Peter Sellers

The Mouse That Roared (1959)

The Mouse That Roared (1959)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(On TV, September 2019) I have very fond memories of reading the comic novel on which The Mouse That Roared is based—a romp in which a small impoverished European country, having learned the wrong lessons from the Marshall Plan, deliberately sets out to lose a war against the United States in order to be richly rewarded by a reconstruction plan. But the plan fails when the country unexpectedly wins the war, inadvertently capturing a doomsday device. The film does deviate a bit from its source, most notably by casting Peter Sellers in multiple roles, including that of the country’s reigning queen. It’s all quite amusing in a clipped British-humour way, although the opening minutes of the film feel remarkably modern given the density of the editing, the deadpan jokes and the way it quickly gets the exposition business out of the way. Things do slow down after that, once we’re past the grand concepts and into the character humour—it never gets as funny as in the opening moments, but it does wrap things up nicely. The Mouse That Roared in not a great film, but it’s one that does still have its share of pleasures even today—albeit perhaps more as an affectionate look at Cold War issues.

The Return of the Pink Panther (1975)

The Return of the Pink Panther (1975)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(In French, On TV, June 2019) This is the first Peter Sellers film I’ve seen since diving deep into Sellers’s biography, and it’s fair to say that the disappointment at uncovering the actor’s worst traits definitely has echoes in the way that I’m reacting to the film. But not that much, as The Return of the Pink Panther is Sellers at his most rote and formulaic: Donning costumes, affecting different mannerisms (alas, the French dub means that I didn’t get the voices, even if that “alas” is qualified by how much I don’t particularly care for the accents). My appreciation for the Pink Panther sequels isn’t high to begin with: I didn’t like the Pink Panther sequel I watched a few months ago, and I still don’t here. Despite my lack of enthusiasm for The Return of the Pink Panther, it’s not a complete waste—some of the plotting is amusing, some of the costumes work and for all of its repetitiveness, some of the slow-motion scenery destruction is worth a chuckle or two. Christopher Plummer does have presence as the master-thief villain, as does Catherine Schell as another one Clouseau’s inexplicable string of love interests. Sellers himself is willing to do anything for a laugh, but it is a bit too much and the same considering the superficial variations in disguise. At this time in the series, this was the fourth Clouseau film and the third to star Sellers—you can argue that the series hadn’t yet degenerated in further self-copying. But even at this relatively high level of quality, The Return of the Pink Panther can feel as annoying as it is entertaining.

The Life and Death of Peter Sellers (2004)

The Life and Death of Peter Sellers (2004)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(In French, On Cable TV, May 2019) Few biographies have as much naked contempt for their subject matter as this unexpectedly fascinating biography of famed comedian Peter Sellers. After all, The Life and Death of Peter Sellers exposes Sellers as an unstable, gluttonous, credulous, and self-hollowed figure, cruel to children and lovers, unable to depend on a solid inner core and all-too-willing to escape through his characters. I suspect that my admiration for this film has as much to do with its willingness to break down the structure of typical biographies than my growing knowledge of Sellers’s work (It’s a lot of fun to see the film recreate and nod at movies of the period, even some Sellers-adjacent ones in the Kubrick repertoire—the 2001: A Space Odyssey reference is blatant, but there’s a not-so-subtle one to The Shining as well). Structurally daring, The Life and Death of Peter Sellers reinforces its thesis about Sellers taking on roles as a substitute for his inner life by having Sellers occasionally portray people around him, delivering monologues that either reflects these people’s opinions of Sellers, or Seller’s best guess at what they thought of him—it’s not rare for the film to step in and out of sound stages, further breaking the thin line between fiction and moviemaking. The all-star cast helps a lot in enjoying the result: Geoffrey Rush is surprisingly good as Sellers, the resemblance between the two getting better and better as the film goes on. Other notable actors popping into the frame include Emily Watson and Charlie Theron as two of his four wives, John Lithgow as Blake Edwards and no less than Stanley Tucci as Stanley Kubrick. The tone and look of the film shift regularly to illustrate Sellers’s state of mind, his circumstances or simply the movies he played in—as an expressionist take, The Life and Death of Peter Sellers is frequently surprising, delightful and rewarding the more you know about Sellers. It did cement my unease with Sellers’s work (you’d be surprised at how many Sellers movies I don’t particularly like—click on the Peter Sellers tag to know more) but it informed my half-grasped notions about his life. Now I’ll have to read a biography to know more. [June 2019: And I did! As it turns out, the real story is even stranger, even worse for Sellers and just as disdainful for its biographer.]

