the Bond books so interesting. Things like details of Bond’s clothes, (the Sea Island cotton shirts) his food, (Bond always had scrambled eggs for breakfast) his cars, his cigarettes (the special handmade ones with the triple gold band) and all that sort of stuff. ‘The Man with the Golden Gun’ was published after Fleming had died and sadly, he had not revised his original draft. I persevered though, did some research, found the proper order of the books and began to read ‘Casino Royale’, the first in the series. April this year marks the 70th anniversary of Casino Royale and it is this anniversary which has prompted the Bond books to be reissued, complete with disclaimer.

That first book is a pretty original story. ‘Le Chiffre’, a gambler and also a member of SMERSH, a murderous department of the KGB, is engaged on a desperate effort to win a great deal of money at the casinos of Royale Les Eaux in France. Le Chiffre is desperate because he has used SMERSH funds for his personal use and his spymaster bosses will not be pleased if they find out. Britain’s secret service happens to find out about this and sends Bond to France to make sure Le Chiffre doesn’t recoup those funds as of course, as we all know, James Bond 007 is a bit of an expert with the cards.

The book is interesting in another way too. Ian Fleming sold the movie rights to Casino Royale separately from the rest of the books and this enabled producer Charles K Feldman to produce a movie independently from Eon productions who own the rights to the other books. Feeling that he could not compete with the mainstream movies, Feldman decided to make Casino Royale into a comedy version. David Niven starred as Sir James Bond and ironically, Ian Fleming had mooted Niven as a possible Bond when casting began for Dr No, the first movie in the series.

Eon Productions finally acquired the rights to Casino Royale ready for the debut of new Bond actor Daniel Craig. I’ve got to say I didn’t like Craig at first. He didn’t look like Bond and I honestly thought he would have been better cast as one of the Bond villain’s henchmen but I did warm to him eventually and although I didn’t much care for it at first, I really do think Casino Royale is one of the better Bond films. It was released in 2006 and follows the book pretty faithfully which many of the previous films rarely do. Craig’s last Bond film was No Time To Die which I really thought was the poorest of Craig’s five outings as 007 and Bond has been in the news frequently as writers, journalists, bloggers and everyone and his dog have speculated about who the next James Bond 007 will be.

Will it be the usual upper class white guy or will Bond be black? Will there even be a female Bond? What does a 21st century secret agent look like or act like?

James Bond, the character created by Ian Fleming, was a commander in naval intelligence in World War II. He learned to ski in Kitzbühel in the 1930s and fought in the Second World War. He was an officer and a gentleman. He frequented expensive restaurants and gentlemen’s clubs as well as casinos and card tables. He drove a Bentley, lived alone in a Kings Road, Chelsea flat where he was looked after by an elderly Scottish housekeeper named May. He drank a martini made with three parts gin, one of vodka, a half measure of Kina Lillet, shaken with until ice cold then served with a slice of lemon peel. Bond is a character entrenched in mid twentieth century England so making him into a character from the 21st century will not be easy. What can the film makers do? Well, they could set the Bond films back in the 1960s. That’s one option although I doubt if that will happen. They could go radical and make Bond an ethnic character; I’m forever seeing posts about Idris Elba as the next Bond in my social media feeds but then, the character wouldn’t be Bond, would he?

The first change of Bond actor was from Sean Connery to George Lazenby. I liked Lazenby and his one 007 film, On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, was one of my favourites. Connery returned for Diamonds are Forever and then Roger Moore took over Bond’s licence to kill. His films ranged from bad to supremely dreadful and as much as I’ve always loved Roger, I hated his Bond films.

Timothy Dalton stepped into Bond’s shoes when Moore stood down and made two pretty good films. Legal issues kept Bond off the screen for a long time but when the franchise finally returned it was with Pierce Brosnan as 007. Goldeneye was one of my favourite Bonds but his other films weren’t so good and even looked for a while as if they were going to go down the same road as Roger Moore’s Bonds into slightly ridiculous territory. With Casino Royale though things got pretty serious. The film makers played down the gadgetry which always was a staple of the early Bond films, things like cars with ejector seats, watches fitted with special magnets and belt buckles firing climbing pitons. None of that played any part in the Daniel Craig era but here’s the thing; in the previous films each new Bond has just carried on as before with hardly a nod to the previous actor, although George Lazenby did famously say ‘this never happened to the other fella!’

When Daniel Craig took over the series was to a certain extent rebooted. Bond was new to the 00 section and Casino Royale his first mission. His mission in No Time To Die was also his last, his very last because, and I don’t think I’m giving anything away here, because Bond actually dies. How could the producers start over then with the next Bond? Well, many fictional characters have come back from the dead, most notably Sherlock Holmes who author Arthur Conan Doyle killed off when he got bored with the character.  Holmes perished by falling off a cliff but a few years later Conan Doyle bowed to public pressure and Sherlock Holmes returned. It turned out, he hadn’t really died after all.

image courtesy flickr.com

Ian Fleming didn’t kill off Bond but in You Only Live Twice, Bond is seriously hurt and is rescued by Kissy Suzuki who was posing as his wife while Bond was on a mission for Tiger Tanaka, the head of the Japanese secret service. Bond had lost his memory and Kissy hides Bond away from the authorities. One day though, Bond sees something about Vladivostok in either a newspaper or a book, I can’t remember which, and still suffering with amnesia decides he must go there. You Only Live Twice ends there but in the next book, The Man With The Golden Gun, Bond returns having been brainwashed by the Soviets into assassinating his own boss, the head of the British secret service, known only as M.

The producers never used that storyline in the film adaptations of those two books so if I was the writer of the new Bond movie, that’s exactly how I would start the new era of Bond films off.

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Some More Random Classic Film Connections

Posted on by Steve Higgins

Back in the 1960’s I was a big fan of the Apollo moon missions and on UK TV one of the presenters was James Burke. Burke also did a TV show called Connections. It was a really fascinating series which connected various historical events to make a sort of chain which led up to something which was pretty unexpected. The episode that stands out in my memory was one about the atom bomb, various unconnected events and discoveries that together, led to the splitting of the atom. In today’s post, I’ve tried to do something similar but all relating to the world of film, so here are five fascinating connections.

