Spinout

Spinout
December 14, 1966
Comedy, Musical
MGM
VHS
B-

The Medveds selected this as one of their 50 Worst Movies of All Time, when it's not even the worst Elvis movie.  (But then, they also picked Boy, Did I Get a Wrong Number!, which isn't even the worst Bob Hope sex comedy.)  It is the most entertaining of my '66 movies, an admittedly dubious achievement.  It has some things in common with Girl Happy, notably a romance with Shelley Fabares, and Elvis leading a music combo that features Jimmy Hawkins.  In that movie, the music cues told us that Elvis's pals were three blind mice, while here they are stooges named Larry, Curly, and...Les?  Les is a tomboy drummer, played by Deborah Walley, so already we can see that the formula's being mixed up a bit.  (Since she's a redhead, it's like she's the grandmother of the Kim character in Scott Pilgrim.)   Les has an unrequited crush on Elvis, and there's a Helen-Gurley-Brownish writer pursuing Elvis, too.  In the end he "marries all of them," to other men.  (I think he means he gives them away, although this may be a very early case of people getting married by Elvis.)  Along the way, there are some songs that range from romantic to silly, Elvis lines that include the word "kosher" and a Don Adams imitation, and Carl Betz, Shelley's TV dad, playing her attractive big-screen dad.  Oh, and some racing, but it isn't as boring as in most movies, because it focuses on the competition between various characters, rather than the racing per se.

Una Merkel, of The Bank Dick and The Road to Zanzibar, has one of her last roles, as Mrs. Radley.  Dave Barry (not that Dave Barry) was much more memorable as Beinstock in Some Like It Hot than he is as Harry here.  Christopher Riordan, who was a latecomer to the AIP Beach Party series, appears in a small role.  Victoria Carroll was the shoeshine girl in How to Stuff a Wild Bikini, and she plays Award Girl here.  (She's probably best known as Mel's girlfriend Marie on Alice.)  Nancy Czar was in Girl Happy and Winter A-Go-Go.  Arlene Charles was also in Winter AGG.  Phyllis Davis and Deanna Lund were models in The Swinger.

Warren Berlinger, who plays fainter Philip, and Diane McBain, who's writer Diana St. Clair, would be in another racing movie, Thunder Alley.  Dodie Marshall, who plays Susan, the girl who takes the drumming spot, would do Elvis's Easy Come, Easy Go, Will Hutchins ("Officer Tracy," the friendly gourmet cop) Clambake, Sheryl Ullman Speedway, and Thordis Brandt Live a Little, Love a Little.  James McHale plays Shorty and would do The Love God? Two of Elvis's real-life friends, Red West, who was in Girl Happy, and Joe Esposito, who'd be in Clambake, play members of Shorty's pit crew.

Road to Zanzibar

Road to Zanzibar
April 11, 1941
Paramount
Comedy, Musical
VHS
C

I used to watch the Road to... movies on TV a lot as a kid, but I never owned any until a few months ago, when I saw this tape for less than $1.  This is the first I've watched the movie as an adult and, well, it hasn't aged well.  It starts out all right, with Bob & Bing bantering.  But I didn't like that everyone in the movie is immoral, with Bing manipulating best friend Bob, and Dorothy Lamour (as Donna Latour) tricking both of them, while planning to marry for money, and lots of other scheming going on throughout, including Donna's pal Julia tricking "the boys" when Donna seems to be sold in the slave market.  If this was meant to be a dark comedy, I mean a black comedy-- Oh dear.  The other big problem is this is set in Africa (they never actually get to Zanzibar), and the "natives" are stereotyped, especially the cannibal tribe that Bob & Bing meet.  Yes, it's possible this is all a parody, but it's not a funny one.  The wall-breaking jokes are better, as when the pattycake routine is anticipated and Bob says, "They must've seen the picture," i.e. Road to Singapore, the first in the series.  This one isn't terrible, but I can recommend it just to Hope and/or Crosby completists.  (Lamour fans will like the scene where she's wearing only leaves.)  That said, when I got this tape, I decided to spring for the Road to Morocco DVD.  It was my favorite of the series when I was a kid, and when I saw it as an adult a few years ago, I still enjoyed it.  (Not that it's not without its own problems, but we'll get to that.)

Eric Blore was headwaiter in Flying Down to Rio, and often played servants, so it's odd to see him as a rich man here.  Paul Porcasi was also in Flying Down, and would soon appear in Casablanca, as would Norma Varden. Joan Marsh, who plays Dimples, the Human Cannonball act assistant, was Pauline Bisbee in You're Telling Me.  Another of Fields's onscreen daughters, Una Merkel from the recent The Bank Dick, has a much larger role, as Julia.  Buck Woods, who portrays jungle guide Thonga, was a singer in A Day at the Races, which also featured Robert Middlemass.  Charles Gemora was often a gorilla, as in At the Circus.  Georges Renavent was Mr. Ram in Turnabout.  Ed Bridge would go on to The Miracle of Morgan's Creek.  Iris Adrian was recently in Go West and would much later appear in Freaky Friday.

The Bank Dick

The Bank Dick
November 29, 1940
Universal
Comedy
DVD
C-

Not only my least favorite W.C. Fields movie, but my least favorite movie in my collection so far.  As before, Fields is a bumbling husband and father who is saved by a deus ex machina at the end.  (Well, more like three or four.)  The movie is very unfocused, with a subplot about Fields as a film director forgotten for about an hour.  All the imagination seems to have gone into the names: the Sousé (accent gravamen over the E) family, Mackley Q. Greene, Og Oggilby, J. Frothingham Waterbury, Miss Plupp, A. Pismo Clam, and Filthy McNasty.  (I didn't say they were funny names.)  I might've gone with a C, but there's gratuitous racism.  (It can't be excused, as that in You Can't Cheat an Honest Man might be.  And, yes, I'm ignoring gratuitous sexism for the most part.)  Even Franklin Pangborn (implausibly cast as a husband and father) can't save his scenes.  And it was odd to see Shemp Howard in a straight-man role-- running the bar with the censor-bait name of "Black Pussy Cafe"-- especially when there are Stooge-like sound effects underlining how unfunny the slapstick is here.  I suggest you skip, and I don't mean in the exercise sense.

Cora Witherspoon, who was in The Women, plays Fields's wife.  Evelyn Del Rio, who portrays his younger daughter, was the crying girl in Honest Man.  Una Merkel plays his elder daughter, and would soon be in The Road to Zanzibar.  This time Grady Sutton is his potential son-in-law, and main victim.  William J. O'Brien was in A Night at the Opera, Vangie Beilby in A Day at the Races.  Russell Hicks and Dick Purcell were in Follow the Fleet.  Fay Adler, Charles Hart, and George Moran were in My Little Chickadee.   Pat West was the warden in His Girl Friday.

Joseph North was a butler in in Thank You, Jeeves! as well, but would play a secretary in Citizen Kane.  Jack Gargan was in The Story of Vernon and Irene Castle, and would also appear in Kane.  William Alston, Eddie Coke, Monty Ford, and Sam Rice are in Kane as well.  Bill Wolfe was in some earlier Fields movies and would go on to Never Give a Sucker an Even Break, as would Jack Roper and Emma Tansey.  This is the last and possibly most forgettable of Jan Duggan's appearances in Fields movies, but she would have a role in The Big Store, which features Al Hill.

We are not amused.