Mill Creek Entertainment has a film collector’s dream package lined up for delivery in the New Year … 12 films, as a four-DVD set on Jan. 25.
Titled Through the Decades: 1960s, this is a nifty blend of classic comedies, dramas and action films from the 1960s, including some films that are difficult to come by.
There is so much here for film buffs and collectors that the best way to detail what Mill Creek is serving up on Jan. 25 in this homage collection of films from the 1960s is to cover them in chronological order.
With that said, leading the way is director George Sidney’s 1960 film adaptation of the Norman Krasna stage play, Who was that Lady?, starring Tony Curtis, Dean Martin and Janet Leigh.
This marked the fifth and final time that the husband-and-wife team of Tony Curtis and Janet Leigh would star together … two years after the release of Who was that Lady? they could call it quits. In addition to this comedy with Dean Martin, Leigh and Curtis co-starred in Houdini (1953), The Black Shield of Falworth (1954), The Vikings (1958) and The Perfect Furlough (1958).
Tony Curtis plays David Wilson, a chemistry professor at Columbia University, and everything is going just fine until one day his wife Ann (Janet Leigh) walks in at the exact moment he is kissing one of his students. All hell breaks loose … get out, divorce, you’re done!!
Commiserating later with his buddy, Mike Haney (Dead Martin), he wonders how he is going to get out of this jam with his wife. Since Mike is a script writer for various television productions, the answer is simple, he will come up with a fantastic story that explains the indiscretion away!!
It is a simple plan, David is secretly an FBI agent, complete with a studio-fabricated ID and a prop gun and he was on assignment when Ann walked in. When the two “pitch” the story to Ann, she buys it, forgives David and they live happily ever after … HA!!
Of course, the story rapidly spins out of control and before you know the trio are “knee-deep” in a CIA spy plot and more.
Next up is director Richard Quine’s 1962 film release of The Notorious Landlady, teaming Kim Novak with Jack Lemmon and Fred Astaire.
It’s London and Bill Gridley (Jack Lemmon) has just arrived at his new post with the State Department, and manages to find lodging at a town house run by fellow American, Carlye Hardwicke (Kim Novak). When Gridley’s boss, Franklyn Ambruster (Fred Astaire) learns of this, he warms him, she might be dangerous.
It seems that her husband, Miles (played by Maxwell Reed), has gone missing. Ambruster’s advice, “keep an eye on her,” which is sort of a double-edge sword in that Carlye is an attractive woman. And sure enough, Gridley walks in on what appears to be the murder of her missing husband one evening, but a key witness, nurse Brown (Philippa Bevans — The World of Henry Orient, The Group), gets Carlye off the hook.
And then another murder! Perhaps poor Gridley, but nothing is as it seems … there’s a piece to the puzzle missing. Great fun.
Well one Jack Lemmon classic comedy deserves another and that’s exactly what’s up next with director David Swift’s 1963 film adaptation of the Lawrence Roman Broadway play, Under the Yum Yum Tree, teaming Lemmon with Carol Lynley and Dean Jones.
And if Lemmon was good for one, and good for two, why not got for three with the 1964 film release of Good Neighbor Sam! Also directed by David Swift, this time Lemmon’s co-stars are Romy Schneider and Dorothy Provine.
For a change of pace, and also released in 1964, is writer/director Robert Rossen’s film adaptation of J. R. Salamanca’s 1961 novel, Lilith.
Warren Beatty stars as Vincent Bruce, a Korean War vet, who takes a job as a therapist at a private sanitarium for the rich and eccentric. There he meets Lilith Arther (Jean Seaberg) and falls desperately in love with her … no-no sexual relations follow.
But soon Vincent learns that Lilith has tastes that run beyond what he expects and finds her sleeping with Mrs. Meaghan (Anne Meacham), one of the other patients. She also toys with Stephen (Peter Fonda in an early role), who snaps when she rejects him … he kills himself. At that point, everything spins out of control.
We next have three films from 1965. Director Robert Mulligan’s Baby the Rain Must Fall, starring Steve McQueen and Lee Remick; director Henry Levin historical epic, Genghis Khan, with Omar Sharif as the future Khan, plus Stephen Boyd, James Mason and Françoise Dorléac as Princess Bortei (the older sister of Catherine Deneuve, who was killed at the age of just 25 in an auto accident in 1967) and Warren Beatty is back in director Arthur Penn’s crime drama, Mickey One.
Director Arthur Penn is up again in the 1966 classic, The Chase, starring Marlon Brando, Robert Redford and Jane Fonda.
Bubber Reeves (Robert Redford) has escaped from prison and word soon arrives in the little Texas town of Tarl, that not only has Reeves escaped, but he may have been involved in murder of a carjack victim. The town’s sheriff (Marlon Brando) is convinced that he will soon be heading this way … his wife, Anne (Jane Fonda) still leaves here, but she’s been sleeping around with Reeve’s childhood friend, Jake (James Fox) … when Reeves arrives, death and murder will follow.
The 1967 entry is director Clive Donner’s film adaptation of the Murray Schisgal Broadway play, Luv, starring none other than Jack Lemmon, who is joined by Elaine May and Peter Falk.
Harry Berlin (Jack Lemmon) has had it. He is poised to jump off of the Manhattan Bridge and end it all when his college buddy, Milt (Peter Falk), intervenes. One thing leads to another and Milt asks Harry if he will knock-off his wife, Ellen (Elaine May), so that he can hook up with the very well-endowed Linda (Nina Wayne). But the problem is solved when. Harry falls in love with Ellen and a divorce is worked out, rather than murder.
Time passes and neither Harry or Milt are happy and Milt and Ellen discover that they still are in love with each other. The solution, kill Harry!!
The 1969 comedy Hook, Line and Sinker, starring Jerry Lewis, Peter Lawford and Anne Francis rounds out this magnificent film collection from Mill Creek Entertainment on Jan. 25.
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