The Party (1968)

The Party (1968)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(On Cable TV, April 2019) Is it possible that the more I see of Peter Sellers, the more I find him annoying? The Party does him no favour, with director Blake Edwards letting him go wild with improvisation, and showboat in brownface with an Indian accent. The plot is paper-thin, and really an excuse to let Sellers run set-pieces into the ground through repetition and predictable execution. His character, a bumbling Indian actor, is designed to be as irritating as possible and it’s not an accident if the film improves the further away it moves from him. He is, of course, immensely destructive, with a climax of bubbling proportions. If you’re getting the feeling that I didn’t like The Party all that much, you’d be half-right—I couldn’t stand Sellers most of the time, but even I have to admit that there’s something magnificent in the film’s fantastic set, its ability to avoid relying on dialogue, and the sheer anarchy of the last twenty minutes. Still, The Party should have been a far more disciplined film, a less stereotypical one, and it would have been better with someone else in the lead role.

Revenge of the Pink Panther (1978)

Revenge of the Pink Panther (1978)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(In French, On TV, February 2019) OK, world, I admit it. Revenge of the Pink Panther has pushed me over the edge, and it forces my hand. I have to come clean, even if you’ve seen it coming from the hints I’ve left all over the place. Are you ready? Here goes: I’m not that much of a Peter Sellers/Inspecteur Clouseau fan. I have accumulated enough data points by now to realize that I like the original The Pink Panther best because Clouseau is a support player to Niven/Cardinale/Capucine. By this sixth entry in the series, Sellers/Clouseau has become an all-engulfing, all-self-indulgent ego monster around which the entire series revolved. The plot revolves around him (it’s all about attempts to kill him, something that director Blake Edwards must have had on his mind at the time), the direction puts him centre stage and the editing can’t bear to cut away from his antics. The silly story hits many familiar plot points in the series, and can’t stand still by going from England to France to Hong Kong. While the budget is obviously bigger than previous instalments and there are a few comic moments along the way, the constant bumbling, perplexing fixation on costuming, graceless stumbling upon the truth, have become more grating than amusing—and that applies equally to the criminal and the romantic plot. Revenge of the Pink Panther was the last of the six “main” Pink Panther movies, and it clearly shows the reasons why it was quickly running out of steam by that point. Or maybe even at any point past the first movie.

A Shot in the Dark (1964)

A Shot in the Dark (1964)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(In French, On TV, February 2019) The original The Pink Panther was not designed to spawn a series of movies featuring Inspecteur Clouseau, who was clearly a supporting player in a much broader farce. But Peter Sellers brought such a manic energy to the role that producers were quick to ditch the panther and keep the inspector. With A Shot in the Dark, you can see the progression of the series’ premise in featuring Clouseau at its centre, not even attempting to recapture the spirit of the original. It’s not yet perfect—the comedy is unusually dark for the series, with a high body count of innocents dying from being at the wrong place while villains were aiming for Clouseau. But there are still a few funny moments in the result—most notably toward the conclusion, as “the usual suspects” are brought together and nothing goes as planned. Sellers himself is quite good in pratfalls, but his bumbling does become tiresome when it’s the focus of the film, and A Shot in the Dark’s annoying repetitions of the same gags does mean that the film gets redundant after a while. Ironically enough, the French dub of the film is less annoying than the original English version … because it removes Clouseau’s ridiculous accent, and makes Sellers about half as annoying as a result.

