Even though it’s executed
with obvious craftsmanship and intelligence, The Carey Treatment suffers from a lack of novelty and substance,
which isn’t helped by the jagged narrative rhythms that were presumably
transposed from the Michael Crichton novel upon which the film is based. The
best Crichton yarns have such fascinating underlying ideas that storytelling
hiccups don’t matter, but The Carey
Treatment is far from being one of Crichton’s best. James Coburn stars as
Dr. Peter Carey, a swaggering pathologist newly arrived at a Boston hospital.
Quickly shacking up with beautiful Dr. Georgia Hightower (Jennifer O’Neill),
Carey springs into action when his old friend, Dr. David Tao (James Hong), is
arrested for allegedly botching an illegal abortion that resulted in the death
of a young woman with important society connections. The story gets confusing
when Carey simultaneously investigates whether Tao actually performed the
abortion and looks into the sordid
lifestyle of Roger Hudson (Michael Blodgett), a pretty-boy masseur with a bad
habit of knocking up young women. Adding other dimensions to the story are
Carey’s fraught relationships with a diligent policeman (Pat Hingle), a senior
physician (Dan O’Herlihy), and various other characters.
Director Blake Edwards,
skewing toward the thriller side of his style but still lacing the picture with
the sort of urbane dialogue found in his many comedy films, handles individual
scenes effectively but can’t quite get a handle on the overarching storyline.
It doesn’t help that the movie constantly puts Carey into antihero mode,
because logic suffers when Carey does things like trapping a college girl in
his car and then taking her for a terrifying high-speed ride along a cliff in
order to extract information. Even though Carey’s ostensibly doing everything
in the service of justice, he’s such an arrogant prick that it’s hard to root
for him. That said, the performances are generally quite entertaining, with
Alex Drier standing out as an eccentric blueblood whom Carey interrogates. And,
for what it’s worth, O’Neill is beguilingly pretty. The Carey Treatment is murky and ultimately forgettable, but it’s
pleasant enough for a single casual viewing. (Available at
WarnerArchive.com)
The Carey Treatment: FUNKY
3 comments:
Wow, Blake Edwards directing James Coburn?? Grooovy baby, but your review tells me I should pass on this one...;-)
Six years on (?):
Masseuse is a French word, for a woman who gives massages.
A man who performs this task is a masseur.
Better late than never …
The story I heard was that the head of MGM, James Aubrey, cut the shooting schedule and then edited the film differently than Blake Edwards wanted. James Coburn told Sam Peckenpah that Aubrey destroyed the film. Ironically, Aubrey did the same thing to Peckenpah on Pat Garret and Billy The Kid.
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