Category Archives: 1969

Muhammad Ali, the Greatest
Directed by William Klein
Written by William Klein
1969/France
IMDb link
First viewing/YouTube

[box] I done wrestled with an alligator, I done tussled with a whale; Handcuffed lightning, thrown thunder in jail; Only last week, I murdered a rock, injured a stone, hospitalized a brick; I’m so mean I make medicine sick. – Muhammad Ali[/box]

[box] It’s not bragging if you can do it. – Dizzy Dean[/box]

The only time I watched boxing in my life was when Muhammad Ali fought.  I just loved to watch him dance around the ring.  So this was nostalgia and thus perfect for Lockdown.

The version that I watched spanned Ali’s career from his first heavyweight champion win against Sonny Liston in 1964 through the 1974 “Rumble in the Jungle” fight against George Foreman in Zaire.  We see highlights of several fights and classic Ali mouthing off as no one before or since.

The Beatles visit Ali’s training camp in 1964

Given the 1974 footage, the release date for this seems odd.  I can only assume that the color footage in Zaire was added later for a re-release.  I’m glad it was included as this part is particularly fascinating.   If you have any affection at all for Ali, this is a must-see.  If you weren’t born while this was going on, find out what it was all about.  Recommended.

The Oblong Box
Directed by Gordon Hessler
Written by Lawrence Huntington and Christopher Wicking from a story by Edgar Allen Poe
1969/UK
IMDb link
First viewing/Amazon Prim3
They Shoot Zombies, Don’t They?

[box] N’Galo: We have knowledge of things you know nothing of.[/box]

When horror movies are a suitable exchange for worry, it must be Lockdown.

The story takes place in 19th Century England or at least that’s where it settles.  The beginning takes place in Africa.  The Markham family has made a handsome fortune on the backs of Africans.  The elaborate opening sorcery/voodoo scene is quite intriguing.  Eventually the witchdoctor draws Edward Markham to the ceremony where he is made hideously ugly and insane by magic.  His brother Julian (Vincent Price) takes him home and locks him in the attic.  Julian then proceeds with his courtship and marriage to the much younger Elizabeth.

Edward’s lawyer Trench and the sorcerer come to England to spring him.  Unfortunately, their scheme accidentally sees Julian buried alive.  Julian once again escapes.  He forces local doctor J. Neuhartt (Christopher Lee) to shelter him while he carries out his revenge plans.

Well, the ending didn’t come as a surprise and Christopher Lee is wasted in much too small and straight a part.  But we do get Price who is always fascinating to watch and a bunch of the salacious and cruel set ups that are typical of this era of British horror.  Not great but quite watchable.

The Cremator (Spalovac mrtvol)
Directed by Juraj Herz
Written by Ladislav Fuks and Juraj Herz from a novel by Fuks
1969/Czechoslovakia
IMDb link
First viewing/Criterion Channel

Kopfrkingl: The flames, my sweet, will not hurt you.

Not a feel-good film but a unique and well-made one.  I’ll settle for that during Lockdown.

The setting is Czechoslovakia in the weeks surrounding the Nazi occupation.   Kopfrkingl is the director of a large crematorium.  He is demented and believes that cremation sets the soul free to travel to heaven or some such nonsense.  He is devoted to his half-Jewish wife and two children.  He has several Jewish employees.

The cremator is surprisingly blase about the Occupation and soon attracts the attention of Nazis who are eager to recruit him to the Party.  He does not let love or loyalty stand in his way.

I found this movie on the They Shoot Zombies, Don’t They? list and assumed it would be a horror film.  The subject matter is  macabre obviously and several cremations are shown.  However, the style is very detatched and dreamlike and not conducive to actual scares.

There is some incredible showy use of the camera in this one along with a beautiful score. It is full of the wry Czech wit I have grown to love.  It’s a subversive film and I’m not surprised that it was banned on release in 1969 and not shown in Czechoslovakia until after the Prague Spring.  This goes immediately onto the short list for the Favorite New-to-Me Films of 2020.  Recommended.  If you like the trailer, you will likely love the movie

Gamera vs. Guiron (AKA “Attack of the Monsters, “Gamera tai daiakuju Giron”)
Directed by Noriaki Yuasa
Written by Niisan Takahashi
1969/Japan
IMDb link
First viewing/YouTube

[box] [Akio tells the grownups what he’s learned from his alien adventure] Akio: Let’s make the Earth a great place to live, without war, and traffic accidents… [/box]

This stupid movie is perfect for the terminally distracted during Lockdown.

