Rhapsodies

This week I decided to do another round of caper films.

The first of the two was The Anderson Tapes from 1971 starring Sean Connery featuring Christopher Walken.’s film debut. (He’s so young  here, I didn’t even recognize him until he opened his mouth.)

Connery plays Duke Anderson, a burgler coming out of prison after ten years, for not ratting out a mobster. With the mobs backing, he plans on robbing the luxury apartments his girlfriend lives in. I wasn’t particularly impressed by the heist itself or most of the movie for that matter, but it had some interesting bits that made up for this. The first is much more a film about surveillance then it is a caper. Anderson, and people connected to Anderson, are constantly being monitored by various groups at completely cross purposes, the IRS, the FBI and a private investigator working for Anderson’s Girlfriend’s sugar daddy. So much of the film is done from the perspective of the surveillance teams. In many ways it felt like a precurser to what Copella would do much better in the Conversation. The other thing I liked was how the caper was treated in the narration. The story kept going back and fourth between Anderson and his crew committing the crime (essentially going door to door like reverse trick or treaters) and the the victims being interviewed by the police. This was probably to add to the suspense (and pick up the pace on what was probably a slow all day affair) But added quite a bit to what was pretty much a by the numbers caper film

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I confess that the only times I had ever come across our second movie, Basil Dearden‘s League of Gentleman, were the number of times I stumbled over it when doing searches for the situation comedy of the same name. (or even The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen.) I was also hearing about it because of the recent death of Sir Richard Attenborough.
Lieutenant-Colonel Norman Hyde played by Jack Hawkins is inspired by an American to pull off the perfect crime to do so he brings together a group of disgraced former officers to pull it off with military precision and things go perfectly until the very end.

Seeing the League of Gentlemen for the first time I can see exactly why it has deserved so much tribute. This is a movie that virtually serves as the template for most caper films up to now as we are first introduced to the team in great detail, watch as the plan is put together the preparations and made and finally the heist which goes with clockwork precision. Every little detail is shown to us even the mistakes which lead to their eventual downfall.

All in all this is a wonderful tight ensemble film with a wonderfully dry sense of humor which I will gladly add to my film library. It’s taking in all the little details that make it all the fun! Keep your eyes open for an early performance from Oliver Reed as a flamboyantly camp actor.