THE FIXER – Alan Bates, Dirk Bogarde

The Fixer (1968)
Direction: John Frankenheimer
Screenplay: Dalton Trumbo, from Bernard Malamud’s 1966 novel
Cast: Alan Bates, Dirk Bogarde, Georgia Brown, Hugh Griffith, Elizabeth Hartman, Ian Holm, David Opatoshu, David Warner, Carol White
 

 

In 1969, director John Frankenheimer declared that he felt "better about The Fixer than anything I’ve ever done in my life." Considering Frankenheimer’s previous output — Seven Days in May, the much admired The Manchurian Candidate — it is hard to believe that the director was being anything but a good PR man for his latest release.
Adapted from Bernard Malamud’s National Book Award- and Pulitzer Prize-winning novel (which itself was based on the real story of Jewish bricklayer Mendel Beiliss), The Fixer is an overlong, overblown, and overwrought contrivance that, [...]

by Andre Soares | October 28, 2004   
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FACES d: John Cassavetes

Faces (1968)
Direction and screenplay: John Cassavetes
Cast: John Marley, Gena Rowlands, Lynn Carlin, Fred Draper, Seymour Cassel, Val Avery

 

 
John Cassavetes reportedly threw the money he made with the 1968 horror hit Rosemary’s Baby into his finishing touches on Faces, a personal project he had begun filming in 1966. Cassavetes spent months (some sources say a couple of years) editing the film into a "manageable" six hours, and eventually into its final 130 minutes.
Silent-film maverick Erich von Stroheim would have been proud of him — at least in regard to the film’s (initial) length and to Cassavetes’ committed auteurship. Now, would the irascible Stroheim have approved of the frequently inaudible dialogue, sloppy editing, poor lighting, careless camera placement, and faux-naturalistic acting? Probably [...]

by Andre Soares | September 29, 2004   
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