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Category:    Home > Reviews > Comedy > Dating > Relationships > Mystery > Supernatural > Murder > Slapstick > Robbery > Romance > Goodbye To All That (2012/MPI/IFC Films DVD)/The Maltese Bippy (1969)/Quick! Before It Melts (1964)/Three Bites Of The Apple (1966/MGM/Warner Archive DVDs)

Goodbye To All That (2012/MPI/IFC Films DVD)/The Maltese Bippy (1969)/Quick! Before It Melts (1964)/Three Bites Of The Apple (1966/MGM/Warner Archive DVDs)



Picture: C/C+/C+/C+ Sound: C+ Extras: C-/C-/D/D Films: C



PLEASE NOTE: The DVDs here (save Goodbye) are now only available from Warner Bros. through their Warner Archive series and can be ordered from the link below.



Here are four comedies that do not totally work, but the makers were trying for the most part...



Angus MacLaughlan's Goodbye To All That (2012) gives us a 30+ year old guy (Paul Schneider) who has just been dumped by his wife who can't take the relationship anymore, leaving him to go looking for another woman. I wanted to like this, but he was so annoying, I could zee why she filed papers. There actually are some good moments here, but more for a drama because nothing here was funny or memorable. Anna Camp, Amy Sedaris, Melanie Lynskey and Heather Graham are among the cast trying, but this never works much.



Norman Panama's The Maltese Bippy (1969) tries to capitalize on the huge hit success of Laugh-In (MGM needed another hit) with Rowan & Martin playing guys trying to make a movie, but land up getting involved with a bizarre series of murderers and people acting wild, some of whom may be real life supernatural monsters! Carol Lynley, Robert Reed, Julie Newmar, Fritz Weaver, Mildred Natwick and a cast of solid character actors show up, but the comedy is repetitive, ridiculous and not up to the wit or rapid-fire cleverness of the duo's TV show. This is for kids at best and almost a cult item, so it should be on DVD just the same.



Delbert Mann's Quick! Before It Melts (1964) has Robert Morse and George Maharis looking for fun and woman despite being sent to the arctic for work. Morse's fiancee (a pre-Batgirl Yvonne Craig) has a would-be father-in-law that hates her and is responsible for the trip he does not want to take. James Gregory plays another convincing military man, the underrated Michael Constantine is a Soviet scientist and Anjanette Comer is the distraction Morse never expected.


Some of this is amusing and good, plus I had a few chuckles. But it is too lite for its own good despite the talents involved. Add that Craig is as sexy as any of the women (making any conflict hard to believe) and an average film results.



Finally we have Alvin Ganzer's Three Bites Of The Apple (1966) with David McCallum (the original Man From U.N.C.L.E.) as a tour bus guide when he reluctantly makes a big chunk of cash at a local casino, which gets the attention of sexy Sylvia Koshina, who starts following him all over the place. The lite romanic parts are not bad, if overdone, but then her crime partner shows up and this becomes a would-be thriller. Tammy Grimes is one of the bus customers, underused here and this becomes about not much except seeing good actors in a film not certain of what it is doing. The cover art is a take-off of the board game Monopoly. If only the film was that fun.



The anamorphically enhanced 1.85 X 1 image on That is the newest shoot on the list by 43 years, but it is the softest performer throughout with poor detail and color that gets in the way of the performers, while the remaining films are here in anamorphically enhanced 2.35 X 1 image presentations shot in real 35mm anamorphic Panavision and developed in MetroColor that hold up better than you might think. Not that the prints are always perfect, as there are point where age, wear, dirt and minor artifacts show, but they are not bad or much.


The lossy Dolby Digital 5.1 on That has some moments where it has the cleanest & clearest sonics because it is a newer recording, but it is also not always well mixed, is dialogue-based and even quiet a few times. Music is responsible for half the surrounds, so the lossy Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono on the rest of the films comes across surprisingly good for their age and sound pretty clear. The only extras are Original Theatrical Trailers on That and Bippy.



To order all of the Warner Archive DVDs, go to this link for them and many more great web-exclusive releases at:


https://www.warnerarchive.com/



- Nicholas Sheffo


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