Excellent adventure yarn, great locations, moody music. The last “action-picture” from the late great french director Claude Sautet – from this he went on and did Les choses de la vie, Cesar et Rosalie, Vincent, Francois, Paul et les autres, plus the two masterpieces Un coeur en hiver and Nelly et M.Arnaud, his final movie, from 1994. By the way, he also wrote Borsalino (for Jacques Deray) and Les yeux sans visage (for Georges Franju). L’arme a gauche is not, by all means, a great movie – but compared to the contemporary crap we’re fed every day it’s outstanding. Read More »
Steve Thompson (Burt Lancaster) returns home after a few years of knocking around the country following his divorce from good-time girl Anna (Yvonne De Carlo). Getting his old job back driving an armored car, and not even convincing himself that he’s making a new start, he also wants his old wife back.Read More »
Fifth of the Pink Panther series and the last to star Peter Sellers before his untimely death. French mobster, Phillip Douvier has got a problem – hardly none of the other crime families give his family any respect. To try and fix this problem, he gives orders to murder Chief Inspector Clouseau who everybody think is a genius and only a few like Chief Inspector Dreyfus know of his true stupidity. Thanks due to a mixup an escaping criminal dies in Clouseau’s car, and it crashes and explodes. Chief Inspector Dreyfus is delighted (so much so that when at the memorial service he tries very hard not to laugh out in delight and everybody thinks he’s crying), but Clouseau, wondering who’s out to kill him gets the help of his oriental servant Cato and Douvier’s secretary and ex-lover Simone Legree to help solve the mystery…Read More »
Synopsis: Charles Dreyfus (Herbert Lom), the Chief Inspector of the Surete and superior of Inspector Clouseau was last seen in The Return of the Pink Panther (1975) suffering a breakdown cause of Clouseau’s torment. He decides to try and kill him, but fails and was last seen confined to a mental asylum. This movie begins three years later, Dreyfus’ doctors think is well enough to be released, but before he is, Clouseau visits him and agitates him into killing him, so he’s not released. But he escapes and tries to kill Clouseau, but fails. He then decides to recruit some of the best criminals in the world, and then kidnaps a noted English scientist and creates a device that can destroy the world. After using it, his only demand is Clouseau. So every country in the world sends their best assassin to kill him but fail. And Clouseau tries to find Dreyfus before he does any more damage.Read More »
Synopsis: Third in the Pink Panther film franchise. The “Pink Panther” Diamond is stolen once again from Lugash and a white glove is left making everybody think that the famous jewel thief “The Phantom” has stolen it. This surprises everybody as it was thought that The Phantom was retired. It also surprises The Phantom (a.k.a. Sir Charles Litton (Christopher Plummer)) himself as he didn’t do it. He sets out from the south of France to Lugash find the diamond and to clear his name as pressure comes from the Lugash authorities to give back the diamond. Meanwhile, infamous French Detective Inspector Jacques Clouseau (Peter Sellers) is called in to find the diamond and he immediately goes to the south of France to check up on Sir Charles. Lady Claudine Litton, Charles’ wife (Catherine Schell), discovers this and leads Clouseau on a false trail and, as normal, Clouseau, with his clueless methods, and Cato Fong (Burt Kwouk), his oriental manservant, cause mayhem as they try to find the diamond. Meanwhile, Clouseau pushes his boss, Chief Inspector Charles Dreyfus (Herbert Lom) too far and as the story proceeds, Dreyfus makes attempts to murder Clouseau and get him out of his life forever.Read More »
Synopsis: This, the second adaptation of Raymond Chandler’s novel, is much closer to the source text than the original – Murder, My Sweet (1944), which tended to avoid some of the sleazier parts of the plot – but still concerns private eye Philip Marlowe’s attempts to locate Velma, a former dancer at a seedy nightclub and the girlfriend of Moose Malloy, a petty criminal just out of prison. Marlowe finds that once he has taken the case, events conspire to put him in dangerous situations, and he is forced to follow a confusing trail of untruths and double-crosses before he is able to locate Velma.Read More »
Dr. Trotta is shot at night in his garden. He was a fan of the odd band “Joker Five” among which Keller suspects the perpetrator. The female singer of this band, a friend of Trottas son Peter, died a few weeks earlier of complications of an abortion. A direct guilt can be proved, but who bears the moral responsibility for the tragic event?Read More »
Synopsis: Uniformed Chicago cop Johnny Kelly, Jr., who originally joined the force to make his policeman father happy, has grown restless in the job and has decided to resign the next day. He allows himself to be compromised by a shady lawyer and has decided to desert his wife because of his obsessive affair with a stripper in a sleazy nightclub. Although the sergeant who partners with him for his last night of duty is a stranger to Kelly, the enigmatic cop seems to know Johnny very well. They leave in a squad car for what will be a very eventful last night on duty for the disillusioned young policeman.Read More »
Synopsis: Rodion Raskolnikov, an impoverished ex-student in Saint Petersburg, driven to utter desperation by grinding poverty and near-starvation, formulates a plan to kill an unscrupulous pawnbroker for her money, afterward falling prey to the torment of his own conscience.Read More »