Rebecca 1940

Rebecca is actually my favourite film from director Alfred Hitchcock. It was released in 1940 and was Hitchcock’s first American film. It is based on the novel by Daphne Du Maurier. The film stars Laurence Olivier as the aristocratic widower Maxim De Winter and Joan Fontaine as the shy young woman who becomes his second wife. The two meet in the south of France when De Winter is on the verge of jumping off a cliff top only to be interrupted by the shy young woman. The woman is never named in the film except for later when she becomes Mrs De Winter. This new or second Mrs De Winter seems to be living her life in the shadow of Rebecca, Maxim’s first wife. Later we find that Maxim murdered her after finding out that she was having an affair with Jack Favell played by the smooth and suave George Sanders.

I have to say I have always loved this film, the ruthlessly charming George Sanders, the gorgeous Joan Fontaine and the scary Mrs Danvers, the housekeeper dedicated to the dead Rebecca played by Judith Anderson. Joan Fontaine has never looked lovelier and the only blot on the film landscape are the rather poor models used to represent Manderley, the ancestral home of the De Winter family.

Joan Fontaine was actually the sister of Olivia De Havilland and the two seemed to have had a rather strained relationship. Olivia starred with Errol Flynn in the magnificent Robin Hood but is probably best remembered for her role in Gone With The Wind.

Gone With The Wind 1939

Gone With The Wind was actually being made at the same time as Rebecca and Hitchcock and producer David O Selznick, who produced both films, had numerous fallings out over Rebecca and Hitchcock was apparently happy that Selznick was preoccupied with GWTW which kept him away from the production of Rebecca. Selznick later made many edits and revisions to Rebecca which didn’t go down well with Hitchcock.

Gone With The Wind starred Clark Gable and much was made of a nationwide hunt for an actress to play Scarlett O’Hara. The eventual winner was Vivien Leigh. Olivia De Havilland played Melanie who marries Ashley Wilkes played by Leslie Howard.

The film is set in the American south at the time of the American Civil War and its aftermath. Scarlett O’Hara is the daughter of a plantation owner and she has the hots for neighbour Ashley Wilkes. Wilkes marries Melanie but Scarlett is unable to give up on her romantic feelings for Ashley even when she marries the roguish Rhett Butler.

Gone With the Wind is an epic film in every sense of the word and follows the fortunes of Scarlett and her family through the devastation of the civil war and into the reconstruction era afterwards.

Leslie Howard captures perfectly the slightly wimpy Ashley. Howard was not happy in Hollywood and returned to England after the filming to help with Britain’s war effort. He was a star of many English feature films but was sadly killed when flying back to England after a visit to Portugal where he was promoting the British war effort. Some have suggested that the Luftwaffe shot down Howard’s aircraft as the Germans believed the Prime Minister was on board. Others have speculated that Howard himself was the target as he had angered the Germans with his efforts to promote the British cause as well as the success of his film The First of The Few about the designer of the Spitfire aircraft.

The First of The Few 1942

David Niven plays the part of Squadron Leader Geoffrey Crisp and he tells his pilots of how his friend RJ Mitchell designed the Spitfire. He tells how Mitchell observed seagulls through his binoculars and envisaged a new high speed era of fighter aircraft. After entering an aircraft in the Schneider Trophy, Mitchell convinces Rolls Royce to design a new and powerful engine for the new breed of aircraft and eventually, the Spitfire is born. Leslie Howard played the part of Mitchell as well as producing and directing the film.

Casino Royale 1967

David Niven had left Hollywood in 1939 and returned to the UK in order to re-join the army and fight against the Nazi menace. As well as his army duties, Niven was released from time to time to appear in a few propaganda films, one of which was The First of The Few. He was attached to a commando unit named Phantom whose job was to find out enemy positions and report back to British commanders. After the war he resumed his film career starring in a British film A Matter of Life and Death which was chosen for the very first Royal Film Performance. Niven returned to Hollywood only to encounter terrible tragedy when his wife, whom he had met and married in England, fell down the steps into a cellar when the two were playing hide and seek at a Hollywood party. Niven must have been devastated but he carried on and later remarried.

In 1967 he appeared as James Bond in the Bond spoof Casino Royale. Ian Fleming, the author of the famous James Bond series, had sold the film rights to Casino Royale separately to the rest of the Bond books and producer Charles Feldman acquired them, hoping to do a deal with Eon productions who were producing the mainstream Bond series. When negotiations failed, Feldman who had recently had a big hit with the oddball comedy What’s New Pussycat, resolved to make a James Bond comedy satire and recruited Niven to star as Bond.

The film turned out to be a critical disaster. Two of the other stars in the film were Peter Sellers and Orson Welles. Peter played the part of a card playing expert and Welles was the villain, Le Chiffre, a spy who has spent a great deal of money that wasn’t his and intends to win it back in the casino. All went well during the filming but then Sellers approached the director Joe McGrath and demanded that he and Welles should not appear in the same shot. McGrath replied that the film was in widescreen and this could not be done. Sellers then threw a punch at McGrath and a fight ensued until they were split up by a stuntman. Sellers asked for a break but then disappeared from the set which might be why his character disappears abruptly from the film. Ultimately five directors and as many screenwriters contributed to the film.

As I mentioned earlier, Niven plays Bond in Casino Royale and interestingly, Ian Fleming had wanted Niven to play Bond in Doctor No, the first in the 007 films.

Another actor approached to play the part of Bond was Cary Grant. Grant was urbane and cultured and also British. He was in many ways perfect for the part of Bond. He was also close to producer Cubby Broccoli and in fact was Broccoli’s best man at his 1959 wedding. Grant was interested in playing the part but stipulated that he would only play the role once and wasn’t willing to do a series of films.

