cult film freak: hugh o'brian

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Written by James M. Tate / 2/12/2024 / No comments / beverly garland , edmond o'brien , fifties , film noir or melodrama , hugh o'brian , jazz-score , laurette luez , luther adler , mystery , neville brand , race against time , rudolph maté' , thriller , virginia lee

EDMOND O'BRIEN RACES THROUGH THE CLASSIC FILM NOIR 'D.O.A.'

<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjdDX4nhHupyCn_IlsmPtDOB0KyUkd8TQwt3HWQ8rFF9IyLMyS6F3yhfUDATt_gHV6xcFeraN7tUDvv0rsFwpeKfzd8PdcqE6RDrR-0ET3GeKIWJ2WTJ8PujA6DA7lRmsNukJnu3Jwg9EcnQhc_UgCPCSScnYcMplgsX1WLOxniwN8g9iFzNTX07lsl-iXa/s2076/Screen%20Shot%202024-02-22%20at%208.43.38%20PM.jpeg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1288" data-original-width="2076" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjdDX4nhHupyCn_IlsmPtDOB0KyUkd8TQwt3HWQ8rFF9IyLMyS6F3yhfUDATt_gHV6xcFeraN7tUDvv0rsFwpeKfzd8PdcqE6RDrR-0ET3GeKIWJ2WTJ8PujA6DA7lRmsNukJnu3Jwg9EcnQhc_UgCPCSScnYcMplgsX1WLOxniwN8g9iFzNTX07lsl-iXa/s16000/Screen%20Shot%202024-02-22%20at%208.43.38%20PM.jpeg"></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Title: D.O.A. Year: 1959 Director: Rudolph Maté Stars: Edmond O'Brien Rating: ****</td></tr></tbody></table>For one of the most literally deadly-serious film noirs ever made, when accountant Edmond O'Brien goes from his L. A. office to a San Francisco hotel for a vacation, there are cheesy wolf-whistles added whenever a beautiful woman walks by, starting at the lobby and then upstairs where a salesman convention rages — but for O'Brien's Frank Bigelow the good times don't roll very long... Although the rudimentary suarez is like a short film all its own, which is what distinguishes D. O. A. since it's really three pictures in one: the first peaking at a noisy jazz club where O'Brien's distracted by gorgeous and rich, blonde jazz-freak Virginia Lee while a hooded mystery man puts something in his drink, causing O'Brien to wake up feeling even worse than the hangover he'd have anyway...

beverly garland, edmond o'brien, fifties, film noir or melodrama, hugh o'brian, jazz-score, laurette luez, luther adler, mystery, neville brand, race against time, rudolph maté', thriller, virginia lee

EDMOND O'BRIEN RACES THROUGH THE CLASSIC FILM NOIR 'D.O.A.'

Title: D.O.A. Year: 1959 Director: Rudolph Maté Stars: Edmond O'Brien Rating: **** For one of the most literally deadly-serious film noi...

VAL GUEST'S 'KILLER FORCE' AKA 'THE DIAMOND MERCENARIES'

<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-dQUiEcVzuRVnsRn6tgBdHcS-XkYuyj5zTL16iySu_blm5VXMUzM3ZeHkIeTEOTJdZyymcsU2g41RCQCmZlD_9Akfudl1imTnleu0IBunIDIsGl36c-Xn9X07IxrQvNiGqO-FDK5uy0MhntOlik8yCrHAaPp7kW2GQetlEz8W_MFJNBetTPmLLFxMGam7/s1358/411102006_1853721855056982_3066518112935668379_n.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="742" data-original-width="1358" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-dQUiEcVzuRVnsRn6tgBdHcS-XkYuyj5zTL16iySu_blm5VXMUzM3ZeHkIeTEOTJdZyymcsU2g41RCQCmZlD_9Akfudl1imTnleu0IBunIDIsGl36c-Xn9X07IxrQvNiGqO-FDK5uy0MhntOlik8yCrHAaPp7kW2GQetlEz8W_MFJNBetTPmLLFxMGam7/s16000/411102006_1853721855056982_3066518112935668379_n.jpg"></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Titles: KILLER FORCE/THE DIAMOND MERCENARIES Year: 1976 Rating: ***</td></tr></tbody></table>The only thing more pathetic than Peter Fonda's fake beard is that <a href="http://www.cultfilmfreaks.com/search/label/val%20guest">director Val Guest</a> had almost no career after making some of <a href="http://www.cultfilmfreaks.com/search/label/hammer%20films">Hammer</a> Films' best work, from horror to war to science-fiction to (like this) crime thrillers... And while KILLER FORCE is no Hammer there's Dracula himself, <a href="http://www.cultfilmfreaks.com/search/label/christopher%20lee">Christopher Lee</a>, within a group of DIAMOND MERCENARIES in a South African desert where the beautiful-vastness of LAWRENCE OF ARABIA meets the jeep-leaping potential of THE RAT PATROL, and, either indoors or out, Lee's the most cold-blooded villain (killing perfectly good hooker Marina Christelis for no apparent reason) in a movie all about villains...

action, body count, christopher lee, ensemble, exploitation, heist, hugh o'brian, maud adams, mission, o.j. simpson, peter fonda, team-up, telly savalas, val guest

VAL GUEST'S 'KILLER FORCE' AKA 'THE DIAMOND MERCENARIES'

Titles: KILLER FORCE/THE DIAMOND MERCENARIES Year: 1976 Rating: *** The only thing more pathetic than Peter Fonda's fake beard is that d...

