1965: movies, magazines & Sylvia

My 900th post !  I can go on if you want - shall we aim for 1,000 ? !

I was down in the garage and pulled out my bound copies of "Films & Filming" magazine for 1965, along with some other magazines from then, and suddenly I am 19 again, living in my room in North London, going to the cinema a lot, these magazines were my companions then, but that was the year I met new friends and began to move around the city a lot .... 

As per other posts here (Magazines label) "Films & Filming" was that essential magazine, not as lowbrow as "Photoplay" or as highbrow as "Sight & Sound" that was well just essential for us then - I even worked there in the '70s for a year and got to know the owner, editor and staff, and had a review or two published myself. Its glory years though was from 1954 when it began through the '60s and '70s, it was a spent force by 1980 but limped on for a while, after the suicide of the owner. 

I like browsing through the back copies, so evocative of those days, a fascinating record of that time, and they are crammed with interesting features and photos - like that interview with Delon (above) on his first years in cinemal and those articles like "Joan Crawford, 40 years a queen" or "Susan Hayward, the Brooklyn Bernhardt" .... and the new pop movies like HELP!, below. essential for young movie buffs then!
 

 Ditto MOVIE and some Sight & Sound issues ....see Magazine label for the contents of this terrific 1965 issue of MOVIE.

Julie & Roland Curram in DARLING

Here is a delicious piece of Hollywood product from 1965: SLYVIA, one of Joe Levine's efforts to make another Monroe out of Carroll Baker.

SYLVIA – One of those Joe E Levine [the Mogul of the Mediocre] mid’60s melodramas which the studios were turning out in a desperate attempt to get with it as the Swinging 60s took off, but ended up looking more dated than ever. Thank heavens the like of BONNIE AND CLYDE were just around the corner. 

Here, old hand Gordon Douglas directs Carroll Baker (in her Harlow phase) as the poetess Sylvia West who is engaged to Peter Lawford (playing a sleazeball as usual) who hires private eye George Maharis to track down the background of the mysterious Sylvia. This is quite enjoyable actually as cue cameos from Edmund O’Brien, Joanne Dru as an ex-hooker who married well, Ann Sothern hilariously overblown, Aldo Ray as Sylvia’s abusive father, Viveca Lindfors as a possibly lesbian librarian, Nancy Kovack as a brassy showgirl and Lola Diamond, a very scary drag queen. Baker is quite nice here as the rose-growing poet untouched by her sordid past, and there is a perfect theme song by Paul Anka. Ok, its trash but in a good way. Its in black and white with that nice mid-60s feel, but maybe should have been in colour. Maharis & Baker look good together, it was one of the last gasps of the old Hollywood studios before that new mid-60s came in. SYLVIA is not as bad as Carroll's HARLOW or THE OSCAR or THE LOVE MACHINE - all at Trash label. Carroll, over 80 now, had a long career, we like some of her European giallo thrillers, particularly with Jean Sorel - she wrote some racy novels too!  THE CARPETBAGGERS is a great Trashy pleasure too now. 

Main 1965 films for me are DARLING, REPULSION, WHATS NEW PUSSYCAT?, HELP!, SANDRA (VAGUE STELLE DELL'ORSA), DR ZHIVAGO, LE BAMBOLE, MARRIAGE ITALIAN STYLE, LE BONHEUR, SHOP ON THE HIGH STREET, THE KNACK, YOUNG CASSIDY, A HIGH WIND IN JAMAICA, and the fun of SHE, SYLVIA, THE PLEASURE GIRLS, THE YELLOW ROLLS ROYCE and the trash of HARLOW and WHERE LOVE HAS GONE ....