North By Northwest

Cary Grant appeared in numerous adventure films with an espionage background, in particular North By Northwest. Grant plays advertising executive Roger Thornhill who calls over a waiter in a New York hotel bar. The waiter was paging a George Kaplan and when Grant calls the waiter over, two thugs nearby assume Thornhill is really Kaplan. It turns out that Kaplan is a fake identity, created by American Intelligence agents to trap a spy played by James Mason. The film is an exciting cold war thriller and was directed by none other than Alfred Hitchcock, who directed Rebecca, bringing our connections full circle.

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Favourite Film Directors Part 4: David Lean

Posted on by Steve Higgins

The other day I was waiting in for a repairman to come and fix something. He was due sometime between 12 and 6pm so I nipped out early, did my shopping, returned home for a late breakfast and settled down to wait. I flipped on the TV and was pleasantly surprised to see the film Hobson’s Choice about to start. Hobson’s Choice was directed by David Lean and it just so happened that the previous night, sorting out various bits and pieces, I came across a lovely book about David by his widow Sandra so without further ado I thought it must be the perfect time to write a post about another of my favourite directors.

David was born in 1908 and spent his early life in Croydon (actually 38 Blenheim Crescent, Croydon) until his parents divorced. His father moved out and left the family in 1923 which must have been an upsetting moment in Lean’s young life. Another perhaps more significant moment was when an uncle gave him a camera when David was aged 10 and then Lean began to develop and print his own photographs.

In her book, David Lean: An Intimate Portrait, by Sandra Lean, his widow tells us that David was considered a ‘dud’ at school and his headmistress wondered whether he would even be able to read and write.

When he left school he began work as an apprentice at his father’s accountancy firm and at night spent his spare time at the cinema. The Gaumont film studios were nearby and Lean managed to get himself employment there starting out as a tea boy. He later became a clapperboy and gradually rose up to become a newsreel editor.

Later Lean moved on to editing feature films and was asked to work with Noel Coward on In Which We Serve. David asked to be credited as a co director on the film and Coward wasn’t too keen at first but eventually gave way. According to an interview with Lean I saw many years ago, Noel Coward soon became bored with the process of directing the film and mostly left the job to David.

Lean directed other adaptations of Coward’s plays including Blithe Spirit, filmed in colour and the highly regarded Brief Encounter, the latter winning grand prix honours at the 1946 Cannes film festival. The atmospheric exterior shots of Brief Encounter were filmed at Carnforth Railway Station in Lancashire which still exists today.

Lean married six times and three of his films featured his third wife Anne Todd. The last of the films with Todd was The Sound Barrier made in 1952 which has a screenplay by the playwright Terence Rattigan.

Hobson’s Choice, the film I mentioned earlier, is a film that shows a different side to David Lean. It’s a character driven comedy made in 1954 with excellent performances from Charles Laughton and Brenda De Banzie and a world away from the epics that David Lean later became famous for. It was hugely enjoyable to watch and one tends to forget that in his earlier years Lean made many films of a similar nature. His reputation though, at least in part, stems from a series of epics the director made starting with The Bridge on the River Kwai and including Lawrence of Arabia, Doctor Zhivago, Ryan’s Daughter and his final film which he directed, edited and wrote the screenplay for, A Passage to India.

His great collaborators were Robert Bolt who wrote and rewrote many of the screenplays used in Lean’s films, John Box his art director and production designer and Maurice Jarre who wrote the musical score for all Lean’s films from Lawrence of Arabia to his final film A Passage to India.

Sandra Lean muses that perhaps because of his parents’ divorce, David lived mostly in a series of hotels and a few rarely visited houses. He declared that ‘I have four shirts, two suitcases and the Rolls. I need no other possessions or a home’. In his later life he bought a warehouse property named Sun Wharf, situated on the banks of the river Thames at Limehouse in the east end of London. Architects, builders and decorators were brought in and the property was transformed by David, almost as if he were building a set for a new film. A similar thing happened to a property he and Sandra bought in France.

In 1970 he made Ryan’s Daughter. It’s personally not one of my favourite films and it’s hard to see why David Lean was so interested in the story. It is set in Ireland during the time of the First World War and tells the story of a married Irish woman played by Sarah Miles, (who was actually the wife of the screen writer, Robert Bolt) who has an affair with a British officer. Robert Mitchum played her husband but the only really outstanding performance was that of Sarah Miles. Many critics felt that the small scale romantic story did not fit with the film’s massive visual scale and long running time.

The film did however win two Oscars for cinematographer Freddie Young and supporting actor John Mills. The poor reception of the film prompted David to meet with the New York critics at the city’s Algonquin Hotel. I’m not sure if David wanted to reason with them or just find out why they didn’t like the film but they spent two hours attacking his production. David came away devastated and would not make a film again until A Passage to India in 1984.

He did try to make another film prior to A Passage to India. He was very interested in the story of Fletcher Christian and Captain Bligh and the mutiny on board the Bounty. He spent a few years living in Tahiti researching and making preparations for the film which included overseeing the construction of a replica of the Bounty but when Robert Bolt suffered a stroke and was unable to continue working on the script David backed out of the project. Producer Dino De Laurentis had ploughed a lot of money into the production and he agreed that a new director, Roger Donaldson, a friend of star Mel Gibson, could continue in David’s place. The film was later released as The Bounty.

In the late 1980’s David began to work on his last film, Nostromo, an adaptation of the novel by Joseph Conrad. Various scripts were produced including one by Robert Bolt. Sets were built and a budget of 46 million dollars was allocated but sadly, David Lean succumbed to throat cancer in 1991 and the production collapsed.

His work, in particular his sweeping visual style, inspired a new generation of film makers including Steven Spielberg who took over another unfinished project of David’s, Empire of the Sun.

In Sandra Lean’s book she tries hard to get at David Lean’s inner self; his actual character. He was apparently a man who accepted that some people would go out of his life and that would be that; they would be gone just like a cut in a piece of film. Once people were cut out, like his previous wives, he would never look back but whatever he was like, he was someone committed to motion pictures and Sandra quotes a speech given by Celia Johnson from In Which We Serve, in which she thinks if we substitute ships for film, we might get a true understanding of the man.

In 1987 Lawrence of Arabia was restored by film restoration expert Robert A Harris. David heard about the project and rushed to assist. Producer Don Siegel had cut elements out of the film to reduce its running time and Lean felt that now was the time to restore them. The producers could hardly say no to David Lean.

