KANSAN REVIEWS
FILMS:Enter funnyman
By JOHN TIBBETTS Kansan Reviewer
Iris-in to scene at beach with bathing beauties. Frolics at the seaside. Enter funnyman with shuffle, little hat and crooked smile. Enter the girl, all bright and fluttery, million dollar teeth and Garbo eyelashes. The day is saved when the hero rescues Doris Dazzle from the surging breakers. Fade-out with smiles and a bouquet of flowers. . .
Addenda: the funnyman is an egocentric lush who hits the flask and makes business deals with producers' wives. A has been at thirty, he fades out for thirty years like an old silent film crumbling into dust.
Result? That's it. "The Helen Morgan Story" all over again with titles.
"The Comic" opens at the funnyman's funeral. Appropriately enough. The picture dies right before our very eyes. The dead comic narrates his past and it flickers before us in a series of flashbacks, the images and characterizations like celluloid—flat and transparent. It's a serious
and transparent. It's a serious film but it tries to be funny and ends up being neither.
What it was like in the early days of screen comedy, the studios, the stars, the mad way of making films, the nostalgia of a vanished era, the funny little men on the screen, the galloping flickers . . . here is where "The Comic" belongs, not following a third-rate plot that's pure soap.
Devotees of the silent film will occasionally note parallels of Our Hero to the later career of Buster Keaton; the reference to Laurel and Hardy's "Battle of The Century" in one of the blackout sketches; or to Barrymore in a tepid "Jekyll and Hyde" routine. That's pretty paltry fare.
The rest of the time we follow Van Dyke around tearing up what he believes is the house occupied by his wife and lover, skipping down to Mexico to hit the skids (HIT THE SKIDS—term referred to when a character in a Hollywood movie gets drunk and sick and leaves his career behind him to follow a life of ruin) or doldering around with Mickey Rooney on park benches as two old has-beens in some incredibly boring sequences.
The wealth of possibilities never explored is unbelievable. The re-creations of silent comedy are at best second-rate and totally unworthy of the work put out even by the lesser stars of the period like Bevan or Chase. The character of Van Dyke, on and off screen is only a caricature. Carl Reiner's direction is barely adequate and writing is barely zero. "The funnyman's life was like a bad comedy," he seems to say, but 'why show this in a bad movie?' We keep waiting for that insane flash of wit that we have a right to expect from Reiner, that bit of madness that will save the day. But does he save us like the hero at the beach saved Doris Dazzle? No, fade-out and house lights up. We're still floundering.
There is a glimpse of the Brown Derby and the Avenue of Stars in Los Angeles (the Brown Derby looked fake), a few bits and pieces of gags, a rusty silent projector (courtesy of the prop department), and one memorable glimpse of Van Dyke at the end, sitting stonily in front of the tube watching one of his old films . . .
But a work of the seriousness and intent of a Sunset Boulevard or of the occasionally brilliant satire of a Singing in the Rain it ain't. Not by the length of Chester Conklin's whiskers it ain't.
Nov. 7
1969 KANSAN 5
BOOKS
THE RUNNING GUN, by Robert MacLead (Gold Medal, 60 cents); THE ILL WIND CONTRACT, by Philip Atlee (Gold Medal, 60 cents); THE MAN WHO PLAYED THIEF, by Don Smith (Gold Medal, 60 cents)—Some light ones for the light time of year (if anyone still believes summer session is a light time). "The Running Gun" is a western, whose plot lines will reveal nothing that wasn't in the pulps half a century ago. "The Ill Wind Contract" is another in a series about a counterspy named Joe Gall. The setting is Southeast Asia, with Communists all over the place, naturally. "The Man Who Played Thief" is a suspense tale that takes place in London, Paris and the Riviera.
STARTS TONIGHT!
The story of a man...a woman.. and a girl who rated all her lovers in a little black book!
Rod Steiger Claire Bloom Judy Geeson
O
IN A JULIAN BLAUSTEIN PRODUCTION
"3 into 2 won't go"
SHOWS Hillcrest
Mat. 2:10
ve. 7:10-9:00 ALL STATE PLUS
Eve. 7:10-9:00 ALL SEATS $1.50
WALT DISNEY PRODUCES MOTION PICTURES,
NOT FOREIGN FLICKS!
WALT DISNEY'S Darby OGill and the Little People
Mat. 2:30 Wed., Thurs.
Fri., Sat., Sun.
Eve. 7:15-9:15
You only need eyes to enjoy these two motion pictures!
ALL WALT DISNEY PROGRAM!
WALT DISNEY presents THE TATTOOED POLICE HORSE
Choir appears Sunday
The KU Chamber Choir makes its first appearance Sunday under the direction of James Ralston, teaching associate in choral music. The concert will be a 3:30 p.m. in Swarathout Recital Hall.
The choir consists of 31 students and is the most select of six ensembles. Annually it conducts a tour of Kansas cities and last year performed at the KMEA convention in Lawrence and at the
SWMENC convention in St. Louis.
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Ralston, Director of Choral Activities, has headed the Choral Department since 1966.
The program will be: "Behold! I Build a House" by Lukas Foss. James Moeser, associate professor of organ and head of the Organ Department, will be featured as guest artist.
Hillcrest3
You Mean You Have Only Seen Butch and The Kid Once?!!!
SHOWS
Mat. 2:15
Eve. 7:15 - 9:20
All Seats $1.50
Hillcrest
ALL NEW
CHUCK WAGON SPECIALS
Self Service Style Bring Coupon
OPEN DAILY
11:00 A.M. TO 9:00 P.M.
LIMITED TIME ONLY
99c
CHOPPED SIRLOIN STEAK CHICKEN GENUINE ITALIAN SPAGHETTI RANDY'S RANCH
Char-Broiled U.S. Choice Steaks 1811 WEST 6th STREET LAWRENCE, KS.
1001.Y. N. NEW YORK AVIONIZER 082