The Story of Mankind (1957)'s comments

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fragilelabyrinth

I would give this 2 out of 5 stars. And those 2 stars are Ronald Colman and Vincent Price. Because everything else was just embarrassing.

10 years 6 months ago

Woof. A decent cosmic premise is wasted by a narrative that amounts to a Cliff's Notes of an all-to-traditional, semi-mythological, Western-centric Story of Civilization. The approach allows director Irwin Allen to employ what would become one of his trademarks - a sprawling Who's Who cast. This cameo casting is probably the most interesting part of the movie - Peter Lorre as Nero! Dennis Hopper as Napoleon! John Carradine as Khufu! Agnes Moorehead as Queen Elizabeth! Hedy Lamarr as Joan of Arc! Chico Marx as Isaac Newton! Groucho Marx as... some racist Pilgrim! And so on. It doesn't matter, they are all terribly used. In particular, the choice to feature the Marx brothers in their final film but all in separate scenes is unforgivable.
The money must have been used in the casting because the scenes are mostly cheap soundstage sets - the only shots that look interesting are also clearly stock footage. Colman and Price, really the sole redeeming features, try to animate the plodding episodic narrative to no avail. The celestial trial framing story concludes with a cop-out ("...this choice is entirely up to YOU!") that makes you wish the "Super H-Bomb" had been dropped on this production, instead.

4 years 6 months ago

Local Hero -- aka MestnyiGeroi

Let's make a film that takes on an age-old spiritual-philosophical chestnut -- a trial of humanity's moral worth -- but let's handle it in the most pedestrian manner possible, with nothing to appeal to the imagination or intellect. And let's make it an hour and three-quarters long.

6 years 5 months ago