It just so happens that I have that restored version on DVD so as I’m feeling rather chilly on this December afternoon writing this, I might just dig out my copy, make a cup of tea and give it a viewing, or should I go for Blithe Spirit, the wonderfully witty play filmed by David Lean in 1945?

Which David Lean film would you watch?

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Almost But Not Quite (Part 3)

Posted on by Steve Higgins

This is the third post in an occasional series about actors who almost got the role of a lifetime, and in some cases did, but then they didn’t. I’m getting the feeling I’m not explaining it all very well so let’s kick off with the first of four case studies . .

Frank Sinatra and Die Hard.

The Detective was a novel written by American author Roderick Thorp, and was first published in 1966. It was made into a film in 1968 also called The Detective and starred Frank Sinatra, as Detective Joe Leland. Billed as “an adult look at police life”, The Detective went on to become one of the highest-grossing films of 1968 and a great box office hit for Sinatra.

A sequel to the novel, Nothing Lasts Forever, was published in 1979 and in 1987 screen writer Jeb Stuart was asked to work on a screen adaptation of the book. The essential idea for the film according to Wikipedia was that of ‘Rambo in an office building’.

The producers were contractually obliged to offer Frank Sinatra the role although Sinatra, being 70 at the time, was hardly in a position to say yes. Various actors were considered for the role of the detective, now renamed John McLane, including Sylvester Stallone, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Harrison Ford, Clint Eastwood and many others. Bruce Willis was originally forced to turn down the role because of commitments to the TV series Moonlighting but then co-star Cybil Shepard became pregnant and filming on the show was shut down for eleven weeks leaving Willis free to star in the film, the new title of which was Die Hard.

Willis was a controversial choice for the role. He was still only a TV actor and at the time it was proving difficult for TV stars to make the transition to film. Willis himself felt he wanted to distance his character from the larger than life characters played by Schwarzenegger and Stallone in similar action films and he played McLane as an ordinary guy thrust into an out of the ordinary situation.

The film was shot at the Fox Plaza in Century City, Los Angeles which was then still under construction. It was released in 1988 and was one of the year’s top films as well as being a break out film for Bruce Willis. It’s a film I’ve always enjoyed but I still can’t see Sinatra ever playing John McLane.

George Peppard and Dynasty

I can’t really say I was ever a fan of Dynasty. I watched a few episodes but I much preferred the rival show, Dallas. Dynasty was a 1980’s TV soap opera about a wealthy family, the Carringtons, living in Denver, Colorado. John Forsythe starred as the head of the family, Blake Carrington, with Linda Evans as his wife Krystle and Joan Collins as his former wife Alexis. In the pilot episode however, George Peppard played Blake Carrington but the actor didn’t like the script and clashed frequently with the producers. Peppard felt that his role was too similar to that of Jock Ewing, the family patriarch in Dallas. Before the pilot was completed, Peppard was fired and John Forsythe took over the role and all scenes involving Peppard had to be re-shot.

Screenshot from Quora.com

The first season of the series wasn’t too good but the arrival of Joan Collins for series two seemed to bump up the audience figures. George himself wasn’t too bothered about being sacked. He got the part of Hannibal Smith in the A Team.

In his personal life Peppard battled alcoholism and cancer. He died in 1994.

Dennis Hopper and The Truman Show

Dennis Hopper was a great fan of James Dean and he appeared with Dean in two films, Rebel Without a Cause and Giant. Later he was part of Easy Rider, a film which supposedly kick started the American new wave of filming in the late 60s and early 70s. Hopper directed and co-wrote the film although I remember watching a TV documentary in the 1980s in which Hopper, Peter Fonda and others all claimed credit for the film. In later life Hopper appeared as a film villain in films like Speed.

In 1997 he signed on to play the part of Christof in the film The Truman Show. Christof is the TV producer of The Truman Show, a TV reality show in which the star, Truman, played by Jim Carrey, doesn’t realise he is on TV. The show is filmed using hidden cameras and actors and is funded by product placements. Hopper was fired after only two days on the shoot as the producers weren’t happy with his performance. Ed Harris, who plays the role in the finished film was a last minute replacement.

Dennis Hopper died at his home in Los Angeles in 2010. He was 74 years old.

Elvis Presley and A Star is Born

A Star is Born is a film that has had numerous remakes. The original was released in 1937 starring Janet Gaynor and Frederic March. It had a screenplay by Dorothy Parker, Alan Campbell and Robert Carson and is about a young girl who wants to get into the movies. Janet Gaynor plays Esther Blodget who meets film star Norman Maine. Maine gets Esther into the film world and Esther falls for him but Maine is an alcoholic and his star is rapidly fading while Esther’s is on the rise.

Sid Luft asked director George Cukor to take the helm of a new musical version in 1952 starring his then wife Judy Garland. Cukor wasn’t keen at first but changed his mind when he found the film would be shot in technicolour and he wanted to be part of this new process. Cukor chose Cary Grant to take on the role of Norman Maine but Grant declined. Various others were in the frame for the part including Frank Sinatra. Stewart Granger was a favourite for a while but he didn’t like the way Cukor worked and finally the role went to James Mason.

In the mid seventies, Barbara Streisand and her then husband decided to produce a new musical version of the story based on the music industry rather than Hollywood. Streisand wanted Elvis Presley for the Norman Maine role and even met with Elvis to discuss the film. Elvis who was a great film fan wanted to revive his film career but the big problem was his manager, Colonel Tom Parker. Parker apparently wanted top billing for Elvis and a substantial pay packet. He was also concerned that Elvis would be playing a singer whose career is on the way out thinking that might harm the King of Rock n Roll’s actual career. Eventually Elvis backed out and Kris Kristofferson played the part.

I’ve always thought that Elvis was actually a pretty good actor. OK I know a lot of his later films were dreadful but Presley was bored with the kind of films that Colonel Parker had him making. Presley was a great fan of James Dean and knew all the dialogue from Dean’s films. I reckon he would have been outstanding in A Star is Born but sadly, it wasn’t to be.

