Tony Arpino Movies
A couple tries to hold their relationship together despite the twenty-three year gap in their ages in this romantic comedy/drama. Scott Wardman (Charles Bronson) is an 39-year-old American author living in England who supports himself by writing pornographic novels. Scott meets Twinky (Susan George), an attractive young woman who tells him she's almost 20. Scott quickly falls for her beauty and charm, but he discovers her definition of "almost" is looser than that of most people -- it seems Twinky is only 16 years old. In a moment of romantic impulse, Scott and Twinky travel to Scotland and get married, but Twinky's parents are less than enthusiastic when they hear the news. Scott soon brings his new bride to New York City to meet his friends, and while they're not as upset, they have a hard time believing this is true love, especially after the differences in Scott and Twinky's ages become increasingly apparent. Lola (also released as Twinky) was an early film credit for director Richard Donner, who at the time was still best known for his work in television. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi
- Starring:
- Charles Bronson, Susan George, (more)
- 1964
Hardly the best of Hammer Studios' Frankenstein epics, The Evil of Frankenstein is too much the mixture as before to be truly memorable. Back in business once more is Baron Frankenstein (Peter Cushing), who finds his fabled monster (Kiwi Kingston) frozen in a block of ice. Once the creature is thawed out, the Baron, worried that the big lug might develop a mind of his own, engages the services of a hypnotist (Peter Woodthorpe). Instead of keeping the monster docile, the hypnotist decides to use old "Frankie" for his own evil designs, and we're off and running again. At 84 minutes, Evil of Frankenstein was too short for a two-hour network TV slot, so Universal (the film's American distributor) tacked on 13 minutes of pointless additional footage, featuring timorous villagers Steven Geray, Maria Palmer and William Phipps. The film was followed by a vastly superior sequel, Frankenstein Created Woman. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi
- Starring:
- Peter Cushing, Peter Woodthorpe, (more)
- 1964
In this wartime espionage drama, two incarcerated safecrackers are released to help Naval Intelligence steal classified Japanese documents following the attack on Pearl Harbor. The documents are hidden in the Japanese embassy in Lisbon. Once there, the crooks learn that the papers are worth a bundle so after the mission is completed, one of the thieves attempts to steal them for himself. He ends up killed by their Lisbon contact, who absconds with the documents himself. He too gets killed and the Navy finally gets the papers. Meanwhile the other safecracker is caught by the Japanese and held captive on a ship. When it is torpedoed, the thief is saved and receives a presidential pardon for his heroism. ~ Sandra Brennan, Rovi
- 1963
Novelist Mickey Spillane portrays his own creation, Mike Hammer, in The Girl Hunters. Hammer has spent seven years in an alcoholic funk after the supposed death of his secretary, Velda. He is brought back to the land of the living by his old friendly enemy, police lieutenant Pat Chambers (Scott Peters), who wants Hammer to extract some information out of a dying federal agent. This puts Mike on the trail of a subversive communist organization, the key to which seems to be sexy Laura Knapp (Shirley Eaton), the widow of a murdered senator. When Hammer determines that following this espionage trail may lead to relocating Velda, who might not be dead after all, he pursues matters with his usual fascistic tendency to pummel first and ask questions later. The Girl Hunters is the film in which Mike Hammer incapacitates an opponent by literally nailing the latter's hands to the floor. But that's kid stuff compared to the fate in store for the treacherous Laura Knapp. The Girl Hunters was filmed in its entirety in England. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi
- Starring:
- Mickey Spillane, Shirley Eaton, (more)
Robert Newton repeats his Treasure Island role as Long John Silver in this Australian adventure film--and if anything, Newton is even more out of control this time around than he'd been in the earlier picture. Paying only lip service to the Robert Louis Stevenson original, the film is made up of several marginally related episodes. In the first, Silver rescues a governor's daughter, managing to save the day and crooked line his own pockets in the process. In the second, Long John quells a mutiny and prevents his young friend Jim Hawkins (Kit Taylor) from having to walk the plank. And in the third, Long John and Jim arrive at Treasure Island, where they're forced to duke it out with the minions of Silver's old enemy Mendoza (Lloyd Burrell). Connie Gilchrist costars as Purity, Long John's on-and-off pubkeeper sweetheart. Long John Silver was later sliced up into three separate half-hours and released to TV as part of the 26-episode Long John Silver TV series, which of course also starred Robert "Arr, matey!" Newton. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi
- Starring:
- Robert Newton, Kit Taylor, (more)
- 1946
Produced, directed and scripted by Peter Ustinov (who did not star), Secret Flight was released in Great Britain in 1946, but not distributed in the U.S. until 1951 -- at which time it was panned as being out-of-date! The fact-based screenplay details the efforts of five dedicated British scientists to develop Radar and other preventative measures on the eve of WW II. The five "boffins" are played by Ralph Richardson, Raymond Huntley, John Laurie, Ernest Jay and David Tomlinson. Some excitement is engendered when a test pilot (Richard Attenborough) cooperates with the scientists' remote-control airflight experiments. Given the film's sober treatment of certain British wartime military maneuvers, it is surprising that Peter Ustinov frequently chooses to depict the scientists as Dr. Watson-style comic figures. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi
- Starring:
- Ralph Richardson, Raymond Huntley, (more)
- 1945
That daring pulp-novel detective Sexton Blake is back again in The Echo Murders. David Farrar stars as Blake, a Sherlock Holmes wannabe who takes on a gang of Nazi spies. While solving a series of baffling murders, Blake is captured and beaten by the bad guys, but emerges from his ordeal none the worse for wear and with hardly a crease in his trousers. In one scene, our hero uses acid to burn off the ropes that bind his hands, miraculously doing no harm whatsoever to his wrists. Of interest is the presence in the cast of future British leading man Dennis Price, who like David Farrar seems to be grateful to have the work. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi
- Starring:
- David Farrar, Dennis Price, (more)
- 1944
The title character in Meet Sexton Blake was created in 1893 as a way of cashing in on the immense popularity of Sherlock Holmes. This 1944 film opens with a bizarre and intriguing murder. Late one night along the London waterfront, a man is desperately tugging at the hand of another man -- a corpse, the audience soon discovers. There clearly is something very important about the dead man's hand, as the living man goes so far as to take out a saw and start removing it. Soon after achieving his prize, he falls from a bridge to his own death. The body is hauled aboard a passing ship, and when they search the body they discover the grisly severed hand. Blake is soon on the scene, using his keen powers of detection to determine that the hand belonged to a photographer from another country. Blake retires to his digs, but it's not long before a new client appears at his door. By coincidence, this man -- an arms manufacturer -- wants Blake to investigate the death of a friend, who just happens to have been a foreign photographer. Blake and his assistant Tinker delve into the case, which leads them to a mysterious villain named Slant Eyes and an espionage plot involving a new alloy for use in airplanes that is of enormous value to both sides in the war. ~ Craig Butler, Rovi