DON SIEGEL DIRECTS JOHN WAYNE'S FINAL FILM 'THE SHOOTIST'

<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgeBZmfvcl4Ud5k2Z43gzBsfrFvI2g0fOXN2PpbQJhw1ed7lMVmb-aNIFjEhwAIcobYkvZ7uAckiPuhCH56hUuLO-pJIiDpKiVsN7R78OYsa4wYTyqoaErnMOqige4lATtRMEzVNGO-Eb5iO29L2lIhyArQgiahecjt3Fj0_HR-x1K-89WLu4JnNWg2Zg/s1945/Screen%20Shot%202022-06-20%20at%202.33.27%20PM.jpeg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1083" data-original-width="1945" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgeBZmfvcl4Ud5k2Z43gzBsfrFvI2g0fOXN2PpbQJhw1ed7lMVmb-aNIFjEhwAIcobYkvZ7uAckiPuhCH56hUuLO-pJIiDpKiVsN7R78OYsa4wYTyqoaErnMOqige4lATtRMEzVNGO-Eb5iO29L2lIhyArQgiahecjt3Fj0_HR-x1K-89WLu4JnNWg2Zg/s16000/Screen%20Shot%202022-06-20%20at%202.33.27%20PM.jpeg"></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Title: THE SHOOTIST Stars: John Wayne, Hugh O'Brien Year: 1976 Rating: ***1/2</td></tr></tbody></table>Don Siegel's THE SHOOTIST seems perfectly suited as John Wayne's final movie since it's about the final week of an infamous gunslinger dying of cancer (given the news by a doctor played by James Stewart); yet there was a string of slightly younger actors considered before a surprisingly healthy-looking Wayne took the now legendary role...Where his acting is solid, true, even mellow despite the fact he's about to die while almost getting killed at the same time, contrasting with a horribly-miscast Ron Howard as the whiny son of Lauren Bacall, running a bed-and-breakfast where Wayne's holed-up, getting sporadic THIS IS YOUR LIFE drop-ins from various character-actors...

don siegel, exploitation, harry morgan, hugh o'brian, james stewart, john wayne, lauren bacall, richard boone, ron howard, seventies, western

DON SIEGEL DIRECTS JOHN WAYNE'S FINAL FILM 'THE SHOOTIST'

Title: THE SHOOTIST Stars: John Wayne, Hugh O'Brien Year: 1976 Rating: ***1/2 Don Siegel's THE SHOOTIST seems perfectly suited as Jo...

JOHN WAYNE & KIRK DOUGLAS IN PREMINGER'S 'IN HARM'S WAY'

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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Kirk Douglas with Jill Haworth and John Wayne in the poster for IN HARM'S WAY Year: 1965</td></tr>
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In 1965, the same year stylistic and artistic director Otto Preminger would provide a stylistically artistic comeback with the B&W mystery BUNNY LAKE IS MISSING, he directed an anti-war film starring John Wayne and the recently-departed Kirk Douglas, which is one of the few movies not a John Wayne or Kirk Douglas Picture but a Preminger Film they happened to star in... 
 
Very different for The Duke in that, set in Pearl Harbor, beginning with the last jazz-soaked night of oblivious peace, when the wife of yet unseen Kirk Douglas and her lover (a sexy Barbara Bouchet and Air Force stud Hugh O'Brian) are frolicking at the beach, IN HARM'S WAY is not gung-ho or overly patriotic but more cerebral and cautious in tone, which fits Douglas's forte after PATHS OF GLORY late in the previous decade... 
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi-huJkZxSp8RfpDY_FD3lT0iSGyrKAa2Comdvv1tzWHTCB0jc-_UB-Edip0imRCbfDPqvKGLbq67b6vMYOqUb8W7ZHRisNXP2oGOMBFl7QyLZOrMo6PdXglOwdhq-oVEtwb3H1iOj1xH5Y/s1600/86802841_909966779432499_302764223358828544_o.jpeg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="640" data-original-width="1382" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi-huJkZxSp8RfpDY_FD3lT0iSGyrKAa2Comdvv1tzWHTCB0jc-_UB-Edip0imRCbfDPqvKGLbq67b6vMYOqUb8W7ZHRisNXP2oGOMBFl7QyLZOrMo6PdXglOwdhq-oVEtwb3H1iOj1xH5Y/s1600/86802841_909966779432499_302764223358828544_o.jpeg"></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Hugh O'Brian and Barbara Bouchet in IN HARM'S WAY</td></tr>
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The camera glides around a slew of characters in various scenes where eventually Wayne, who was blamed for the sake of the Pearl Harbor attack needing scapegoats, later has a chance for a comeback — despite the fact he did nothing wrong in the first place... 
 
Meanwhile, during the attack are random scenes on the harbor, and while bombs splash the surrounding sea, we never do see, only hear, the attacking planes. Making this one of the more low budget war pictures featuring The Duke, and Douglas.