Yes, I would have loved to have seen Presley in A Star is Born. Also, I wouldn’t have minded seeing Cary Grant in the Judy Garland version either!

Elvis died in 1977. He was 42 years old. His last acting role in a film was Change of Habit, made in 1969.

A Star is Born was remade yet again in 2018 starring Bradley Cooper and Lady Gaga.

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Reviewing the Rocky Franchise

Posted on by Steve Higgins

I’ve always liked the original Rocky film but something more interesting than the film itself is the story of how it came to be made. In the mid-seventies Sylvester Stallone was a bit part actor with few acting credits to his name. One day in 1975 he watched the Ali v Chuck Wepner fight in which Wepner lost but managed to stay 15 rounds with heavyweight champion Muhammad Ali. Stallone, inspired by the bout, wrote a screenplay about a washed-up fighter called Rocky who manages to stay the distance with the world champion. He passed the screenplay to his agents who took it to various producers. The screenplay was good and many producers were interested but Stallone attached one small condition to the sale, that he himself had to play the part of Rocky.

The producers who finally picked up the screenplay were Winkler-Chartoff productions. They had a contract with United Artists but UA still wanted a big name star in the title role. Burt Reynolds and James Caan were suggested but Stallone hung on and continued to insist that he played Rocky. I have always thought that Stallone was offered a million dollars to let James Caan play Rocky but according to an article I read which quoted Stallone himself, the offer went up to $340,000 and he still said no. Eventually the producers gave in and Sylvester Stallone received just $35,000 for acting and writing the screenplay plus a percentage of the profits. United Artists had a major production in the pipeline at the time, New York, New York, a big budget musical and they felt that the profits from that film would cover any losses on Rocky. In fact, the musical was a flop and those losses were covered by the success of Rocky.

The basic plot of Rocky is that World Champion Apollo Creed, played by Carl Weathers and based loosely on Muhammed Ali, is let down after planning a title bout to be held during the US Bicentennial celebrations. His opponent backs out and no other contender is available. Creed decides to rescue the fight by selecting an unknown boxer for the hugely publicised event. He chooses Rocky Balboa, a part time boxer and debt collector. The problem is, Creed thinks it will just be a demonstration match but Rocky thinks he can win.

The film was a low budget production but is still a great looking film. It was one of the first films to be shot with a Steadicam, a revolutionary camera mounting which absorbs movement. It was used in the fight scenes and the scene in which Rocky runs through the market in Philadelphia. In a sequence filmed at a skating rink, the producers had no money for any extras so they changed the script. Instead of skating with extras, Rocky and his girl Adrian bribe the cleaning staff to let them in when the rink has closed and is empty.

Joe Frazier makes a cameo appearance in the film and in fact some aspects of his life were used on the film as part of Rocky’s training regimen, running up the steps of the Philadelphia Museum of Art and punching the meat carcass in a freezer.

Rocky was released in 1976 and grossed over $5 million in the first weekend of its national release and a later box office of 225 million dollars worldwide. The film was nominated for various awards and won the Oscar for Best Picture. Stallone’s pay packet has increased with each subsequent instalment of the film franchise but even today he still isn’t happy that the producers, rather than Stallone himself, own the rights to the Rocky character.

Verdict: 10/10

Rocky II

Given the huge success of the original there was really no doubt there would be a sequel. The film starts just where the last one left off except in the original the two fighters agree that there will not be a rematch. In this sequel, Apollo Creed does a quick reversal and is immediately on at Rocky about a rematch. Rocky is not sure what to do with his new found celebrity or with his money. He buys a house and a new car. He tries his hand at TV advertising but when that fails he sinks deeper into debt and begins to consider fighting again. His manager played again by Burgess Meredith is against the idea but when Apollo ups his campaign to get Rocky to fight and publicly insults Rocky, he finally comes on board. Adrian isn’t keen on the idea and Rocky trains in a lacklustre fashion until she gives him her blessing.

The title bout begins and at the end the two fighters knock each other down together but it is Rocky who gets up to claim the win.

Stallone asked to direct the film and when John G Avildsen, the director of the original film was unavailable, he got his chance.

I’ve seen this film before and always thought that in a way it was just a remake of the original. I watched it again for this blog and rather enjoyed it.

Verdict: 7/1

Rocky III

Rocky is doing well as the heavyweight world champion. He is settled with Adrian and has a son. He takes on various contenders but is constantly hassled by Clubber Lang, played by Mr T, for a title shot. Rocky agrees to meet Clubber in the ring but his manager Mickey, played by Burgess Meredith, is not so keen. On the night of the match Mickey dies of a heart attack and Rocky loses to Clubber. Apollo Creed decides to help Rocky and takes over his training for the rematch. After a tough match he wins back his title and the film finishes with Rocky and Apollo getting together in the ring for a friendly and private bout.

Stallone wrote the screenplay and directed the film and the theme song, Eye of the Tiger won an academy award.

I had not seen this before but watched it last week and thought it was pretty good.

Verdict: 7/10

Rocky IV

Can’t say I was totally impressed with this film. Apollo Creed decides to make his comeback with a fight against Russian Boxer Ivan Drago played by Dolph Lundgren. Creed is badly beaten by the Russian and dies from his injuries. Rocky agrees to fight Drago in Russia and takes a predictable win. It was again written and directed by Stallone and he and Lundgren traded real punches in the filming which ended up with Stallone in intensive care. Stallone’s future wife Brigitte Nielson played Drago’s wife, Ludmilla. Bill Conti who wrote the musical score for all the other Rocky films was absent from this one and instead Vince DiCola produced the disappointing music.

In 2021 Stallone released a new version of the film and the re-edited and re-released film was titled Rocky Vs Drago. The new version is only slightly longer but apparently was meant to add more depth to the relationship between Rocky and Apollo Creed as well as cutting some sillier elements like the robot Rocky gives to Paulie as a gift. A review I read in the Guardian felt that Stallone only marginally succeeded.

