Cyril Delevanti Movies

Best known for directing several popular science-fiction films in the 1950s, Jack Arnold turned to blaxploitation with this gritty crime film. Fred Williamson stars as Shep Stone, who becomes a private detective after being suspended from the police department. The usual sleazy setpieces deal with porno producers (one of whom, Bret Morrison, was the voice of The Shadow on radio), drugs, and murder. Teresa Graves (Get Christie Love!) co-stars with Rosemary Forsyth and The $6,000,000 Man's Richard Anderson in this average, but entertaining potboiler. Williamson and Arnold re-teamed for Boss Nigger the same year. ~ Robert Firsching, Rovi

Bedknobs and Broomsticks was produced several years after Walt Disney's death and released in the fall of 1971. As it turned out, Bedknobs was frequently compared to Mary Poppins -- probably thanks to several striking similarities between the two productions, notably the presence in the cast of David Tomlinson, the use of Cockney children as central characters, and the inclusion of sequences that combine animation and live-action. Set in wartime England, Bedknobs stars Angela Lansbury as Eglantine Price, a would-be witch who hopes to use her newly acquired conjuring powers to forestall a Nazi invasion. Saddled with three surly kids who've been evacuated from London, Lansbury wins over her charges by performing various and sundry feats of magic. And, yes, she manages to foil a few Germans along the way. The film's most famous episode is an elaborate undersea fantasy, which combines animation with live-action on a gargantuan scale, dwarfing all previous Disney sequences along these lines. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Con artist Carl Beaumont (Steve Ihnat) and nurse Angela Reese (Joanna Moore) have worked out a "perfect" scam: Angela determines which of her female patients has the most money, whereupon Beaumont moves in and swindles the targeted lady out of her savings--then kills her before she can talk. Unfortunately for Beaumont, his most recent victim lived long enough to point FBI Inspector Lew Erskine (Efrem Zimbalist Jr. in the right direction. But will Erskine be able to move quickly enough to save Beaumont's newest "mark", Sarah Whittaker (Mildred Dunnock), from sharing the same fate as the others? ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Circumstantial evidence suggests that a murdered cop was supplementing his income as a blackmailer. Chief Ironside (Raymond Burr), an old friend of the dead man, is determined to prove otherwise. In the course of his investigation, Ironside reopens an unsolved homicide case in which the deceased officer's girlfriend Adrienne May (Jan Shepard) was a key player. Featured in the cast is Robert Alda, the father of future M*A*S*H star Alan Alda. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

The first of Mission: Impossible's multipart adventures, "Old Man Out" began its two-episode run on October 8, 1966. The IMF agents disguise themselves as a carnival troupe in order to rescue 80-year-old freedom fighter Anton Cardinal Vossek (Cyril Delevanti) from an impregnable Balkan prison. Aiding the agents this time out is Briggs' old friend Crystal Walker (Mary Ann Mobley), a hire-wire artist. Part One of "Old Man Out" was written by Ellis Marcus. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Police sergeant Dave Wolfe (Skip Homeier) has already ordered Joe Oliver (Dale Van Sickel) to stay away from Dave's sister Susan (Chris Noel). Heading to Joe's apartment for a final showdown, Dave hears a woman's scream and breaks down the door. Several shots later, Joe lies on the floor dead, while the badly beaten Susan stands by in mute horror. In order to defend Dave on a murder charge and to find out whether or not Joe was really Susan's assailant, Perry Mason (Raymond Burr) must break through the wall of stony silence which surrounds the six people who may have witnessed the crime--but who claim to have seen and heard nothing. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Though he's most famous for his portrayal of Victor Laszlo in 1942's Casablanca, actor Paul Henreid took a few turns behind the camera as evidenced by this 1964 thriller starring Bette Davis as twins Margaret DeLorca and Edith Phillips. After landing the beau they both sought after by falsely claiming she was pregnant, Margaret lives a life of luxury as the wife of a wealthy man. Now, 20 years later, a broke and lonely Edith has returned for revenge. After killing the recently widowed Margaret, Edith assumes her identity with plans of living the life she feels she's deserved all along. But in order to pull it off, she'll have to play the role of Margaret connivingly enough to fool her servants as well as a local playboy and the police. Dead Ringer was remade in 1986 as Killer in the Mirror, a made-for-television movie starring Ann Jillian. ~ Matthew Tobey, Rovi

