Change Your Image
peter-patti
Reviews
The Hot Rock (1972)
70s' Zeitgeist
Okay okay, Westlake's novels are always much better than the respective movies (take for example "What's the Worst that Could Happen"), but I must admit that director Peter Yates did a really good job. Dortmunder (the author was inspired to this name by the German beer!) is not much like Donald Westlake's original in the Dortmunder books, along with some of the other characters. Redford is too handsome. George C. Scott in "Bank Shot" was much more Dortmunderish (Westlake's master-crook John Archibald Dortmunder is worn down and pessimistic), but in the "Hot Rock" movie Yates catches the 'Zeitgeist', or spirit of the times. And that's enough.
Brilliant: Quincy Jones' soundtrack (with Gerry Mulligan playing the sax).
Le hasard et la violence (1974)
Simple twists of fate
A small masterpiece about the absurdity of life. Love and (gratuitous) violence are the main themes of this Labro's film in which we see criminologist Laurent Bermann (Montand) residing in that madhouse called Cote d'Azur and being assaulted by a strange type in a hotel toilet. He begins a love relationship with Dr. Constance Weber (Katharine Ross) and is eventually called by the police to identify the corpse of his assaulter. Later on he's assaulted again, this time on the strand, and he dies in the arms of the woman doctor. The viewer keeps expecting something to happen that will validate his patience, but zip. Nada. Not much violence or action, no real nudity, no real memorable acting. But a lot of crazy gestures and queer situations. And this is just what the director wanted. He keeps the mirror in front of life -- and of us. The message is: life is meaningless, because of fate.
Pure Luck (1991)
Hilarious movie but not half so good as the original
The original French version "La Chevre" ('the goat', in France a symbol of bad luck), with Pierre Richard and Gerard Depardieu, is much funnier, but I too agree that Martin Short is a great comedian and that this movie works not bad. Anyway I'm sure that a couple like Gene Wilder and Richard Pryor would have do a much better job. Wilder also worked in an adaptation of another funny and successful French movie: "The Woman in Red", and it turned into a little masterpiece... For Martin Short "Pure Luck" was the second "French" adaptation after "Three Fugitives" from 1989 with Nick Nolte (in France the original movie starred again the duo Richard-Depardieu).
Every Home Should Have One (1970)
The public loved him and begged for more but he left too early.
It's one of the best comedies I ever saw, made with much intelligence and much courage in a time when censorship was pretty terrible. Particularly brilliant and unforgettable: the dream scene on the beach with naked Marty and naked Swedish goddess, which is a tasty parody of the Ingmar Bergmann's movies. The German title is "Haferbrei mac-ht sexy" ("Porridge makes sexy"). Marty Fieldman, wild-haired and pop-eyed as always, is to see in many cult favorites. He became notably famous for his role as Igor, Gene Wilder's bemused hunchbacked assistant (whose hump switched shoulders from scene to scene), in director Mel Brooks' Young Frankenstein (1973).
Stars and Bars (1988)
Good novel adaptation
William Boyd's "Stars and Bars" - the book - stands in the great tradition of the English comic novel (Evelyn Waugh being one of Boyd's masters and inspirators). Now, I've seen the film only in German language... That's a pity because of the resulting demi-lack of Englishman-in-New-York-effects. As you can image, the German translation cannot be that perfect. I guess that the linguistical misunderstandings between the "hero" (Day Lewis) and the bizarre Georgian family with Anglophobic slursare are ten times funnier in the original version (as they are in the book). Anyway, I liked the film immediately and I'm happy to have taped it. Great cast! Unforgettable: Maury Chaykin as Elvis-like Freeborn.