Verdict 4/10

Rocky V

This is probably the low point in the franchise. Original director John G Avildsen returned to the director’s chair and Stallone intended it to be the last in the Rocky franchise but it’s possible that because it was badly received, he went on to make Rocky Balboa.

Rocky returns from Russia but retires from boxing due to an injury. He then finds that his brother-in-law Paulie has given power of attorney to Rocky’s accountant who has then gone on to squander Rocky’s fortune. Rocky and his wife have to sell their home to pay their debts but Rocky finds purpose in training a young fighter. The relationship later sours and the two engage in a street fight which Rocky wins.

I have to admit that this is one Rocky film that has eluded me so far. Over on Rotten Tomatoes the review went like this: “Rocky V’s attempts to recapture the original’s working-class grit are as transparently phony as each of the thuddingly obvious plot developments in a misguided instalment that sent the franchise flailing into long term limbo.”

Verdict: Rotten Tomatoes gave the film only a 29% approval rating.

Rocky Balboa

I have two of the Rocky films on DVD. One is the original Rocky and the other is this one, Rocky Balboa. It’s a really thoughtful entry into the Rocky franchise. Rocky has retired. His wife has died and he has lost a lot of his money. His income comes from a small Italian restaurant in which many of the patrons come not just for Italian food but also to meet the former heavyweight champion of the world, Rocky Balboa.

The current champion Mason ‘the line’ Dixon has been criticised for fighting easy opponents. To get some positive publicity, he decides to enter into a computer fight with Rocky. It’s a fight reminiscent of the encounter between Rocky Marciano and Muhammad Ali in the 1970’s. At the time Marciano and Ali were the sport’s only two unbeaten champions. They were filmed sparring for various rounds and the result decided by probability formulas entered into a computer. Two different outcomes were filmed, the version shown in the UK showed Ali winning which my father was not happy about as he loved boxing and was a particular fan of Rocky Marciano.

In the film Rocky is judged to have won the computer fight and so decides to renew his boxing licence. Mason, not happy about being beaten, challenges Rocky to an exhibition fight which both men want to win. Mason emerges as the winner but Rocky doesn’t seem to mind. His day is over and he receives a standing ovation from the crowd.

This was probably the very best entry into the Rocky series. Rather than just boxing, the film looks at Rocky himself as he gets older, mourns the loss of his wife, and worries about his relationship with his son. He revisits many of the locations in the original Rocky film including his old house and the pet store where he met his wife. The only problem I had with the film was that the actor playing Mason Dixon didn’t look much like a heavyweight boxer to me. Surprise, surprise, then when I found out that actor Antonio Tarver was in fact a former light heavyweight champion! Ah, not a proper heavyweight then.

Rocky Balboa was the last in the Rocky series although a spin off series began in 2015 with Creed in which Rocky mentors boxer Adonis Johnson, the son of Apollo Creed. Although Stallone apparently contributed to the story, he did not write or direct either this or the following films. He isn’t happy about the producers owning the rights to characters he created either and publicly tweeted his unhappiness about a reported spin off film about Drago, the Russian boxer in Rocky IV.

In a lot of ways, the Rocky films parallel Stallone’s own life. He turned down big money offers to let others play what was the role of a lifetime, took it on himself and was propelled to film stardom.

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Reviewing the Mission Impossible Franchise

Posted on by Steve Higgins

It was a cold afternoon in Manchester and I mumbled something to myself about the supposed heatwave and zipped my jacket up to my neck. At the left luggage office I took out the key that had been given to me earlier and when I opened the compartment I found a small package inside. I took the package and walked the short distance to the square. I sat down on the hard wooden bench and opened it up. Inside was a small tape player and a set of earphones. I put on the earphones and pressed play. There was a short burst of static and then a voice spoke.

‘Good afternoon, Mr Higgins. In the 1970’s a television show called Mission Impossible was produced that became a minor cult TV classic. Many years later the franchise was revived with a series of feature films starring Tom Cruise. Your mission, should you decide to accept it, is to review the TV series and the subsequent films, look at the background to the films, try to understand why they have been successful and put together a blog post revealing your findings. The blog post must be ready for publication by Saturday at 10am.

This tape will self-destruct in 5 seconds.’

I put down the earphones and placed them and the tape player back in the package, moments later the package disintegrated and I dropped the remains into a rubbish bin and walked away.

The TV series 1966 to 1973

The TV show was created by producer Bruce Geller and concerned a team of special agents known as the Impossible Missions Force. They are a US government agency which takes on hostile foreign governments, South American dictatorships and criminal organisations.

In the first series the team is led by Dan Briggs played by Steven Hill but he was replaced for season 2 by Peter Graves in the part of Jim Phelps. Other regular team members were Leonard Nimoy, Martin Laudau and his wife Barbara Bain, Greg Morris and Lesley Anne Warren. Each played a team member with a particular skill, for instance Laudau and Nimoy played agents with a talent for impersonation and disguise, Greg Morris played an electronics expert and so on.

Mission Impossible ran for 7 seasons and was cancelled because, according to Wikipedia, the producers at Paramount found they could make more money by syndicating the existing series rather than making new ones.

A revival series was made in the 1980’s also starring Peter Graves. To save money the series was not filmed in Hollywood but in Australia but it only lasted two seasons and was largely unsuccessful.

A great feature of the series was the opening title sequence which involved a match being struck and then lighting a fuse shown over quick clips of the upcoming episode to the sound of the iconic theme tune written by Lalo Schifrin. Next would be Jim Phelps listening to his tape recorded instructions which after being played would then self-destruct. Phelps would then look through his agents’ files complete with photos and choose who he wanted for the mission. Sometimes a guest star would play one of the agents who would be introduced by Jim checking out his dossier. A team briefing would then take place and the mission would get under way.

The IMF used a great deal of gadgets to accomplish their missions, secret listening devices and other electronic hardware as well as incredible masks and make up to impersonate people. One particular episode that I remember was when the team had to retrieve some stolen gold from a South American dictator’s safe. They did it by drilling a small hole in the safe, heating it until the gold melted and ran out down the small hole then a little gadget sprayed the interior of the empty safe to cover the hole. Mission Impossible was staple viewing in our household in the late 1960’s.