The Pink Panther (1963)

The Pink Panther (1963)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(In French, On Cable TV, September 2018) The biggest surprise about The Pink Panther is that it turns out to be an ensemble bedroom romp with a limited role for Peter Sellers’s Inspecteur Clouseau—and, in fact, he gets played like a fool for the entire film, with a conclusion that doesn’t do the character much good. Sellers did such a striking job with the role that later instalments, starting with the follow-up A Shot in the Dark, would develop the Clouseau mythology in earnest. In the meantime, what we have here is a tangled mess of characters lusting for one another, with Clouseau unaware that his wife (the lovely Capucine) is carrying an affair with the master thief (the wonderful David Niven) that he’s chasing. Meanwhile, the gentleman thief is trying to seduce a princess (Claudia Cardinale!) who own the titular diamond, while his nephew is also trying to seduce Clouseau’s wife. It takes a diagram to figure it out, but fortunately the film is much easier to absorb as it gradually introduces its character as they converge on a European ski resort. Comedy director legend Blake Edwards slowly tightens the funny screws, culminating in a bedroom sequences in which characters hide under the bed and exit through windows while Clouseau remains blissfully unaware of how many pretenders his wife has within purring distance. It takes a while to get going and does end on a less jolly note, but the ski resort sequence of the film is a small success in creating a sexy comic atmosphere. Even out-of-nowhere moments, such as Fran Jeffries crooning an Italian song around a communal fireplace, are more charming than puzzling. Niven does stellar work here as an impeccable gentleman thief, but Sellers was simply spectacular enough that the series would therefore focus on him. So it goes—plans never unfold exactly as everyone thinks they will, especially in the Pink Panther universe.

Casino Royale (1967)

Casino Royale (1967)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(Second viewing, On Cable TV, September 2018) On paper, I’m sure Casino Royale was a great idea. In fact, the film does work better from a conceptual viewpoint than a practical one … which is a fancy way of saying that the film is a mess. From a cold viewing, the film makes no sense: it’s an attempt to satirize Bond, and it goes off in all directions at once, making failed jokes in multiple segments that barely relate to whatever plot we can identify. Some moments are funnier than others, and the high-spirited finale is pure comic chaos (in the good sense of the expression), but much of the film simply falls flat. Coherence is a major issue when entire scenes have their own idea of what humour is, and when the actors aren’t following the same plan. And what a list of actors! A young Woody Allen, a remarkably fun Orson Welles goofing off with magic tricks, First Bond Girl Ursula Andress playing (a) Bond, David Niven as “The original” Bond (before Connery ruined the name), Jean-Claude Belmondo for thirty seconds and a bunch of other cameos. Peter Sellers is occasionally fun, but he seems to be acting in another film entirely. The film’s production values are high enough that we’re left to contemplate a bizarre result, clearly made with considerable means but without a coherent plan. What to make of it? The key to understanding Casino Royale is to read about the film’s unbelievable production. It started with the intention of copycatting Connery’s Bond film series through the rights of Fleming’s first Bond novel, but was realigned to a satirical comedy once Connery made himself unavailable. Then, for some reason, the film became a creation from five different directors, with a sixth trying to patch the gaps between the sequences. Then Peter Sellers, who wanted to play a dramatic Bond, started sabotaging the production before leaving it entirely before his scenes were completely filmed. Given all of this, it’s a minor miracle if Casino Royale makes even the slightest sense. That doesn’t make it a good movie (although there are maybe twenty minutes of good comedy here, as long as you keep only the scenes with Sellers, Welles and Allen) but it certainly explains how we got there. There may have been messier productions and movies out there, but Casino Royale is a case of its own. (I saw the film as a young teenager, but the only moment I remembered from it was Allen’s line about learning how to tie women up in the boy scouts. Go figure. Or don’t, given that I was a boy scout.)

