(Richard Reeves) barges in with a passkey, a bottle and bad in- tentions, but gets a sense of the triviality of her troubles when Peter admits her slum apart- ment is luxurious compared to “the camps.” Back on the street, Peter hooks up with an- other downtrodden angel in stripper Tanya (Robin Ray- mond)—her topical billing is “she’s atomic!”—who turns out to be a fellow Hungarian, albeit with an Americanized, greasy- haired hood of a brother (Joe Turkel) ready to turn the refu- gee in to keep the cops away from his big deals. Only when it gets to the UN building (which Shane was allowed to film in, unlike Alfred Hitchcock for NORTH BY NORTHWEST) does the film become overly didactic, with the pained, previously un- communicative Peter suddenly becoming eloquent in his second language (unlike Raymond, Gassman doesn’t even try a few words of Hungarian) and deliv- ers a slightly too on-the-nose speech to the empty seats. Shot by Biroc with a score by Leith Stevens, this is neo-noir, using its chase-through-the-night for- mat to explore a topical, pertinent issue; Grahame, credibly down- trodden yet appealing (and tech- nically a bad girl since she does try to steal that coat), had played a similar part in CROSSFIRE, a noir which uses a thriller format to indict anti-semitism. Extras include the original theatrical trailers and a bonus TV show, “The Payoff,” a 1956 TV episode (from the anthology skein known as either THE FORD THEATRE or ALL STAR THEATRE) with Howard Duff as PI Johnny Abel and Janet Blair (BURN, WITCH, BURN!) as the client: it’s a slight runaround, scripted by Blake Edwards seemingly as a dry run for PETER GUNN, directed by John Meredyth Lucas.
DRIVE-IN CULT CLASSICS VOL. 3: B MOVIE COLLECTION
1968-1979, BCI Eclipse, $9.98, DVD
THE BABYSITTER 1969, 75m 22s
WEEKEND WITH THE BABYSITTER 1970, 92m 15s THE PINK ANGELS 1971, 88m 44s BLOOD MANIA 1970, 80m 12s SINGLE ROOM FURNISHED 1968, 98m 18s VAN NUYS BLVD. 1979, 93m 40s THE POM POM GIRLS 1976, 89m MALIBU BEACH 1978, 89m 44s By Bill Cooke
Crown International Pictures
was like a shabbier cousin of American International, prolifi- cally grinding out gritty exploi- tation during the heyday of drive-ins and sketchy hardtops. Roughly the equivalent of two dusk-till-dawn shows, this bar- gain pack of eight Crown “jew- els” is the third such compilation to come from now-defunct BCI Eclipse (all subsequently reissued by new rights holder, Mill Creek Entertainment); and at roughly a-dollar-and-some-change per film, it’s the most affordable way to sample the company’s weird output.
There is no overarching theme to this collection, though individual flipper discs strive to be complementary. First up is a politically incorrect double-bill of May/September romance, begin- ning with THE BABYSITTER, which is the earliest and only black-and-white title in the set. The film’s writer and producer, George E. Carey, stars as George Maxwell, a middle-aged attorney growing increasingly uptight with
US insert poster with Ontario Censor Board rating sticker attached.
his frigid wife because she only wants to play bridge and have “drinkies” with the rich and influ- ential. Enter the Maxwells’ teen- age babysitter, Candy Wilson (Patricia Wymer), who’s more than willing to show George a good time, from teaching him how to eat a fast-food hamburger (oh man, is this guy square!) to topless frolicking in the pool and, finally, R-rated sex in a hammock. “What are you—a hippie?” asks a bewildered George. “I only want to laugh... to have fun... to feel things,” she replies. “I want to be free!” Conflict arises when an- other hippie chick (played by nudie-film fixture Kathy Williams), wants her psychopathic biker
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