Mission Impossible 1996

Paramount Studios had plans to make a movie version of the series but the plans never seemed to come to fruition until Tom Cruise expressed an interest. He had been a fan of the TV series and hoped to make the film version the first project for his own production company, Cruise/Wagner Productions. The project began with Sydney Pollack as director but Cruise later decided he wanted Brian De Palma. De Palma designed most of the action sequences in the film and the final script was written around these. It just so happens that recently Channel 4 in the UK decided to run all the Mission Impossible films on consecutive nights so that came in pretty handy to refresh my memory on these films.

I enjoyed Mission Impossible much more on this recent viewing than when I had first seen it. The film uses the fabulous TV theme and opens in a similar way to the TV series.

Cruise plays agent Ethan Hunt with John Voight playing Jim Phelps. Hunt is sent to stop the theft of a list of agents kept inside the American Embassy in Prague. The mission fails and Jim Phelps, the agent in charge, is wounded and all of his team are killed except for Ethan Hunt. There is clearly a double agent or mole at work and various things happen until we find out the mole was Jim Phelps which was just a little bit sneaky because all of us who watched the 1960’s TV series knew that Jim Phelps was a character in that show and therefore could not possibly be the mole. The fact that he was made me feel a little cheated by this film because they used my nerdy TV knowledge against me.

I read recently that Peter Graves was asked to play Phelps in the film but declined after seeing his character was the traitor. Other stars from the TV series weren’t happy either.

Mission Impossible II 2000

This second instalment of the franchise was directed by John Woo. It’s about a biological weapon called Chimera. Rogue agent Sean Ambrose steals the virus from its inventor by impersonating Ethan Hunt. He destroys the aircraft on which the inventor is travelling and parachutes to safety. Hunt was played once again by Tom Cruise and his mission is to regain the virus. The opening sequence sees Cruise doing some daring rock climbing which the studio wasn’t happy about. Cruise didn’t have a safety net but did apparently wear a harness. I didn’t like the heavy metal style version of the classic theme and as a matter of fact, I lost interest in the film early on.

Mission Impossible III 2006

This third instalment was directed by JJ Abrams and for the first time the writers decided to show a little of the background to the Ethan Hunt character. He has retired from the IMF and has become a trainer for new agents but is asked to take on a new mission. He is about to get married but his fiancée knows nothing of his espionage work. The IMF team kidnap villain Owen Davian who escapes but decides to take revenge on Ethan. The film is filled with high powered action sequences and although a little implausible, I kind of liked it.

Mission Impossible Ghost Protocol 2011

The IMF are tasked to stop a man only known as ‘Cobalt’ who is trying to initiate a war between the USA and Russia. Tom Cruise as Ethan, infiltrates a Moscow prison to get to a man who has links to Cobalt. Things go wrong and the IMF is closed down by the US government when Cobalt blows up the Kremlin. The IMF team however stay on the hunt for Cobalt and follow him to various parts of the world including Dubai, where Tom Cruise has to climb up the outside of the world’s tallest building, the Burj Khalifa. Cruise does all his own stunts but for a long time I just assumed that all the stuff on the outside of the Khalifa was done in a studio with a green screen and the background digitally inserted. Nope, Cruise actually swung on hidden cables outside the skyscraper. Why he should choose to risk his life in that fashion is beyond me but there it is. A good film full of action and adventure with numerous shootings and explosions.

Mission Impossible Rogue Nation 2015

This next instalment of Mission Impossible is pretty similar to the previous one. The CIA director (Alex Baldwin) asks a government committee to close down the IMF and incorporate them into the CIA which they decide to do. Ethan Hunt escapes from a criminal organisation known as the Syndicate with the help of British double agent Ilse Faust. Various exciting adventures ensue including a highly dangerous motorcycle chase and a deep underwater dive without oxygen. The IMF manage to capture the head of the Syndicate in the end. A government committee decide it would be best to reform the IMF. It’s all a little fantastic but not bad for a Saturday night on TV with a couple of beers and a pizza.

Mission Impossible Fallout 2018

After a week of watching the Mission Impossible films I’m sorry to say I missed this one which is a pity because according to the reviews it’s the best in the series. Still, sometimes it’s important to move one’s lazy behind off the couch, switch off the TV and go out and enjoy oneself. Pity there weren’t a few Mission Impossible questions in the pub quiz that night. After all this research I think I might have done pretty well.

Update

It just so happened that my brother has Fallout on DVD so he brought it round and we gave it a watch. The plot is something about plutonium and atomic bombs and the IMF guys have to swap the captured head of the Syndicate for the plutonium. The plutonium gets put into 2 atomic bombs which cannot be defused but after some highly implausible action-packed chases including a helicopter chase with both helicopters crashing, rolling down a cliff and being suspended on the edge, things finally get sorted. I reckon this would have been a good one to watch in the cinema.

Conclusion

It’s not easy to reboot a successful TV series whether it’s for the small screen or the big one but the producers of the Mission Impossible films have actually done a pretty good job. The films do have something of a link to the old TV series. They have different characters and different actors but the films have kept that opening element from the TV show with the match lighting the fuse.  They have also kept that fabulous theme tune. Then again, could they have really made Mission Impossible without the Mission Impossible theme? I don’t think so.

I did read that some of the TV actors from the original series weren’t happy with the films. Greg Morris apparently walked out of a screening when it was revealed that Jim Phelps was the traitor which was exactly why Peter Graves, the original Jim Phelps declined to reprise his old role as I mentioned earlier.

Personally, with the exception of MI2 I’ve enjoyed all the films and I look forward to the next instalment in the franchise which I believe has already been filmed.

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Memory, Memories and Memorabilia

Posted on by Steve Higgins

I got to thinking about memory the other day, after all memories are important. Our whole past experience is made up of memories so in effect, everything that has passed, everything that has gone before, exists only in memory.

