Favorite Films, Part IX

Part nine of ten of my 100 favorite movie series, in chronological order. We finally make it to the 1970s, considered by many to be one of the greatest decades in film history. Maverick directors abounded in this decade. So what do I have but a lot of horror movies and westerns. What can I say, I have low brow tastes.

“True Grit” (1969). I said this in a previous blog and it bears repeating. Whenever there are articles about past Oscar winners who didn’t deserve to win, John Wayne’s Best Actor win for this film invariably comes up. People say he was just playing himself, they proclaim or it’s the worst Oscar ever handed out. To which I say: Bull. And. Crap. Wayne’s performance as the eyepatch-wearing Rooster Cogburn is a winner all the way. We watch his character evolve from a crude, mean U.S. Marshall to a caring (though still unsentimental) father figure to young Mattie Ross (Kim Darby), who is tracking her father’s killer. It’s not contrived either, but we witness the character’s evolution over the course of the movie. Besides, who should have gotten the Best Actor Oscar that year, those two mopes from “Midnight Cowboy”? No, the Academy made the right decision that year.

“The Abominable Dr. Phibes” (1971): One of my favorite horror movies ever is this stylish entry starring Vincent Price, as the title character who exacts revenge on the surgical team who he feels caused the death of his beloved wife on the operating table. He exacts his vengeance on them by basing their demise – in very ingenious fashion - on the 10 plagues of Egypt as related in the Book of Exodus. There’s a great deal of humor to this movie too, especially in the befuddlement of Scotland Yard Inspector Trout, who for the life of him can’t figure out what’s going on. Robert Fuest’s direction and the film’s 1930’s Art Deco set design are of the highest order.

“Big Jake” (1971). One of the meanest outlaw gangs in movie history, headed by John Fain (the great Richard Boone), kidnap a young boy from a wealthy ranch and hold him for $1 million ransom. They think his grandfather Jake McCandles (John Wayne) is dead. He isn’t. The Duke takes his estranged sons (Patrick Wayne and Christopher Mitchum) into Mexico to hunt down the Fain Gang and bring his grandson home alive. Probably my all-time favorite John Wayne movie. Not his best, mind you. I even know that. But it was the first John Wayne movie I ever saw, back as an impressionable nine-year-old one summer evening at the Dolton Theater. It’s been almost 40 years, but I can still remember the cheers and applause from a packed house when the movie ended with the freeze frame of Wayne and his family and that triumphant Elmer Bernstein music cue kicked in. I can understand when younger people say watching something like “Star Wars” (1977) or “Raiders of the Lost Ark” (1981) changed their lives, because it happened to me watching “Big Jake.” I’ve been a Wayne fan ever since that night, and it instilled a love for the western genre that has never abated over the years.

“Tales from the Crypt” (1972): I’ve always been a big fan of the horror anthologies that England’s Amicus Studios produced in the 1960s and 1970s, and this is probably the best. It’s actually a very moral film…if you do bad things to people, then bad things will come back to you a hundredfold. Each of the five stories here are good, but my favorites are the third, starring kindly Peter Cushing against a very nasty neighbor, and the final episode where residents at an institute for the blind extract a most ingenious vengeance on the callous and miserly new manager. The first segment, set on Christmas Eve featuring an escaped lunatic in a Santa Claus costume, makes for ideal holiday viewing. Ho Ho Ho.

“That’s Entertainment” (1974): Not really a documentary, but a magnificent overview of M-G-M musicals. In those pre-video and pre-cable days, those clips of musicals rarely revived or shown on TV were absolutely mouth-watering. The early 1970s was a huge feast for nostalgia buffs, and this was the cherry on the sundae. If you’re feeling down, put this on, settle back, watch, and marvel. The blues will be lifted within minutes.

“Breakheart Pass” (1975): I love westerns, mysteries and stories set on trains. This happily combines all three. Charles Bronson is arrested for murder and placed on a train traveling west through the snow-covered wilderness to bring much needed medical supplies to a fort. Someone on the train doesn’t want the train to reach its destination, what with murders and acts of sabotage occurring on a regular basis. Bronson takes it upon himself to investigate. (Hint: he’s really not a murderer). There’s gorgeous scenery on display here, with that beautiful steam engine hauling that train through vast mountain gorges and across bridges. There’s a great fight scene on top of the moving train between Bronson and ex-boxer Archie Moore. This was the last assignment for legendary stuntman/coordinator Yakima Canutt and he went out with a bang with the expert staging of the action scenes here. A terrific cast too, full of such pros as Ben Johnson, Richard Crenna, Jill Ireland, Charles Durning, Ed Lauter, David Huddleston and Bill McKinney. This is a perfectly satisfying evening’s entertainment, and the type of fare that contemporary Hollywood has no idea how to make anymore.

“The Man Who Would Be King” (1975): One of the greatest adventure films ever made, and features what are arguably my favorite performances of two of my favorite actors, Sean Connery and Michael Caine. Based on a short story by Rudyard Kipling (who is played in this movie by Christopher Plummer), two cashiered British soldiers in 19th century India decide to travel into the wilderness and find a country where they can set themselves up as kings. One can see the film as a look at greed and man’s driving ambitions, but director John Huston doesn’t allow the message to swamp this marvelously entertaining movie. The Moroccan locations are stunning.

