The Triple Echo (1972)

          Adapted from a short story by H.E. Bates, offbeat WWII drama The Triple Echo would be easier to swallow had it been extrapolated from real events, because the central premise is as far-fetched as the relationships that drive the storyline. Set in the English countryside, the picture concerns Alice (Glenda Jackson), the lonely wife of a soldier being held prisoner overseas by the Japanese. One day, a young solider named Barton (Brian Deacon) wanders onto her remote farm, so she offers him food and lodging. He’s a deserter. Over the course of several weeks together, they fall in love, but Alice worries that neighbors might discover Barton’s presence and shatter their romantic idyll. She contrives the peculiar idea of disguising Barton as her sister, “Jill,” by way of cross-dressing. This works until yet another soldier wanders onto the farm. Arriving astride a tank, he’s a bearish sergeant played by Oliver Reed. (The character never gets a proper name.) Improbably, the sergeant becomes obsessed with “Jill,” and even more improbably, “Jill” accepts an invitation to a military party even though it’s plain the sergeant expects more from “her” than a dance. All spongy narrative contrivances and inorganic motivations, he story wends its way toward a strange type of romantic tragedy, with the gloomy pastures of the hilly countryside serving as some sort of visual metaphor representing loneliness.

          As directed by Michael Apted, whose work is always competent, The Triple Echo moves along as well as it can, given the episodic and incredible storyline. One feels the strain of screenwriter Robin Chapman stretching Bates’ vignette to feature length, and what might have seemed believable on the page is less so onscreen. Jackson attacks behavior and dialogue with her usual consummate skill, but she’s far too chilly to provide the level of emotion necessary for putting the illusion of The Triple Echo across. Likewise, Deacon is a cipher at best and a simpering twit at worst, because his performance gets more and more unsteady as the stakes of the narrative rise. Reed, as was sometimes his wont, barrels through the picture with more energy than nuance, so while he’s credible as an overbearing monster, he steamrolls past the central problem of making viewers believe the sergeant can’t see that “Jill” is a man. Other shortcomings include pedestrian camerawork and some truly atrocious music during upbeat passages—overwrought and twee was not the way to go for scoring what is essentially a tragic chamber piece.

The Triple Echo: FUNKY

1980 Week: Coal Miner’s Daughter

          Late in Coal Miner’s Daughter, the acclaimed biopic of country-music legend Loretta Lynn, there’s a telling remark about fame: “Gettin’ here is one thing, and bein’ here’s another.” That the line is spoken not by Lynn, played to Oscar-winning perfection by Sissy Spacek, but rather by her husband, Mooney, portrayed by Tommy Lee Jones, speaks volumes. In this particular story, the rise from dirt-poor roots to extraordinary success is hardest on Mooney, because once his wife’s career takes flight—thanks to years of hard work by both members of the couple—Mooney becomes superfluous in ways he never expected. This insightful take on the rags-to-riches formula that’s usually employed for biopics about music stars is just one of several commendable aspects of Coal Miner’s Daughter. Even though the film is quite ordinary in many ways, from the unavoidably predictable storyline to the way the title character is all but sanctified, delicate nuances of character and regional identity give Coal Miner’s Daughter an appealing sense of authenticity.

          Opening in rural Kentucky circa the late 1940s, the picture introduces Loretta as the dutiful 15-year-old daughter of Ted Webb (played by real-life rock singer Levon Helm), a hardworking coal miner and father of eight kids. Life in the tiny mountain village of Butcher Hollow is hard, so when fast-talking World War II veteran Oliver “Mooney” Lynn woos Loretta with dancing and romance, she’s quickly swept off her feet. Marriage and pregnancy follow. Eventually, Mooney relocates his growing family to the city so he can find work, and he encourages Loretta to develop her singing talents by performing at honky-tonks. Though she misses her people in Butcher Hollow, Loretta realizes she’s got a gift for entertaining audiences, and things start falling into place. Mooney finances a recording session that produces a hit single, Loretta gets invited to perform on the Grand Ole Opry, and reigning country-music queen Patsy Cline (Beverly D’Angelo) becomes Loretta’s best friend, mentor, and touring partner. Despite exhaustion, marital tensions, and tragedies, Lynn soldiers on to become a chart-topping superstar.

