Ahoy, squirts! Quint here with today’s installment of A Movie A Day.
[For those now joining us, A Movie A Day is my attempt at filling in gaps in my film knowledge. My DVD collection is thousands strong, many of them films I haven’t seen yet, but picked up as I scoured used DVD stores. Each day I’ll pull a previously unseen film from my collection or from my DVR and discuss it here. Each movie will have some sort of connection to the one before it, be it cast or crew member.]
We kick off our Peter Sellers-A-Thon with WHAT’S NEW PUSSYCAT?, an incredibly silly, ridiculous, but utterly charming movie.
This film marks the screenwriting and screen-appearing debut of one Mr. Woody Allen. Now, I grew up not liking Woody Allen movies… at least in my mind. I think the only one I had watched all the way through in my childhood was SLEEPER and I greatly liked it, but the others… well, the bits I saw just went right over my head.
In my teen years, around the time I fell in love for the first time, I ended up dipping my toe into the Woody Allen waters again. This time I hit Vulcan Video, the great independent geek video store here in Austin, and walked out with a stack, including two that would ultimately change my mind on Allen and end up in my top 100 favorite films: MANHATTAN and THE PURPLE ROSE OF CAIRO.
I was old enough to get the humor, had enough patience to sit through his dramas and was rewarded accordingly.
So, right away the humor in this one was right up my alley, being a now decade long convert to the cult of Allen. And when you throw in a near slapstick performance by Peter O’Toole and a beautifully exaggerated German-accented turn by Peter Sellers and you have a movie that had me howling.
Don’t get me wrong, this movie is light as a feather, little substance to be had, but why the hell would you be looking for substance in a silly comedy and, more importantly, why would you be disappointed if you found none? The point of the movie is to make you laugh and I was laughing out loud (I refuse to use internet shorthand or slang… although I am very partial to the term LOLacaust…) from the very opening featuring a very long shot of a castle as Sellers argues with his wife, appearing in various windows, on outside staircases, etc.
Seller’s outfit, hair and German accent are f-bomb ridiculous. Ridiculous and hilarious. Seller’s giant Bavarian wife thinks he’s cheating on her and he’s not denying it. She demands to know if this girl is prettier than she is, Sellers screaming back at her “I am prettier than you!”
The domestic dispute lasts a good long time, actually, which makes it all the funnier, ultimately culminating in a wrestling match between the two, which is interrupted by an alarm clock. They stop, agreeing to pick up the fight later. It’s time for him to work.
This looney bastard, we come to find, is a psychiatrist and his first patient of the day is Peter O’Toole. On his first visit to the good Doctor we come to find that O’Toole has a rather unique problem. You see, when the light hits him a certain way, he’s kind of handsome, apparently, and as a result he fucks a whole lot. The problem is that he has a woman who loves him, whom he in turn loves, but she’s wanting marriage. With him being so damn good looking (in the right light, of course) he is used to crazy sexcapades and doesn’t believe he can settle down.
The irony here is that he goes to Sellers for help and Sellers becomes obsessed with O’Toole, who has the lifestyle he dreams for.
That’s the plot. There is one character arc in this movie and that’s O’Toole having to discover that he can find the will to resist temptation and stay true to the one girl who really loves him for him. Even that arc is made a joke of (O’Toole states his point of view change clearly, looking to the sky, nearly crying while “Author’s Message” flashes on the screen next to his head), but it’s a funny joke, so that’s fine.
The movie’s really an excuse to throw some of the most beautiful women at a trio of radically different men. O’Toole is desired by everybody, Sellers desires everybody and Woody Allen is his Woody Allen self… neurotic, fumbling. He has a thing for Romy Schneider, O’Toole’s true love, and Schneider indulges him as a means to raise jealousy in O’Toole.
Schneider is cuter than cute. It’s like if Dianne Wiest’s genes were spliced with Rachel Weisz’s… you just get a being of pure cuteness.
O’Toole’s other women show in the form of the radiant Capucine and Paula Prentiss. Prentiss is a stipper who is lusted after by everybody, including O’Toole. But, and I’ve been there, trust me, once O’Toole starts making headway with her he uncovers a psychopath. Every time his attention is turned away from her she strikes out, usually announcing that she’s going to the bathroom to overdose on sleeping pills… then does it.
That becomes a running gag in the film.
The point being is all the women O’Toole lusts after share two things in common. They’re all beautiful and they’re all insane.
This reaches a boiling point and O’Toole comes ot his realization, gets engaged to Schneider and puts his past behind him… and then the real trouble begins.
He goes on assignment (he’s a reporter for a fashion rag) at a secluded hotel, known for being a sex-spot. Every single character from the movie up to this point ends up there and the result is pure anarchy. Bit players show up, mean drunks, jealous husbands, horny girls, hornier guys… And to really twist the knife… after O’Toole swears to be faithful Ursula Andress literally falls out of the sky (parachuting) and lands in O’Toole’s passenger seat just as he’s arriving at the hotel.
And not only is it Andress, but it’s horny Andress who wants O’Toole. How cruel!
The finale is great and really puts a hugely entertaining cap on a really funny movie. And director Clive Donner was smart enough to force Ursula Andress to spend the entire final reel running around in her underwear. Bonus points.
O’Toole displays a different set of comic chops from yesterday’s HOW TO STEAL A MILLION, where he was more proper and subdued. He’s really shooting for the moon here and he had to. You can’t share the screen with Peter Sellers and downplay your bits or he’d get steamrolled by one of the funniest men to ever appear on the screen in his prime.
And this is Sellers’ movie, make no mistake. He has the confidence to fly completely off the handle here and the movie’s entertainment value all grows from his performance.
Final Thoughts: I know this isn’t the most respected of Sellers’ work, but I found it to be just as funny as all but the very best of the Panther films and funnier than most of the later Panthers. O’Toole is great, in a role supposedly based on Warren Beatty’s life… Hollywood legend states that Beatty hired Allen to work on this with him, but left when the producers wouldn’t let him cast his then girlfriend in the movie. Apparently, O’Toole’s character’s pet-name for all his girls, “Pussycat,” was Beatty’s term for his women. Crazy, huh? Also watch out for a really funny James Bond adlib by Sellers to Andress at one point. I think if you go into this movie wanting to laugh you’ll get everything you desire out of it. It’s a silly, silly, funny fun movie.
Here’s what we have lined up for the next week:
Thursday, December 11th: BEING THERE (1979)
Friday, December 12th: THE PARTY (1968)
Saturday, December 13th: CASINO ROYALE (1967)
Sunday, December 14th: THE STRANGER (1946)
Monday, December 15th: BROTHER ORCHID (1940)
Tuesday, December 16th: THE PETRIFIED FOREST (1936)
Wednesday, December 17th: MOONTIDE (1942)
Now on to one of the bigger gaps in my film education, Hal Ashby’s BEING THERE! See you folks later for that one!
-Quint
quint@aintitcool.com