“Race with the Devil” (1975). Another childhood favorite, and one that holds up really well. Two vacationing couples (Warren Oates and Loretta Swit, and Peter Fonda and Lara Parker) drive across Texas in an RV on their way to a skiing vacation in Colorado. One evening they pull over to a clearing to rest for the night and find themselves witnessing a Satanic ceremony, including the ritual murder of a young woman. The rest of the movie is a chase across Texas, with the Satanists seemingly around every corner. The car stunts in this are sensational, and there’s a twist ending they likely would not do today. I saw this on a Saturday afternoon at the Dolton Theater, and I think every kid in my class was there that afternoon. The TV commercials had us drooling to see this title…no way where we going to miss this. It did not disappoint. Leonard Rosenman, of all people, did the score.

“The Spy Who Loved Me” (1977). Roger Moore’s best outing as 007, and one of the best Bond films ever. It doesn’t take itself too seriously, but still offers some of the best action scenes in the series’ history. For years I thought the large specially fitted tanker that scoops up American, British and Russian nuclear submarines (thus leading to WW III) was a real tanker that the producers purchased, retrofitted with a new special hull, and then blew it up at the end. I was floored when I read it was a miniature. I would have sworn it was the real thing, strong evidence that CGI is not the be all and end all of special effects. This came out the same summer as “Star Wars” and I couldn’t understand the furor over that when the best Bond movie in years was also playing. High school hormones also likely led me to play favorites here. “The Spy Who Loved Me” gave us Barbara Bach and Caroline Munro. “Star Wars” gave us…Carrie Fisher and her cinnamon roll hair style? No contest.

“Superman” (1978). The best comic book movie to date. You know you’re in the hands of something special when you realize that the build-up to the first Superman appearance – the Krypton and Smallville scenes, the introductory scenes at the Daily Planet – are every bit as good as the Superman spectacle and action in the film’s second half. The film also offers my favorite title credit sequence of all time. Though I’m a huge fan of George Reeves from the TV show, I have to admit Christopher Reeve is the ideal Clark Kent/Superman.

In Praise of Peter Fonda...and 1970s Car Crash Movies

One of the special pleasures of “3:10 to Yuma” is the presence of Peter Fonda in a major supporting role as a bounty hunter on the hunt for outlaw Russell Crowe.

With his long gray hair, he makes a marvelous bounty hunter and every scene he’s in is a pleasure. I’ve always liked him, even though, oddly enough, I’ve never seen his most famous movies, “Easy Rider” (1969) or “The Wild Angels.” (1966).

No, my affection for him begins with two action movies he made in the 1970s, “Dirty Mary, Crazy Larry” (1974) and “Race with the Devil.” (1975,)

Back in the days before video games, computers, I pods, and cable television, I think movie awareness was much higher then than now. Television commercials saturated the airwaves for weeks and weeks before these movies opened, so by the time they came to my local theater, the Dolton, every kid in the neighborhood ached to see these movies. And we did, and I remember seeing half, if not more, of my class from Roosevelt School at weekend matinees.

“Dirty Mary, Crazy Larry” starred Fonda and British sexpot Susan George as two modern day outlaws on the run, chased across Texas by Sheriff Vic Morrow in his helicopter. The ads promised amazing car stunts and did not disappoint, culminating in a climax that still packs a wallop. The picture made a small fortune for 20th Century Fox.

Even better was “Race with the Devil” which has Fonda and Warren Oates and their spouses (Lara Parker and Loretta Swit, respectively) riding through the Southwest in their RV when one night they witness a Satanic ritual involving a human sacrifice. The rest of the movie is the Satanists in pursuit of the couples. It’s all most enjoyable, with nary a wasted scene, terrific car stunts, and a climax that was pretty disturbing. (It was talk of all the kids that Monday at recess, and, alas, one that would not be filmed today).

This has been a pretty good year for Fonda. I got a big kick out of his cameo in “Wild Hogs”, and I was pleased to see him as Satan in “Ghost Rider”, a movie which I alone seemed to enjoy as a big budget comic book movie with a hearty B movie sensibility.

The 1970s were a time of ubiquitous B-movie car crash movies, and the Dolton Theater seemingly played them all, either new or revivals as co-features for the newer car crash extravaganzas. We saw Burt Reynolds pictures like “White Lightning” (1973) and “Gator” (1976); Jan-Michael Vincent in “White Line Fever” (1975); David Carradine and Kate Jackson in “Thunder and Lightning” (1977); and the immortal Ron Howard classics “Eat My Dust” (1976) and “Grand Theft Auto.” (1977).

I remember one action flick called with Susan George (again!) and Bo Jackson called “A Small Town in Texas” (1976) which promised a car crashing through a giant block of ice. I wanted to see that, but was disappointed that, due to time considerations when all of us could go, we had to miss it. But my friends and I were able to make the co-feature “Return to Macon County” (1975), so we got to the show early and caught the last 10 minutes or so of “A Small Town in Texas” and we did get to see that car go barreling through that ice. I remember being somewhat disappointed that it didn’t amount to much.

Anyway, I have a special affection for these B movies, which had nothing more in mind but to entertain for 90 minutes and offered their stunt men and drivers the opportunity to work their magic with some really terrific action scenes. They remain a very pleasant memory of my movie-going youth.