Zero Mostel

  • The Hot Rock (1972)

    The Hot Rock (1972)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, September 2021) The amiable good humour of Donald Westlake’s Dortmunder novels carries rather well to the big screen in The Hot Rock. It’s a comedy, but it doesn’t go for the obvious laughs: instead, the fun comes from the mounting absurdity of the situations, and the way nothing is truly threatening or dramatic. Robert Redford stars as master thief Westlake, recently released from prison but almost immediately recruited into a scheme to steal a previous stone on behalf of its original African nation. Putting together a crew for the heist proves simpler than completing it, and much of the film’s distinction in the pantheon of heist movies is how complications eventually force the execution of not just one heist, but four of them with escalating degrees of difficulty. A little bit of plot helps put it all together with an extra curlicue at the end. It’s all quite amusing, and the period detail of early-1970s New York City does add quite a bit to the result. Redford is in fine form, with some good support from George Segal and Zero Mostel. The Hot Rock is the kind of film that has a tendency to disappear from popular memory, not because it’s bad but because it’s just good enough to entertain without making much of a mark. It can, however, be quite a bit of fun to revisit for a simple evening’s entertainment.

  • The Front (1976)

    The Front (1976)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, October 2020) Unusually enough, The Front features Woody Allen in a pure acting performance—within a film that he neither directed nor wrote. But you can understand why Allen would accept the project when you take a look at what the film is about—set in the 1950s, it’s about screenwriters put on the blacklist who hire the services of a store clerk (Allen) as a front to present their scripts to entertainment executives. The film’s aims are clear once the credits roll and a good chunk of the film’s topline crew (starting with director Martin Ritt, screenwriter Walter Bernstein and lead actors Zero Mostel, Herschel Bernardi, and Lloyd Gough) have their names accompanied by a note telling us when they were placed on the blacklist—and of course, those who know about Dalton Trumbo’s career will recall how he kept working under various pseudonyms, even winning Academy Awards as someone else. Parts of The Front are quite funny: helped by Allen’s nerdy charm, the film coasts a bit on his ability to portray a sympathetic loser. But as befit the topic, the film has some less amusing turns toward the end, as the illusion dissipates and the film goes for a well-deserved “take that!” at the idiocy of McCarthyism. While not necessarily well known these days, The Front is a welcome act of reclamation by blacklisted Hollywood people, acting as a marker and a bit of wish fulfillment by those who were sidelined by the excessive paranoia of the time.

  • Du Barry was a Lady (1943)

    Du Barry was a Lady (1943)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, July 2020) Like many other hobbies, movie-watching gets more rewarding the more you put into it. If you’re the kind of person who watches a film a year, then go ahead and enjoy the film on its own merits. But if you’re the kind of cinephile who enjoys tracking down filmographies, sub-genres and how movies exist in context, then a film can become far more than the sum of its parts. While watching Du Barry Was a Lady, for instance, I was struck by how it brings together many people that I liked elsewhere. It has one of Gene Kelly’s earliest roles, for instance—and even at this early stage, he gets play the likable cad, singing and dancing even if it’s not (yet) to his own cinematography. It has one of Lucille Ball’s foremost movie roles, where she gets to be strikingly beautiful and funny. It has Red Skelton, semi-restrained from his usual comic tics and funnier for it. It has one of my favourite supporting actresses of the era, Virginia O’Brien, lovely and hilarious as she sings in her usual deadpan style. (“Salome” has funny lyrics, but half of the song’s many laughs come from O’Brien’s side glances, facial expressions and hand movements.) It has Zero Mostel playing small-time hustler, Tommy Dorsey as (what else?) a band leader and an entire song dedicated to Vargas pin-ups girls (Happily, Miss September is the best). Du Barry was a Lady is also, perhaps more significantly, one of Arthur Freed’s early MGM musicals and you can see bits and pieces of it as inspiration for the tone and content of his later movies. Compared to this thick web of associations and context, it does feel as if the film itself is not as good as its components. Much of the first half is a nightclub comedy (giving generous time to the on-stage acts) paying particular attention to Ball, Kelly and O’Brien, while the second loosens up by going back to Louis XV-era France for some sillier comedy focused on Skelton. It’s not bad, but the film is more interesting for its numbers and showcases than by itself—as mentioned before, “Salome” is worthy of an anthology reel, and it’s a treat to see Ball, Kelly and Mostel in early roles. I liked Du Barry was a Lady a lot, but I suspect that I’m getting a lot more out of it by virtue of having seen, in rapid succession, many of the other movies with which it shares a web of associations.

    (Second Viewing, On Cable TV, November 2021) What I like about revisiting classic Hollywood films is that even a few months can mean a world of difference in how you approach a film knowing more about its stars and their careers. You can watch Du Barry was a Lady (as I did the first time) without knowing much about its players and still appreciate the film on its own terms. But come back to it with a greater appreciation for Red Skelton, Gene Kelly, Lucille Ball, Virginia O’Brien, Zero Mostel and Tommy Dorsey and his Orchestra, and the film becomes nothing short of a quasi-miraculous union of distinctive talents. Skelton delivers another of his usual performances here, and stays (mostly) under control for the first half of the film. Ball was on the upswing at the time, distinguishing herself as a dependable comic performer – but this was the film (her first as an MGM star) that changed her hair colour to red… a distinction she’d keep the rest of her career. Kelly was barely known at the time, but here gets a terrific solo dance number that clearly wowed others enough to give him bigger roles as a dancer. Gorgeous O’Brien gets an anthology number in “Salome” (sung deadpan, but complete with hilarious acting) as well as a decent supporting role. Zero Mostel makes his big-screen debut here, whereas Tommy Dorsey (aka D’Orsay in the French Royalty sequences) and his orchestra get a welcome showcase. Finally, who can resist the rather wonderful “I Love an Esquire Girl” featuring no less than twelve terrific Vargas girls? (Miss September being my favourite, even the second time around.)  The film itself is uneven: the first present-day half is not bad, but the second historical one is rather dull. But it’s by bringing together several talented performers that Du Barry Was a Lady finds its true calling. It’s not a completely satisfying film, but it’s well worth another look, possibly fast-forwarding from one great sequence to another.

  • The Producers (1967)

    The Producers (1967)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, March 2018) Being a modern moviegoer taking a look at the classics can lead to blasphemous statements, so here goes: I like the remake of The Producers better than the original. Once you get your rage out of your system, consider this: The original Mel Brooks version of The Producers is scattershot—it aims in all directions, occasionally hitting a bullseye and occasionally firing off in the air. The real highlight of this original production only comes after an hour of various nonsense—it’s really good once the stage musical begins and we get to see the insanity of a camp version of Hitler. In the meantime (and afterwards), The Producers is duller than expected. In contrast, the remake version doesn’t quite capture the stage musical in its unhinged glory, but has a much stronger first and third act, with more memorable supporting characters and a stream of musical numbers throughout. Yeah, I’ll take the remake if only for Uma’s Ulla. Still, preferring the remake over the fifty-year-old original shouldn’t take away from the qualities of the original. As stated, the original has a much stronger musical sequence. It also benefits from Gene Wilder and (to a lesser extent) Zero Mostel in the lead roles. There’s also a definite shock quality to the original that can’t be properly appreciated by modern audiences—although it can be felt secondhand from some reactions baked in the film itself. Remake aside, The Producers remains a film that can be readily watched even today without trouble … but it is definitely of its time, from a writer/director making his debut. Influential, but since then supplanted by a much slicker (and focused) remake. Considering that Brooks himself wrote much of the remake, that’s not that much of a blasphemous statement.