My mother who suffers with dementia will be 93 later this year. Sometimes when I visit her she is talkative and chatty, other times not. A sad moment a few months ago was when her only words were please help me, intoned over and over like a ritual or a prayer. I left her feeling extremely saddened and upset that day but when I visited a few weeks later she was the complete reverse, bright, happy, talkative and chatty. She couldn’t remember her address, except for her childhood address, the one she left behind many years ago but still, she was bright and asked about her home and her garden and what about the rent? Was I keeping up to date with the rent?

The Auntie I never met.

I brought her a photo I had found of her sister Ada. Ada was a keen cyclist who was sadly killed in 1948 in a traffic accident on her bike. I showed her the picture and she knew Ada immediately telling me about her many achievements in cycling and also winning a place at the Manchester Central Grammar School for Girls.

The photo, as I had hoped, stimulated her memory and we talked for a while about the past and her long-lost sister.

Sometimes I wonder about my own memory. I forget names quite frequently and sometimes when Liz and I go to the pub quiz and try to identify celebrities in the picture round I end up saying things to Liz like ‘It’s the woman who was Mrs Peel in the Avengers on TV’ (one point for Diana Rigg.) Or ‘It’s the woman from the film Titanic’ (another point for Kate Winslet.) Or even ‘the guy who used to be on the breakfast show on Channel 4 with that woman who’s on Celebrity Gogglebox’. (Outstanding if you got Johnny Vaughn!)

The other day I was sorting out some of my old CDs. There wasn’t much on the TV so I popped one in the player. It was by Elton John called simply ‘Elton John’ and contains the hit single ‘Your Song’ and various other tracks. As Elton tinkled the ivories and began to sing, I realised I knew all the words despite not having listened to that album for many years. I’ve also got it on vinyl and when I was in my early twenties and discovered Elton, I played and played his records until my parents yelled up the stairs telling me to pack it in.

Memory is important too in today’s electronic devices. I mentioned in a previous post about how a shoot for one of my videos was curtailed because the camera’s memory card was full. I usually have a spare but on that particular day I hadn’t popped one into my camera bag. Result disaster! Well, almost disaster as I still had my spare camera. When I came to edit that particular video which was about Manchester Airport I also had a lot of unused video from previous visits as well as some video from the VHS days shot in the late 1980s so I was able to change direction a little bit and also to look at how the area has changed in recent years.

Going back further to the 1960s and 70s, my schoolfriends and I used to visit the airport regularly and go on to the viewing terraces to watch the aircraft land and take off. My old schoolfriend Steve used to be a real aircraft expert and when we made a video about the airport in 1986, he would comment on my photos saying things like ‘that was a 747 just arrived from Heathrow’ or ‘that was a Lufthansa 757 off to Munich’.

My mother too was pretty knowledgeable about aircraft, well, World War II aircraft anyway. Manchester was bombed in the war and mum’s suburban home of Wythenshawe was frequently hit as it was just up the road from the airport, a particular target of the Nazi bombers. The famous WWII pilot Guy Gibson did some of his training at Manchester airport, then called Ringway and mentions it in his autobiography, Enemy Coast Ahead. My mother says she could tell if the aircraft were British or German by the sound of their engines. The German bombers had a deep droning sound apparently.

A lot of my photographs are routinely backed up on Google Photos but recently they advised me about the new limits of their online backup service. From June 1st 2021, instead of free back up, that now only extends to 15 GB, after that we will have to purchase a plan with Google to continue our image storage. All my laptop images are backed up at Flickr.com but again, that isn’t a free service, I pay a yearly fee. Of course, I could just cancel but then how could I access my images? Well, it just so happens that all my images and videos are backed up on my three hard drives but Google is so much easier to use. If I want a picture for a blog post I tend to just search my Google photos rather than search around the house for my drives and then plug them in. When I went to back up my 2021 photos and videos the other day, I realised I didn’t have enough memory on my current drive so now I’ll have to get another one.

Loss of memory is a regular theme in the film world. The Bourne Identity and its sequels were about an intelligence agent who wakes and does not know who he is. Matt Damon plays the lead character who is picked up by a fishing boat near to death suffering from bullet wounds and total amnesia. The Bourne films are a series I’ve always wanted to watch but I never seen them. (Note to self- set the TV recorder next time The Bourne Identity appears on the TV guide.)

Hitchcock made an amnesia themed film in Spellbound starring Gregory Peck and Ingrid Bergman. A doctor, played by Gregory Peck, arrives at a mental hospital to replace the outgoing hospital director but Ingrid Bergman discovers Peck is an imposter. Peck’s character fears he may have killed the former director but cannot recall anything. Not my favourite Hitchcock film but it’s an interesting one with dream sequences designed by surrealist artist Salvador Dali.

Finally, here’s my favourite amnesiac film, Random Harvest starring Ronald Colman and Greer Garson. It’s a film not often seen on TV and now and again I’ll get out my old VHS copy if I want to watch it. Based on the book by one of my favourite authors, James Hilton, the film concerns a shell-shocked war veteran, played by Colman, recovering in a sanatorium during the latter days of WWI. The man cannot remember his past but makes a new life with Greer Garson. After they are married the man now known as Smithy, journeys to Liverpool to see a newspaper editor about a story he has written. In the city Smithy is hit by a cab and knocked unconscious. When he awakes all memory of Smithy has vanished but his true identity returns.

He returns home to his lost family but what was he doing in Liverpool. Where has he been in the years since his wounding in the trenches of the Great War?

At times a little sentimental, I’ve always loved this film. Colman is wonderful as the man who rejuvenates his family’s business, becomes a respected MP but cannot find happiness until he knows what happened to him in those few lost years.

Here’s a last thought on the subject of memory. When you are at the pub quiz and are struggling to recall the name of the guy who played Jason King in TV’s ‘Department S’, never say to yourself ‘I can’t remember’. According to Paul McKenna, the guy who produced all those books and tapes about confidence boosting which I used to use when preparing for job interviews, you are sending a message to your subconscious saying ‘don’t remember’. What you should say to yourself is ‘I’m not sure at the moment but the answer WILL come to me soon.’ That way, you’re sending a positive message to your subconscious telling it to get working on that long-forgotten name.

Now, who did play Jason King? Peter Wyngarde! Told you it would work!

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