Two annoying little kids are kidnapped by aliens who want to gain knowledge by eating their brains.  Gamera, the giant fire-breathing turtle, comes to their rescue.  He must first defeat Guiron, a giant ninja shark.

This is just exactly as pitiful as it sounds.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RxlOe6ZHGUA

Clip

The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie
Directed by Ronald Neame
Written by Jay Presson Allen from a novel by Muriel Sparks
1969/US
IMDb link
Repeat viewing/YouTube

[box] Jean Brodie: Little girls! I am in the business of putting old heads on young shoulders, and all my pupils are the creme de la creme. Give me a girl at an impressionable age and she is mine for life. You girls are my vocation. If I were to receive a proposal of marriage tomorrow from the Lord Lyon, King of Arms, I would decline it. I am dedicated to you in my prime. And my summer in Italy has convinced me that I am truly in my prime.[/box]

This study of delusion and comeuppance has held up very well over the years.

The action takes place over several years in the mid-1930s.  Miss Jean Brodie (Maggie Smith) teaches middle-schoolers at a girls boarding school in Edinburgh.  She is passionate about her vocation.  She handpicks a set of “special girls” and seems to have their lives planned out for them, concentrating on the qualities she deems them to possess.  Sandy (Pamela Franklin) is the “dependable one”; Jenny is the “pretty one”, etc.  But Miss Brodie, with her lofty ideas of art and beauty and romance,  is not living in the real world.

She is carrying on with two male colleagues, one of them married.  This gets the girls’ pubescent minds in an uproar of speculation.  As the girls get older, Jean relishes encouraging their dreams of love and sex.  Miss MacKay (Celia Johnson), the Headmistress, thoroughly disapproves of Jean’s many excursions outside the curriculum but Jean resists any attempts to reign her in.  I’m going to stop here because the ending is just too good to spoil in any way.  With Robert Stephenson and Gordon Jackson as Jean’s lovers.

This is an old favorite and when I first started watching it, I though Maggie Smith might be overdoing it a bit much.  As I got into it, it seemed to me that her flamboyance suited her histrionic character perfectly.  Then, as Jean’s castle in the sky begins to crumble, Smith gets very raw and real.   Both Franklin and Johnson are equally superb.  Recommended to those looking for a good drama/character study.

Maggie Smith won the Academy Award for Best Actress.  Rod McKuen was nominated for his Original Song “Jean”.

Trailer (contains spoilers)

Hello, Dolly!
Directed by Gene Kelly
Written by Ernest Lehman from a play by Thornton Wilder
1969/US
IMDb link
Repeat viewing/YouTube rental

[box] Dolly Levi: And on those cold winter nights, Horace, you can snuggle up to your cash register. It’s a little lumpy, but it rings![/box]

Not my favorite musical but cheerful enough for the Lockdown.

The setting is 1890’s New York.  Widow Dolly Levi (Barbra Streisand) is an expert at arranging things, particularly marriages.  She has been working on the case of the wealthy confirmed old bachelor Horace Vandergelder (Walter Matthau).  As the story begins, she has been given charge of his niece Ermengarde, who wants marry a painter (Tommy Tune), while Horace travels to New York City to propose to milliner Irene Malloy.

Following Horace’s departure, his clerks Cornelius (Michael Crawford) and Barnaby decide to play hooky and follow their boss to New York.  Dolly aids and abets all this mischief by encouraging Ermengarde to elope and suggesting that Cornelius and Barnaby play a call on Irene Malloy.  By the end of the story, Dolly has made several matches including for herself.

This is a musical that takes choreography to levels unseen since “Oliver!”, i.e. with a cast of thousands joining almost every single number.  In addition, Streisand seems entirely too young to play this part.  The songs are good though and it is certainly better than watching existential terror during a Lockdown.