          As written by Tom Rickman (from Lynn’s best-selling autobiography) and directed by Michael Apted, a versatile Brit who has spent his career toggling between documentaries and fiction films, Coal Miner’s Daughter feels heartfelt from start to finish. The scenes in Kentucky are especially good, with beautifully constructed accents and costumes and sets used to convey you-are-there verisimilitude. Although material depicting life on the road is pedestrian, the combination of D’Angelo’s sass and Spacek’s fortitude amply demonstrates the indignities and sacrifices that women had to make for music careers in the ’50s. Jones also delivers one of his liveliest performances, mostly suppressing his natural surliness in favor of good-ol’-boy warmth. Underscoring all of this, of course, is the fact that Lynn’s early life really did unfold like a country song—she’s the real deal, and the same can be said of this film about her amazing journey.

Coal Miner’s Daughter: GROOVY

The Squeeze (1977)

          Produced in England and featuring the same sort of seedy criminals who pervade such UK crime classics as Get Carter (1971) and The Long Good Friday (1980), this slow burn of a picture boasts a terrific leading performance by Hollywood actor Stacy Keach—so long as you disregard his patchy version of a British accent—and a believably grimy tone. Keach plays Jim, a loser who drank himself out of a job as a police detective and botched his marriage in the process. When we meet him, he’s so far down the spiral that he gets arrested for public inebriation and thrown into a drunk tank, then walks out of jail the next day and heads for the nearest pub.

          Duty calls when gangsters kidnap Jim’s ex-wife, Jill (Carol White), and the young daughter she’s raising with her new husband, Foreman (Edward Fox). Foreman enlists Jim’s aid in tracking down the perpetrators, but in his sodden state, Jim is initially no match for brutal crime boss Vic (Stephen Boyd) and his brilliant but sociopathic underling, Keith (David Hemmings). Jim is captured while attempting to probe Vic’s estate, so Vic humiliates the would-be hero by having him beaten senseless, stripped naked, pumped full of booze, and then deposited back in his own neighborhood without a stitch of clothing. Meanwhile, Keith torments Jill under threat of harming her daughter, forcing her to strip for his goons and provide sexual favors. Bubbling under the whole affair is a blackmail scheme, because Foreman is an executive at an armored-car service, so instead of ransom, Vic demands help arranging a massive heist.

          What makes The Squeeze unique is the twist it provides on the usual crime-movie formula. Whereas most filmmakers would show a character like Jim making subtle moves as he prepares a climactic rescue, the folks behind The Squeeze show that Vic and his goons are fully aware of Jim’s machinations, but don’t consider him a threat because he’s such a wreck. And, for much of the movie’s running time, their assessment proves correct. Jim reacts to hardships by retreating into alcohol, even though he knows that innocent people will pay terrible prices for his choices. All of this dark drama is set to a driving and eerie score by David Hentschel, which pops with synthesizer-laden prog-rock flourishes. Had The Squeeze benefited from a sharper script, the grim concepts marbled through the story could have elevated the piece into rarified terrain. As is, the picture is an interesting near-miss containing several fine performances.

          In particular, Irish actor Boyd—appearing in one of his final films—gives a disquieting turn as an unsophisticated brute, employing his natural accent instead of hiding behind the Americanized speaking style he used during his Hollywood career. (Boyd is a long way from his vapid he-man turns in such widescreen epics as 1959’s Ben-Hur and 1964’s The Fall of the Roman Empire.) Hemmings and Keach deliver exemplary work, though each actor played similar notes in other films; debauched villains were a staple of Hemmings’ filmography dating back to Camelot (1967), and Keach’s definitive drunk-loser performance was in John Huston’s bleak drama Fat City (1972). Yet even if The Squeeze isn’t a defining moment for anyone involved, it’s executed with menace and skill, and it’s among the toughest pieces ever helmed by the prolific English director Michael Apted, who is generally best known for documentaries and sensitive melodramas.

The Squeeze: GROOVY

Agatha (1979)

          Elegant and smart, Agatha has so many virtues it should be a better movie, but a sloppy script and questionable casting get in the way of the film’s lush production values and sensitive performances. An imaginary exploration of what might have happened in 1926, when the internationally famous mystery novelist Agatha Christie disappeared for 12 days, the movie presents a complex intrigue involving adultery, deception, romance, and a wicked plan to kill someone using an offbeat weapon—obviously, the idea was to entangle Christie in a murder plot as ornate as those found in her books. Alas, the piece is more ambitious than successful, largely because the filmmakers fail to properly define Christie and the other main character, an American journalist working in England, before things get weird; thus, viewers are forever racing to catch up with what’s happening, which precludes any real emotional involvement in the storyline.

          Furthermore, leading lady Vanessa Redgrave, playing Christie, and leading man Dustin Hoffman, as the journalist, are mismatched aesthetically and artistically. While it’s refreshing to see a female star tower over her male counterpart, the duo lacks chemistry, and Redgrave’s spacey detachment feels natural while Hoffman’s affectation of globe-trotting sophistication feels contrived.

