Pete, Dud and Raquel... Badazzled (1967)

Brilliant on stage and ground-breaking on TV, Peter Cook and Dudley Moore couldn’t quite project their impressive array of talent onto the big screen. Bedazzled is a period piece of course and gets lots of points for style and substance but is a little too uneven to stand the test of time. That’s ungenerous of me as when we saw it as teenagers on the small screen the playground was full of it the next day including some of the best one liners, especially Cook’s remark that The Almighty was omni-present whereas he was just highly manoeuvrable.

The discipline of filmmaking would work against the improvisational talents of Cook especially and it’s interesting that Moore would later become so much more successful as a film star; more diligent, used to long hours of practice and discipline as an organ scholar and pianist and, it has to be said, palpably a better actor. There was always more of the devil in Peter and his eyes always betray more mischief and uncertainty than Dudley’s, so much more lost in the role is he. Moore would gain a Golden Globe and Oscar nomination for Arthur in 1981 whilst Cook followed a patchy acting career but contributed greatly to this nation’s sanity, founding Private Eye and his comically-vicious genius inspiring generations of comedians.

Together they were always dynamite and they are still winning here aided by old Footlights colleague Eleanor Bron as Margaret Spencer, the object of Moore’s character Stanley Moon’s desire. Bron and Cook had been in the Cambridge Footlights review of 1959, The Last Laugh and she was the first woman in the group. Well, there’s progress Cambridge! Here she provides the depth of character and technique to play variations on Margaret as each of Stanley’s chosen scenarios work out and she’s the perfect straight-woman with more than enough comic nuance to give the boys a run for their money.

Stanley has been driven to the edge after long years working as a short-order chef at a Wimpy fast-food restaurant during which time he has developed a romantic interest in waitress Margaret. It’s a love that dare not, indeed cannot, speak its name and at the film’s beginning he runs out of the café after Margaret and is unable to articulate his feelings once again as she jumps into a trendy bubble car* with a handsome man and drives off laughing. It’s the cinema of humiliation and Cooke just loves humiliating his in some ways more talented other half but Dudley can not only act it, he can take it and it wouldn’t work any other way.

Stanley goes home and attempts to hang himself only for the pipe he’s relying on to break sending him crashing to the floor as water sprays all over the pre-war wallpaper in his one bedroomed hell. He hears a voice who announces himself as George Spiggot, the most prosaic name for The Fallen One, Beelzebub, Lucifer… (Cook). Stanley soon finds a surprising amount of sympathy from The Devil for his plight as what seems like a good deal is offered: seven wishes and seven chances to secure the affection of the loveable Margaret in exchange for the paltry offering of his soul.

The deal with The Devil seem water-tight but Stanley soon finds that the details have plenty of devil in them and that no matter what kind of scenario he wishes to spark the romance with Margaret, there’s always a fatal flaw… Margaret is passionate but for poetry and not his person, he is even less effective transformed into a bee, he gains sisterly love but no more as a nun in a convent and then even when deeply in love the two cannot consummate their affection because of their guilt over the innocent and thoroughly decent man she has married (George again…).

Along the way, Stanley meets George’s Seven Deadly Sins with the standouts being Raquel Welch as Lilian Lust who – naturally tempts in George’s spare room – and then there’s the great Barry Humphries (another Footlights fellow) as Envy, relishing every nasty expression of human frailty. Perhaps we could have seen more of these Deadly Sins… especially as this is the last place you’d expect to find Raquel Welch on the rise?

 

Dusty Verdict: How can you not like this film even with the odd gripes, it’s of its time and a representation of two of our most talented comics in their prime in London when it was swinging. It’s also a call to follow your heart and to be true to yourself as all retellings of Faust would be, The Devil is in your betrayal of yourself as much as the arbitrary rules of man and deity… something Cook was always against. In the end both Pete and Dud followed their stars and we love them both for it. Anti the Establishment from which they came, rebels and rude boys at their best who left a lasting legacy and much love in their wake.

Directed by Stanley Donen (Singing in the Rain and many more!) in Panavision format, the film is very well made and offers a precious glimpse of the London as well as the unforgettable sight of the Order of Saint Beryl, or the Leaping Beryllians, glorifying their founder by jumping in unison on trampolines. Cook wrote the script and Moore wrote the music which is jazzy with psychedelic elements – some lovely use of phasing – with the repeated main theme sticking in your head. It’s quite collectable and well worth seeking out on its own.

 

 

* The Isetta was an Italian-designed microcar created in 1953 by the Italian firm Iso SpA, and subsequently built under license in a number of different countries, including the United Kingdom.

Guilty pressure… Saturn 3 (1980)

The great film critic, Roger Ebert really hated this film and just felt it was dumb, citing as evidence the scene in which the two main characters, on the run from a psychotic robot, break a hole in the floor of their space station so that it will fall into the hyper-cold waters below. Surely the air pressure would render such action suicidal mused Ebert and, thinking about it, he was probably right unless the station formed an air-tight seal over the cavern…?