The Ladykillers (1955)

The Ladykillers (1955)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(On TV, July 2018) If you’re looking for an exemplary British black comedy, you could certainly do much worse than The Ladykillers, a deliciously dark story in which five professional criminals team up for a heist that covers every eventuality … except for their little old lady landlord. Their combined resourcefulness is no match for the bumbling ineptitude of their boarding house host, especially when they make her an unwitting part of their plan. While the heist initially goes well, things get more complicated when she discovers the plot and wants no part in it. The criminals then make one fatal mistake: they decide to kill her. But nothing will go as planned. You can guess who remains standing at the end. Katie Johnson stars as the little old lady to be killed, but the star here is Alec Guinness as a mastermind clearly outwitted, while Peter Sellers has an early role as one of the criminals. My memories of the 2004 Coen Brothers remake are far too dim to be useful, but the original British film is decent enough in its own right—perhaps predictable, but no less satisfying for it. It does help that the film was shot in colour even in mid-fifties UK, giving us a funhouse glimpse in the rather gray life of fifties London, stuck between WW2 and the Swingin’ sixties. This is now remembered as one of the best productions to come out of the original post-war Ealing Studios, as well as one of its last before the Studio was sold to the BBC in 1955. It remains a decently amusing film. 

Lolita (1962)

Lolita (1962)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(On Cable TV, November 2017) I ended up reluctantly watching Lolita (Kubrick completionism…) over a few days, those days being in the middle of a national debate in the United States about the suitability of an Alabama senatorial candidate with a long history of pursuing teenagers. This did nothing to help me see Lolita more favourably, given its premise in which a middle-aged college professor ends up pursuing a teenager. Even the film’s explicit black comedy didn’t help matters, nor the almost arbitrary plotting choices made during the film’s second half. While there’s something semi-amazing in how a film from 1962 was able to tackle such a charged subject matter, the result, seen from today, seems to skirt around the issue to the point of having little purpose. The cinematography, fortunately, is crisp, and Kubrick’s directing skills shows through. James Mason manages to be incredibly creepy in the lead role, while I’m not sure what Peter Sellers was trying to do in some scenes. The karmic retribution of the story feels unsatisfying, although there is something highly appropriate in ultimately seeing a flighty teenager casually dismiss the lovelorn older man. Still, I don’t feel any better from having seen Lolita—subject matter notwithstanding, the plot doesn’t flow naturally and even pointing back in the direction of Vladimir Nabokov’s novel as justification for the narrative hiccups isn’t much of an excuse when Kubrick reportedly changed so much in his adaptation. At least I can check Lolita from the list of movies I still had to see, and never look back.

Being There (1979)

Being There (1979)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(On Cable TV, July 2017) One of my least favourite archetypes is the Holy Fool, the innocent that seems protected from reality by authorial fiat. So it is that Being There is built around the notion that we can project higher qualities onto people who don’t really have them. It does so by presenting a child-minded man who, for decades, has never had to face reality. Well dressed, mild-mannered and competent in gardening, he is thrown in the real world following the death of his benefactor, and manages, through a series of convenient misadventures and falsely profound gardening homilies, to become a respected pundit and political confidante, all the way to being considered as a presidential candidate. (Considering the ongoing fallout of the 2016 presidential election, this is far less funny than it must have been at the time.) Considering my distaste for that kind of story, the first act of Being There is actively irritating. Things do improve afterward, as we start seeing other people’s reaction to the protagonist—that’s when the real world comes back to the movie, and the real comedy begins. But there are limits to the material, especially when it’s a one-note premise stretched so thin over more than two hours. Begin There overstays its welcome as it keeps making the same points. Still, as much as I don’t particularly like the film, there is much to admire in Peter Seller’s performance as the oracular idiot: It takes a lot of skill to act simple-minded while maintaining a credible veneer of respectability, and Sellers is usually able to hit that particular target. (I’m not too fond of Shirley MacClaine’s seduction scene, but the seventies were a special time.) (I’m also not that fond of the ending outtake.) (Although that last shot is growing on me.) I shudder to think of what a modern version of the movie would look like, especially with someone like Will Ferrell in the lead. While there are a few things of interest in Being There, the overall effect is more tedious than satisfying—but then again, I didn’t expect to like the film anyway.