Showing posts with label Lee J. Cobb. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Lee J. Cobb. Show all posts

Wednesday, June 30, 2010

'Our Man Flint' kicks Austin Powers' ass

Our Man Flint (1966)
Starring: James Coburn, Lee J. Cobb, and Gila Golan
Director: Daniel Mann
Rating: Eight of Ten Stars

When the world is threatened by a mysterious cabal who has the abilit to trigger natural disasters at will, only super-spy Derek Flint (Coburn) can save it. But will even his mastery of karate, fencing, bio-chemistry, world cuisne, and countless dance styles; his trick lighter with 80+ functions and weapons; his complete mastery of all his bodily functions; and his powers of seduction be enough to overcome the sinister briliance and beauty of his female counterpart (Golan)?


"Our Man Flint" is a hilarous spy comedy that derives its laughs from the fact that it's played completely straight (unlike "Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery" and its progressively worse sequels, which goes out of their way to be goofy). Flint is an outrageously over-the-top James Bond-type character who can do pretty much everything, and who knows everything, but who is so perfect that he will humbly say that there are many things he doesn't know. His "man-of-peace" attitude (until his friends and acquaintances are threatened), gentlemanly nature combined with his swingin' Sixties lifestyle (with his super-bachelor pad and four live-in girlfriends/personal assistants) make him an even more interesting and funny character.


The storyline is fast-paced, the jokes are funny, and the story is fun, flippant super-spy fare. I think lovers of comedy and James Bond-style spy movies will something to like about "Our Man Flint."



Saturday, January 2, 2010

Big city meets big cowboy hat

Coogan's Bluff (1968)
Starring: Clint Eastwood, Susan Clark, Lee J. Cobb, Tisha Sterling and Don Stroud
Director: Donald Siegel
Rating: Seven of Ten Stars

When an impatient sheriff's deputy from Arizona, Coogan (Eastwood), loses a dangerous prisoner in New York City, he receives a crash course in how things are done Back East.


"Coogan's Bluff" is an amusing detective film crossed with a fish-out-of-water story about a cowboy cop applying tough-guy tactics to a manhunt in ultra-liberal New York. Running gags surrounding stereotypes held by New Yorkers about Westerners (such as everyone in a cowboy hat and boots is from Texas) and Coogan's amazement about how law is enforced in the Big City are all well-deployed and delivered with perfect straight faces and comedic timing by the cast.

The only sour note in this excellent film surrounds Coogan's pseudo love interest. Coogan's a womanizer, so he spends the film trying to bed a bleeding-heart parole officer (who is such a bleeding heart that she lets her clients fondle her breasts during meetings). He eventually gets somewhere with her but instead of "closing the deal", he sneaks a look at her files to get a lead on his escaped prisoner. She is naturally angered by this betrayal, yet at the end of the movie she gives him a loving send-off as he heads back to Arizona. I love macho-fantasies as much as the next guy--if only women would fall into our beds over nothing but our tough ways and country charm!--but in the context of the way these two characters interact throughout the movie, it's an eye-rollingly stupid development that leaves the viewer with a final bad impression of what has otherwise been a pretty decent film.

Fans for the laconic Eastwood from films like "The Good, the Bad and the Ugly" will love him in "Coogan's Bluff". They're also likely to love the entire movie... so long as the DVD player is stopped after Cobb meets Eastwood in the park and repeats his explanation to Coogan about how things are done in NYC.