There is so much pressure to not like this film but you know I always like to find something even in the most lost of causes…

Saturn 3 was, improbably, directed by Stanley Donen who also directed Singing in the Rain… it has a script from Martin Amis (who later based his 80’s masterpiece Money on the experience) and features Harvey Keitel dubbed with an mid-Atlantic English accent (courtesy of Roy Dotrice)… in truth it’s a bit of a muddle but not one that isn’t fun to watch.

Kirk Douglas

Kirk Douglas is in it for a start and, even at the age of 64, he’s a believable action hero – even a leading man. I think his performance is full of warmth and wit overcoming the obstacles this compromised production placed in front of him. Harvey Keitel also puts in a string performance, with lots of dark moody looks and method intensity although he is majorly under-minded by the decision to dub his lines: what on earth was wrong with his accent?!

Farrah Fawcett

Now, Farrah Fawcett is easily the least able of the three leads but she puts in a decent enough stint and is also exceptionally good looking to the point at which you sometimes forget to watch her acting. (In fairness it should be remembered that Ms Fawcett was later nominated for four Emmys for her dramatic work on The Burning Bed, Extremities and others…).

Against all this is a robot with a tiny head…

The big spaceship arrives...

Saturn 3 was based on a story by John Barry, the production designer who devised the visuals for George Lucas’ Star Wars and Richard Donner’s Superman, who hoped to make his directorial debut with the film. Various production chops and changes resulted in Donen directing and initially he was so disappointed in the end result that he asked for his name to be taken off the credits…

The film opens with an attempt at space operatics as a laughably giant spaceship hoves into view in orbit around Saturn. On board there is an unseemly rush to launch a probe, shadowy figures emerge in a large hanger - echoing the emergence of the aliens in Close Encounters – whilst the call goes out for the probe’s Captain Harding (voiced by UFO’s Ed Bishop!); you’d expect things to be better organised.

The Captain is late for take-off!

As Harding is getting dressed in his spacesuit he encounters Benson (Keitel) a man who just failed to make the grade for this mission – being judged unstable. He soon demonstrates how “unstable” as he opens the airlock and Harding is swept out to his doom. Benson makes the take off in time and heads down to Saturn’s third moon – which could be Atlas, an outer ring “shepherd” – where, for some reason, there is a base working on the production of hydroponic food for an Earth choked by pollution and, drug-dependent, over-population.

The base is run by Major Adam (Douglas) and his partner Alex (Fawcett) who, along with their dog Sally, have been alone for three years – Alex has never been to Earth whilst the much older Adam has spent time there.

Harvey Keitel keeps schtum...

They welcome Benson who proves somewhat socially maladjusted, not interested in small talk but clearly impressed with Alex… He has a canister with him that is later found to contain artificially grown brain tissue: it is to be used in the construction of a robot designed to improve efficiency on the base.

Whilst Adam and Alex continue with their daily routines, exercising, taking communal showers and generally living in relaxed inter-planetary idyll, Benson constructs his robot. You wonder why the couple are not more concerned with his strangeness: he’s clearly loopy.

But, they find out soon enough, as the robot is completed and named Hector… at first the mechanoid appears harmless as Adam easily defeats it at chess and it shows its control in extracting s shard of rock from Alex’s eye – in a genuinely unsettling moment.

Hector's steady hand comes to the rescue... this time...

But, as Benson begins to inject Hector with his own consciousness, it takes on his psychotic elements. Sally is killed and Hector attacks Alex only to release her on her command… but the respite is not for long and the robot attacks all three of the humans who only just manage to bring it to ground – Douglas still making his heroic moves with style!

Hector is disassembled and left in pieces in the lab and, as Adam and Alex work on what to do with the bonkers Benson he arrives in their quarters and tries to wrest Alex away from her older lover. Adam easily bests the younger man and has to be restrained by Alex from finishing him off.

Whilst the humans argue, Hector re-assembles and sets off in pursuit of his “instinctive” revenge. With Benson’s “brain” he is set to fulfil his prime directive in the bloodiest and most barbaric way… will anyone get off the planetoid alive?!

Alex is menaced by Hector

Dusty verdict: The endgame is played out in convincing fashion although, as monsters go, Hector is no match for Ridley Scott’s Alien or Kubrick’s Hal.

It’s entertaining in an undemanding way but full of the aforementioned holes: neither science fiction in the detailed way of 2001 (Arthur C Clarke was rather more of a scientist than Barry or Amis…) or Alien and not science fantasy like the grown-up version of Star Wars the producers maybe wanted.

Hector's tiny head

Much was made of Ms Fawcett’s revealing costumes in the film’s publicity and it does feel as if she is an adornment as much as an active participant in the story. That said there’s a slight spark between her and Douglas and she looks so vulnerable next to the rapacious stare of Mr Keitel… such a shame he was robbed of his voice!

The angelic adornment...

The music by Elmer Bernstein is suitably space operatic and lifts some of the grander visuals even when the interior scenes resemble a low-budget TV series.

Saturn 3 is available on DVD from all the familiar places… but I may keep my VHS for a very rainy day…

Lou takes full responsibility...