          The story proper begins when Englishwoman Christie has a quarrel with her awful husband (Timothy Dalton), who wants a divorce so he can marry his attractive secretary (Celia Gregory). Meanwhile, popular columnist Wally Stanton (Hoffman) has become infatuated with Christie, whom he saw from afar at a press conference. When a distraught Christie flees her home, Wally tracks her down to a spa, where she has registered under an alias. He also learns that the secretary is a guest there. Disguising his true identity, Wally courts Christie and determines she means to harm the secretary.

          As written by Kathleen Tynan and Arthur Hopcraft, Agatha wobbles indecisively between drama, romance, and thrills for much of its running time, thereby failing to excel in any of the three genres. Versatile director Michael Apted guides actors well (even though the geography of scenes is muddied by arty camera angles), and legendary cinematographer Vittorio Storaro elevates the material considerably with his luminous images. Both leading actors are strong, though they seem to be starring in totally different movies: Hoffman’s charming turn is all surface, while Redgrave’s intellectualized performance is all subtext. So, while Agatha has many admirable qualities, not least of which is a genuinely imaginative premise, the lack of a solid narrative foundation prevents these qualities from coalescing into a satisfying whole. (Available at WarnerArchive.com)

Agatha: FUNKY

That’ll Be the Day (1973) & Stardust (1974)

          That’ll Be the Day and its sequel, Stardust, collectively tell the life story of a fictional “British Invasion” musician named Jim MacLaine. Compelling and evocative, the films are substantially more insightful than most rock-star pictures—freed from the usual obligation to rehash familiar episodes from the lives of real people, these movies create a pastiche reflecting the life cycle common to every self-destructive superstar.

          As the Buddy Holly-referencing title suggests, That’ll Be the Day takes place during the ’50s. Jim (played by real-life rock singer David Essex) is a tough English kid with abandonment issues—Daddy skipped out when Jim was a wee lad—and dreams of emulating his favorite American rock stars. Jim drops out of school, gets odd jobs like working at a carnival, and bonds with another testosterone-crazed youth, Mike (played by Beatles drummer Ringo Starr). That’ll Be the Day comprises atmospheric but meandering scenes of the buddies brawling and carousing, juxtaposing Jim’s bachelor adventures with his family’s expectations that he’ll get a real job and settle down.

          As written by Ray Connolly, who also penned the sequel, That’ll Be the Day is more about vibe than story, and the lead character comes across as opaque since he’s still in the process of finding himself. Nonetheless, the costuming, dialogue, locations, and period details create a highly credible texture, so at its best, That’ll Be the Day feels like a documentary capturing the vibrant pre-Beatles era in working-class England. Essex and Starr are loose and natural, and the whole cast is stocked with solid British players. However, it’s the music that really energizes the movie, because the soundtrack features amazing tunes by the Beatles, Ray Charles, the Who and others, sometimes played in their original versions as background music, and sometimes performed onscreen by musicians including the Who’s drummer, Keith Moon.

          The follow-up movie, which picks up almost immediately after That’ll Be the Day ends, features a much stronger story, and appropriately so—Stardust dramatizes what happens when Jim and his mates in a band called the Stray Cats become Beatles-type rock stars, leading to the customary onslaught of drugs, groupies, sycophants, and villainous record-company executives. There’s a great deal of continuity between the pictures, even though That’ll Be the Day director Claude Whatham was replaced for Stardust by the proficient Michael Apted. Additionally, Essex’s performance gets deeper and more complicated as his character shifts from post-adolescent angst to rock-star ennui.

          In Stardust, Jim conquers the world with the Stray Cats, ditches the band for a solo career, and eventually becomes a messianic pop-culture figure. At his apex, Jim presents an epic rock opera as a blockbuster TV special, and the project’s success transforms him into a kind of living god for his fans. Being worshipped makes Jim feel detached from society, however, so by the end of the picture, he’s a millionaire recluse living in a European castle, wandering around in a drug-addled haze while managers and promoters tempt him with lucrative comeback offers.

          Seen out of context, Stardust might seem overly melodramatic because of how far it takes the character down the path of self-indulgence, but for viewers who observed Jim’s troubled youth in That’ll Be the Day, the course he charts in Stardust seems believably sad. Once again, the music is great, with tunes by the Lovin’ Spoonful and the Righteous Brothers intermingling with perfectly crafted originals. Better still, the ending is a monster, so Stardust belongs to a select group of sequels that actually improve upon their predecessors.

That’ll Be the Day: GROOVY

Stardust: RIGHT ON