Today’s Blind Spot review is a special one for many reasons. To begin with Manda and I had a very fun podcast on the film where we ended up reacting to the famous Daisy Ad from 1964- the same year our movie Seven Days in May came out.
Also it is of note because this review marks my 100th entry in the blind spot series. That means since I first started in January of 2016 I have covered 100 films for 100 months and what a fun adventure it has been! My original review was for Blade Runner and I was nicer to it than I would be now (it’s not for me) but that’s part of the learning experience of this project is gathering confidence on my opinions on classic films and learning how to convey those feelings as coherently as possible. Now on to 100 more!
With Seven Days in May this was a bit of a wild card when I selected it for this month’s blind spot. I had never heard of it but I noticed a bunch of my friends had rated it highly so I decided to give it a go. I’m so glad I did. This is an absolutely terrific political thriller that continually surprised me at each turn.
I think what was the most surprising was to have a character like Burt Lancaster’s General Scott commit outright treason with no real vindication was shocking. He has his reasons for trying to train a coup on President Lyman, (played by the great Frederic March) but he still does it and begins training an elite group of soldiers to overthrow the government.
Every part of this film is outstanding including the acting from Lancaster, Kirk Douglas (as our man of virtue hero) and March. The writing is also excellent with the tension between Scott and Lyman as they both try to plead their case. It’s hard to imagine what it must have been like for audiences in Cold War America to watch a film like this. They certainly would have been more sympathetic to Scott’s position. He believes if they sign this treaty the Russians will attack and kill over 100 million people (he states that statistic in one of the confrontations with Lyman.) From his perspective he’s the hero trying to save Americans and Lyman is the fool. However, Lyman tells him he has to use the tools given to us to fight the treaty. A military overthrow will only embolden Russia more.
Anyway, the tension grows especially for Douglas who can’t believe a heroic man like General Scott could be planning treason. Ava Gardner is under-used in her role in this but aside from that Seven Days in May is a tight, well-made, engaging piece of filmmaking and I highly recommend it.
Smile Worthy
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“I was nicer to (Blade Runner) than I would be now”
Does that have anything to do with reading the book Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? Because my reaction to Blade Runner (the director’s cut) the first time I watched it was to feel strangely empty as if I had watched something hollow and incomplete.
When I watched all versions (except the work print, San Diego version and network-television-bastardized cut), it felt far more complete and satisfying to me by the end. I felt like I knew the characters more, and was more fully drawn into the unique world they created and the storyline and themes.
However after reading the book I realized I will probably never be able to watch any version without going back to my initial reaction. The reason why I had it is because the movie in every version is nothing but the watered-down dregs of that beautifully-written novel that oozes complex fully-developed philosophical themes that spring naturally out of both the fully drawn characters and the vivid and instantly evocative setting that I would sink into in every reading forgetting the outside world. Its only weakness is that Dick clearly had no idea how to write violence – the extended action scenes of the movie are reduced to barely a sentence with all the conflicts between Deckard and the androids being resolved in quick bursts that are never satisfying or interesting. I would still take that over the ultra-graphic eye-gouging and impaling of The Final Cut, though.
No I’ve never read the book. I’m just more comfortable having different opinions on classic films than I was then. I wasn’t even a critic then