Back on March 7, you may recall, I wrote about how I was prompted to watch Alfred Hitchcock's 1938 spy thriller "The Lady Vanishes." If you don't remember, then allow me to refresh your memory:
Anyway, when searching out information to write about the movie, I learned that "The Lady Vanishes" has been remade a couple of times. In 2013, it was done as a made for TV movie in Great Britain, but the version that interested me was another British version that was made in 1979. I was able to find it on Amazon Prime, and last night I watched it.
This version was made by a British director named Anthony Page and it starred Cybill Shepherd, Elliott Gould, and Angela Lansbury as the three leads. I have confessed on these pages that I had a major crush on Cybill Shepherd since my college days. I still do have that crush, although it is not a "major" as it was back in those days (and yes, my wife is well aware of this). So I was predisposed to like this one, and I did. In this version, Shepherd is a "madcap American heiress" and Gould is an American photographer for LIFE Magazine, and Lansbury is the Lady that Vanishes, but other than that, this story pretty much follows the Hitchcock original almost scene for scene. It included the straight from central casting Brit characters of Caldicott and Charters, and in an a "who-is-that-guy?" moment, the character of Dr. Hartz was played by Herbert Lom, the guy who played Chief Inspector Dreyfuss in all of the Peter Sellers Pink Panther movies. I won't restate the plot here; you can check that out in the linked article above.
Miss Shepherd certainly not disappoint. She played the entire movie on a full length, backless gown that was at times breathtaking.
She was 29 years old at the time this was made, and she was indeed beautiful. And she did an excellent job playing "madcap." Miss Shepherd will never be confused with Meryl Streep, but she pulled off this role with some comic timing that was pretty damn good.
Of course, a movie like this brings up the always controversial topic of Remakes of Movies, especially a remake of a "Classic Alfred Hitchcock" film, no less. Just yesterday, I wrote of how a 2009 remake of the 1974 thriller "The Taking of Pelham One Two Three" was an abomination. 1979's "The Lady Vanishes" is certainly not that. It is a bit frothier than the original, and it is in color, not black and white (which my friend Dan will appreciate), but it is fast paced and entertaining, and it might serve another important purpose: It might prompt the viewer to seek out and watch the Hitchcock original, and that is never a bad thing.
So, all in all, I rate this at Two and One-half Stars on The Grandstander's always reliable scale.
No comments:
Post a Comment