Actually, I'd recommend it if you like Lana Turner.
The Big Cube does have some serious problems. The plot isn't really one of them, it should have worked. Here it is just addled with too many terrible actors, and in need of a better screenwriter. It is, for example, completely unreasonable that daughter Lisa should decide her stepmother hates her and is turning her father against her, simply because they disapproved when they came home to find Lisa and her friends drinking, dropping acid, and stripping! OF COURSE they objected! My daughter should have received considerably more than a disapproving glare from me. The daughter's character is poorly fleshed out, never very believable, and it is further annoying that she has a foreign accent shared by no one else in the family.
It is likewise unbelievable that Adrianna would have automatically rejected her step-daughter's suitor and withheld her inheritance. Adrianna, from what we see in the film, has no idea the boyfriend is a drug pusher or a gigolo, it would seem more probable that she would have had a wait-and-see attitude toward this. This is typical of the numerous instances where our screenwriter chooses expediency over logic, and/or there is more of the screenplay that did not make it to the final cut. Perhaps Adrianna did have clues and they just ended up on the cutting room floor.
Also, Pamela Rodgers character is just disturbing. On Laugh In, her "Stupid Girl" character is often amusing, but when we see it here with nudity and indiscriminate drug usage, it becomes far more base and demeaning. It is typical for the film, all of the "hip" young people are clearly written by someone far too old and out of touch to be writing these characters, and they write them mean-spirited and ill-intentioned with no conception of anything positive that might exist among the younger generation. I often had the impression that the original idea and the actual script are several persons removed from one another.
There are a few things in the film's favor. It is a lovely film to look at, the Mexican exteriors are gorgeous, and on the DVD the color is transfered very nicely. Lana's hairpieces are unfortunate to say the least, but actually would not have been considered nearly so atrocious at the time this was filmed. And most of the music is actually pretty good, not that you'd rush out and buy the record, but not at all bad considering the source. But the main thing that carries the movie, and which it would totally fail without, is that Lana Turner takes it completely seriously. The sincerity she places in this rather absurd character lends the movie its only credibility, and gives us a glimmer of what might have been if only the screenwriter had been half as professional and dedicated to his craft. Lana is clearly playing Adrianna as she should have been, overlooking many of the more stupid things they have her doing and saying.
While it does not really hold up to repeat viewings, for my fellow Lana Turner fans I'd recommend it. It's a rather amusing rainy evenings entertainment if you haven't seen it before.
The Big Cube does have some serious problems. The plot isn't really one of them, it should have worked. Here it is just addled with too many terrible actors, and in need of a better screenwriter. It is, for example, completely unreasonable that daughter Lisa should decide her stepmother hates her and is turning her father against her, simply because they disapproved when they came home to find Lisa and her friends drinking, dropping acid, and stripping! OF COURSE they objected! My daughter should have received considerably more than a disapproving glare from me. The daughter's character is poorly fleshed out, never very believable, and it is further annoying that she has a foreign accent shared by no one else in the family.
It is likewise unbelievable that Adrianna would have automatically rejected her step-daughter's suitor and withheld her inheritance. Adrianna, from what we see in the film, has no idea the boyfriend is a drug pusher or a gigolo, it would seem more probable that she would have had a wait-and-see attitude toward this. This is typical of the numerous instances where our screenwriter chooses expediency over logic, and/or there is more of the screenplay that did not make it to the final cut. Perhaps Adrianna did have clues and they just ended up on the cutting room floor.
Also, Pamela Rodgers character is just disturbing. On Laugh In, her "Stupid Girl" character is often amusing, but when we see it here with nudity and indiscriminate drug usage, it becomes far more base and demeaning. It is typical for the film, all of the "hip" young people are clearly written by someone far too old and out of touch to be writing these characters, and they write them mean-spirited and ill-intentioned with no conception of anything positive that might exist among the younger generation. I often had the impression that the original idea and the actual script are several persons removed from one another.
There are a few things in the film's favor. It is a lovely film to look at, the Mexican exteriors are gorgeous, and on the DVD the color is transfered very nicely. Lana's hairpieces are unfortunate to say the least, but actually would not have been considered nearly so atrocious at the time this was filmed. And most of the music is actually pretty good, not that you'd rush out and buy the record, but not at all bad considering the source. But the main thing that carries the movie, and which it would totally fail without, is that Lana Turner takes it completely seriously. The sincerity she places in this rather absurd character lends the movie its only credibility, and gives us a glimmer of what might have been if only the screenwriter had been half as professional and dedicated to his craft. Lana is clearly playing Adrianna as she should have been, overlooking many of the more stupid things they have her doing and saying.
While it does not really hold up to repeat viewings, for my fellow Lana Turner fans I'd recommend it. It's a rather amusing rainy evenings entertainment if you haven't seen it before.