1967 Part 2

• 

• 

This was the year I nearly threw up in the cinema after witnessing Gene Hackman crawling around in the dirt with half his head blown off in “Bonnie and Clyde”. Little did I know that the demise of the two main characters at the end of the film would knock that into a cocked hat, thus opening the gates to a welter of violence and onscreen mayhem and gore that has influenced film to this day.

• 

• 

Ironically it was the first and second offerings in Sergio Leone’s Dollar trilogy that attracted just as much attention as “B&C”, ironic in that “A Fistful of Dollars” and “For a Few Dollars More” had actually been made in 1964 and 1965 respectively but their release outside of Italy was delayed due to a lawsuit brought by Japanese film director Akiro Kurosawa. Apparently Akiro felt somewhat aggrieved that Leone had nicked the plot for the first Dollar film from Kurosawa’s Samurai movie “Yojimbo”, sued accordingly and walked away with many a fistful of Yen of his own in the process.

• 

• 

Two classic Hollywood Westerns hit the screen in the same year, “El Dorado”, which is to all intents and purposes a reimagining of “Rio Bravo” and “Hombre”, in which Paul Newman took the lead role whilst Richard Boone stole the film as the villain of the piece.

Judging by Sean Connery’s detached performance in his (supposedly) last Bond outing, “You Only Live Twice”, it’s fairly obvious he wanted out by this point. Not the best of the early 007 films but if you want your lethal cocktail of cinematic sex and violence served shaken and stirred then this one did the job.

Talking of shaken and stirred, the sight of Raquel Welch in a figure hugging outfit floating across the giant screen in Dreamland cinema was enough to wish you were one of the antibodies that attached themselves to her as she and her fellow voyagers attempt to operate on someone from the inside. And no, I am not on drugs as I write this. I liked the film so much I even bought the Dell comic tie-in, although it seems to have gone missing during our recent house move. It’s no doubt totally worthless but when you lose something you’ve managed to keep hold of for over half a century it makes you realise you’re probably a hoarder and you need psychiatric help.

• 

• 

“The Sand Pebbles” is not exactly one of my favourite films for reasons I explain in more detail in the book, but a few weeks later I got to see one of the best double movie bills ever released, “The Great Escape” and ‘633 Squadron”. It was only upon seeing these films on the same program together that I realised wee little Scottish actor Angus Lennie appeared in both, hence the suggestion the double bill should have been released under the title “The Angus Lennie Story”.

I know this is tantamount to blasphemy for all of those Christopher Nolan followers out there but I personally feel there’s a case to be made that the spinoff movie from the “Batman” TV show with Adam West in the title might actually be the best film ever made about the Dark Knight. Made me laugh anyway.

• 

• 

Turning to the subject of TV our Sunday afternoon viewing was somewhat enlivened by an American WW II show called “Garrisons Gorillas”. Supposedly inspired by the film “The Dirty Dozen”, the action-packed series followed the exploits of a bunch of criminals who sneak behind enemy lines in order to kill as many Nazis as possible and in the process add grist to the mill that America won the war all on their own. One of the characters was played by English actor Christopher Carey as a sop to the UK audience and, despite being totally absurd, I have to admit I really liked it.

I know the Beatles are still held in the highest regard by a lot of my generation even though the band broke up over fifty years ago but even the most devoted fan must have had a WTF moment after the “Magical Mystery Tour” film was shown on the BBC on Boxing Day 1967. I know I did and, even though some of the songs went a long way towards salvaging the project as a whole, it was still a bit of a disappointment to the legions of Beatles followers at the time. I tried watching it again recently but if I’m honest I much prefer “A Hard Day’s Night”.

Sorry to end on a bit of a bum note but I’ve got a cold right now and I can just about see out of one eye while I’m typing this. See you next week (hopefully).