2025/12/29
These movies are mediocre, but they'll suffice for casual viewing on a slow day or night.
=]=:< <"Let's go!!"
A series never eventuated from this middling, rejected pilot, which enjoyed minor success during a theatrical British release and American telecast. Clairvoyant visions plague an auto racer (Leonard Nimoy) shortly before he's approached by an antiquarian book dealer and paranormal researcher (Susan Hampshire), who's convinced that his precognition pertains to a familial mystery that's troubling a famous actress (Vera Miles) lodged with her teenage daughter (Jewel Blanch) at a littoral English inn. Expect what's usual, and you won't be disappointed: misdirection, red herrings, attempts on the lives of the amateur sleuths, etc. Nimoy's and Hampshire's personality and modest conjoint chemistry carry it all sufficiently.
=]=|=> <"....zzzzzzzz...."
They knew how to forge a signature to exploit a misissued credit card, but a quartet of fraudulent collegians (Stefanie Powers, James Stacy, Elliott Street, Tina Chen) needed the prowess of an experienced, taciturn programmer (Dean Stockwell) to create an entire identity with their university's computer. He's the prime suspect when the offending students are sequentially murdered, but events of his past and present conspiracy are far more complicated. Good acting and a prescient, almost prophetic story concerning computerization and identity theft before either were anywhere near so prevalent as they'd become buoy this televised crime drama, which owes much of its verisimility to Stockwell's tense underperformance and the presence of an actual computer operated with a teleprinter. For whoever can overlook the goofiness of deaths depicted herein, so may the richness of hacking's early zeitgeist be scented.
=]=|=> <"....zzzzzzzz...."
Does the inexpensiveness of her comfortable new apartment's rent really offset the inconveniences suffered by a young barista (Woo-rin Yeo) who's haunted by ghostly children and the caregiver (Joon-young Jo) who murderered them? If a weirdo (Jung-han Kim) who's quietly stalking to pester her would simply explain her predicament in two brief sentences, her haunted ordeal of 73 minutes could've been reduced to 15 shorn of its plethoric dialog, timeworn convolutions, and slipshod, scareless SFX. Seldom does so little occur in so short a span, yet feel so tedious.
=]=|=> <"....zzzzzzzz...."
An assassinated arms dealer, glamorous playgirl (Senta Berger), petty Chicagoan mobster (John Saxon), Texan investor (John Ireland), and Dutch industrialist (Curt Lowens) are with their Swiss bank blackmailed after the confidentiality of their numbered accounts is inexplicably compromised. That financial bulwark's president (Ray Milland) won't dare to publicize the leak, and so employs a gruff former agent (David Janssen) of the U.S. Treasury to probe the internal affair to its mysterious kernel. Goofy, glossy Columbian/West German co-production hasn't much suspense for its violence, but its capable cast, well-staged chases, stunning Swiss sights, and a playful, exceptionally well-shot race between Janssen and Berger in speedy Ferrarris are worth watching. Shot in and around Zurich, it's much more a travelogue of the wealthy, trilingual, central European tax haven than an action film, and much easier on the eyes than the ears -- most of its cast (esp. Ireland) are woodenly, deplorably dubbed. Willkommen! Viel spass mit der formel.
Allen, wake up. The page is almost done.
=]=8< <"OH!! Oh, man....I guess I just dozed off. Sorry. Wow, I really crashed after being awake for 66 hours on all that Adderall. These were okay, I guess. No, wait; these bored me. I was bored."
Neither an adamant agent of the treasury department (Gene Barry) nor thugs employed by a gangster (Jacques Aubuchon) who's buying and consolidating moonshining interests can catch or intimidate a veteran (Robert Mitchum) of the Korean war who's manifestly faster and smarter than his pursuers as he transports moonshine from his family's rural distilleries to their urban destinations. Mitchum's larger than life as the intrepid speed demon in this portrait of an illicit cottage industry's final years of prominence before the federal government and organized crime put an end to the lucrative, backwaterish endeavors prosecuted for generations by Anglo-Irish rustics. Good stunts (performed in cars sold to this movie's production by actual moonrunners!) and a decent supporting cast (featuring Mitchum's son James as his driver's auto mechanic and baby brother) compensate for poor special effects and glaring reshoots -- in one scene where Barry and the younger Mitchum confer, the contrasting photography and backdrops of location and matte painting in alternating shots can't be ignored. Yeesh! This needed less plot, more action, and more of Mitchum behind the wheel and at the throats of his driver's adversaries, where he's great fun to watch -- but not often enough.
=]=:< <"Really, he should've just murdered the mob boss right away when they first met. It would've saved his hash and solved half of his problems."
Murder's your solution for almost everything.
=]=:< <"Uh, yeah. Man's an animal whose existence is defined by his capacity and drive to solve problems. Why do you think he's always killing?"
You win this one. How was your nap?
=]=:< <"Refreshing! I'm glad I slept through these; now I'm rested and ready for a big, 31-course meal in The Dining Hall!"
© 2025 Robert Buchanan