Long resistant to film adaptations of her Mary Poppins books, P.L. Travers finally succumbed to the entreaties of Walt Disney, and the result is often considered the finest of Disney's personally supervised films. The Travers stories are bundled together to tell the story of the Edwardian-era British Banks family: the banker father (David Tomlinson), suffragette mother (Glynis Johns), and the two "impossible" children (Karen Dotrice and Matthew Garber). The kids get the attention of their all-business father by bedevilling every new nanny in the Banks household. Whem Mr. Banks advertises conventionally for another nanny, the kids compose their own ad, asking for someone with a little kindness and imagination. Mary Poppins (Julie Andrews in her screen debut) answers the children's ad by arriving at the Banks home from the skies, parachuting downward with her umbrella. She immediately endears herself to the children. The next day they meet Mary's old chum Bert (Dick Van Dyke), currently employed as a sidewalk artist. Mary, Bert, and the children hop into one of Bert's chalk drawings and learn the nonsense song "Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious" in a cartoon countryside. Later, they pay a visit to Bert's Uncle Albert (Ed Wynn), who laughs so hard that he floats to the ceiling. Mr. Banks is pleased that his children are behaving better, but he's not happy with their fantastic stories. To show the children what the real world is like, he takes them to his bank. A series of disasters follow which result in his being fired from his job. Mary Poppins' role in all this leads to some moments when it is possible to fear that all her good work will be undone, but like the magical being she is, all her "mistakes" lead to a happy result by the end of the film. In 2001, Mary Poppins was rereleased in a special "sing-along" edition with subtitles added to the musical numbers so audiences could join in with the onscreen vocalists. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Filmed on location in Mexico by John Huston, Night of the Iguana stars Richard Burton as Rev. Shannon, an alcoholic defrocked minister, who scratches out a living as a south-of-the-border tour guide. His latest customers are several American schoolteachers, and he guides their bus to a rundown hotel owned by flamboyant widow Maxine Faulk (Ava Gardner). Attempting to dally with Charlotte Goodall (Sue Lyon), one of the schoolteachers, Shannon is caught in the act by the group's "den mother" Judith Fellowes (Grayson Hall), who threatens to have him fired. While he and Maxine connive to keep Judith from calling his superiors, artist Hanna Jelkes (Deborah Kerr) arrives at the hotel with her ailing, elderly poet grandfather (Cyril Delevanti, in a part reportedly offered to poet Carl Sandburg). The midsection of the film charts the vacillating sexual tensions among the besotted Shannon, the earthy Maxine, and the repressed Hanna. The perversions and demons plaguing the principal characters, merely hinted at in the original stage production of by Tennessee Williams, are expanded by Huston, who co-adapted the screenplay with Anthony Veiller. The film won an Academy Award for Best Costume Design for Dorothy Jeakins. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Charles Beaumont adapted this hauntingly-poignant 60-minute Twilight Zone episode from his own short story "Song for a Lady." Hoping to save their tattered marriage, Alan and Eileen Ransome (Lee Philips and Joyce Van Patten) book passage on a luxury liner bound for England. Their first indication that something is amiss is the fact that all the other passengers are very, very old; the second is the realization that the ship is not travelling in the direction that it should. But what seems to be sinister at first ends up as something rare and beautiful. The veteran supporting cast includes Gladys Cooper, Wilfrid Hyde-White, Cecil Kellaway, and Alan Napier. The first Twilight Zone to be produced by Bert Granet, "Passage on the Lady Ann" originally aired May 9, 1963. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

A confused Ritchie (Larry Mathews) stops Rob (Dick Van Dyke) and Laura (Mary Tyler Moore) cold during breakfast one morning with a big question: Why is Ritchie's middle name "Rosebud"? In answer, Rob and Laura flash back to a family gathering at the Petrie home a few months before Ritchie's birth, where virtually every one of their relatives was throwing out suggestions as to the best name for the new arrival. Without giving away the episode's punch line, it should be noted that among the guests are Rob's father Sam (J. Pat O'Malley) and the formidable Grandfather Petrie (Cyril Delevanti), who favors the name "Ulysses David." ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Fed up with the loud and incessant talking of fellow men's club member Jamie Tennyson (Liam Sullivan), pompous Col. Archie Taylor (Franchot Tone) decides to place a most unusual wager. With $500,000 at stake, Taylor bets that Tennyson cannot remain silent for a full year. Deeply in debt, Tennyson accepts the wager, and even permits himself to be placed in a glass cage in the club's basement, so that Taylor and the other members can monitor his silence. Though the story contains no science-fiction or fantasy trappings whatsover, the ironic ending is very much in keeping with the standards set by previous Twilight Zone episodes. First telecast April 28, 1961, "The Silence" was scripted by Rod Serling -- and though Serling denied it at the time, the story would seem to have been influenced by Anton Chekhov's "The Bet." ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Two-fisted Irish salesman Ike Brennan (Robert Gist) comes to Paladin (Richard Boone) to help save the life of Brennan's wife, currently held hostage by Indians. Paladin agrees to help Brennan deliver a wagonload of trade goods--food, blankets, etc.--to use as ransom. What the gunslinger doesn't know is that the shipment also includes a Gaitlin gun (an early form of machine gun), which the Indians plan to use in a fullscale war against the Cavalry. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi