The Pink Panther (original)

[AndyC]

Found out recently that my wife had never seen the original Pink Panther movies. Got me thinking that it's probably been 20 years since I've seen any of them myself, and I have more memories of the increasingly goofy sequels than of the original.

I rented the original 1963 Pink Panther on the weekend. Wow, is it ever a long, dull comedy. It's a classy movie, no doubt about it, but too many of the gags fall flat, and there is such a long wait between them. In many ways, this reminded me of the movies of an earlier time, with its very standard collection of characters, who mostly sit and talk. Apart from it's 60s setting, it feels like a 1930s drama with bits of farcical comic relief.

David Niven, as master thief The Phantom, is really the star of this movie. Clouseau is barely in it, being more of a minor character, and Peter Sellers' physical comedy is very sparse and almost doesn't fit the tone of what is really a highbrow romantic comedy. To make matters worse, the Clouseau character is, for the most part, undeveloped. His accent and his bumbling nature are not nearly as exaggerated as in the later films. Sellers plays it very straight, and mostly just trips and drops things. My wife found him more annoying than funny. I was too busy feeling sorry for him to find him funny, since Clouseau isn't treated very well by his wife.

Even when things are supposed to be at their wackiest, at the costume party, it just doesn't work. (probably the funniest line in the movie happens here, when Clouseau says "I'll have your stripes" to a pair of officers in a zebra costume).

What you end up with is a movie that is really funny in spots, but not worth the effort of sitting through the rest of the interminable "plot." The fact that this movie is supposed to be about a jewel heist is practically forgotten until near the end. It gets caught up in the Phantom's rather lame plan to woo the diamond's owner, along with various romantic misunderstandings (some funny, most not), creating a pointless story that wanders aimlessly until it is forced back into being about a crime. In many ways, it reminds me of a British stage farce, but an extremely dry one.

Thinking back, I don't recall liking The Pink Panther, but I figured I was just too young to get it. I now know better. For us, the high points were seeing an almost unrecognizably young Robert Wagner, showing my wife the origin of the Pink Panther cartoon in the animated title sequences, and enjoying the early-60s setting. I like movies of that period. The early Bond films hold a similar appeal for me.

I'd like to show my wife a couple of the better sequels, which I know are funnier, but I think this one put her off the whole series.



Post Edited (07-18-05 12:48)

[Gerry]

AndyC wrote:

> I rented the original 1964 Pink Panther on the weekend. Wow, is
> it ever a long, dull comedy.

That's pretty much my opinion of the original.  It's entertaining enough, but no where near as good as the sequels.  A SHOT IN THE DARK (which is the immediate sequel) is much MUCH MUCH better!

[AndyC]

Agreed. I used to watch A Shot in the Dark pretty much every time it was shown on TV. Very funny movie.

[LH-C]

I agree with you both totally! 'A Shot In The Dark' is much funnier! And would you believe that Blake Edwards' co-writer for the screenplay was William Peter Blatty (author of 'The Exorcist')? Interestingly it's based on a play called 'L'Idiot' and Edwards rewrote it to suit the Inspector Clouseau character.

[Menard]

LH-C wrote:

> And would you believe that Blake Edwards' co-writer
> for the screenplay was William Peter Blatty (author of 'The
> Exorcist')?


Actually, Blatty was primarily a comedy writer; largely for television. Then he takes this foray into writing a horror novel and becomes known for being a horror writer; as a lot of comedy writers for TV and movies do not get recognized that much. On a talk show once, he found it to be an interesting irony that he followed up on 'The Exoricist' by writing a novel with comic elements and people were surprised that a 'horror writer' could be so funny.

[Wence]

AndyC wrote:
>>It's a classy movie, no doubt about it, but too many of the gags fall flat, and there is such a long wait between them. In many ways, this reminded me of the movies of an earlier time, with its very standard collection of characters, who mostly sit and talk. Apart from it's 60s setting, it feels like a 1930s drama with bits of farcical comic relief.<<

That´s exactly what I thought about this movie when I saw it. A partly boring thing.
But not that bad...

[Archivist]

Geez, that reminds me.  On a past buying spree I picked up the PP movies boxset, and the only thing I watched in it was the cartoons!  Psychedelic Pink forever!!!

I have to watch those movies again, considering they were some of my favourites from childhood.  I, too, like the old 60's feel.  Very 'Valley of the Dolls'.

But some REALLY funny Peter Sellers movies include THE PARTY and the FU MANCHU movie.  VERY cool, those two.

~Archivist~

[Yaddo 42]

Have you seen the movie "The Life and Death of Peter Sellers"? Might make a good companion to the PP films. Geoffrey Rush does a great job as Sellers (and his varied roles), and it touches on Sellers later hatred of the Clouseau role. He wanted to branch out as an actor, but kept making them since he needed the money and many of his other films in the late 60s/early 70s either bombed or didn't get released. If the film and the book it's based on are true, Clouseau was only intended in the first film as a supporting role. It WAS supposed to be a slick charming safe David Niven film. But Sellers brought so much to the film that Edwards expanded the part as he saw what Sellers could come up with.

John Lithgow does a great job also playing Blake Edwards as a charming but entirely crass and greedy filmmaker. I'm surprised Edwards himself contirbuted to the making of extras since he comes off so badly.

As for the films themselves, I still like most of them, but seeing many of them again now that I'm older, I realize just how uneven many of them (especially the later films) truly were. Sellers has a few funny skits or scenes and the fights with Kato are still great slaipstick brain candy (like live action cartoons almost) but they can't sustain the good feelings for the whole film. And "Return" is probably one of the best, but for me it suffers from overexposure. I've seen that film too many times since I was a kid, it used to turn up everywhere, so I have no patience for it now. Not the film's fault, but past the opening theft caper I just can't watch it anymore.

[The Burgomaster]

I'm not a big fan of the 1963 PINK PANTHER.  Too much Niven and Wagner, not enough Sellars.  I think the two best movies in the series are A SHOT IN THE DARK and THE PINK PANTHER STRIKES AGAIN.  Also, RETURN OF THE PINK PANTHER was pretty good.  The rest of the series is mostly pitiful.