The Phynx (1970)

Too much of everything

Don't listen to the negative reviews

A terrific literary drama and character piece that shows how the process of creating art can be seen differently by those doing it and those looking at it from the outside.

It is neither dumb nor smart enough to be fun, and spends way too much time with its boring human characters.

Well, I finally caught up with the true rarity entitled "The Phynx" (1970). In this rock and roll/secret agent spoof, many American celebrities have been disappearing after visiting the Communist country of Albania, and the U.S. government has decided to rescue them and put a stop to this. Their super computer, MUTHA, suggests forming a rock band that will be invited to play in Albania; the members of the band will be trained secret agents who will do their best to get the celebs released. Thus, four teenagers are selected and given the necessary musical and secret agent training. Dubbed The Phynx, the band does eventually prove a smash and gets invited to play in Albania. Anyway, this picture is truly a one-of-a-kind experience, with any number of goofy gags and fairly groovy rock numbers (by the famed songwriting team of Leiber & Stoller!). But its claim to fame today surely has to be the number of guest stars who pop up in cameo roles throughout the film; not since "It's a Mad Mad Mad Mad World" has any film boasted so many celebs! Thus, look at who pops up here: Michael Ansara, George Tobias, Joan Blondell, Ultra Violet, Patty Andrews (of The Andrews Sisters), Edgar Bergen, James Brown, Xaviar Cugat, Andy Devine, Rona Barrett, Busby Berkeley, Dick Clark, Leo Gorcey, Huntz Hall, Louis Hayward, George Jessel, Ruby Keeler, Dorothy Lamour, Guy Lombardo, Joe Louis, Trini Lopez, Butterfly McQueen, Pat O'Brien, Maureen O'Sullivan, Richard Pryor, Martha Raye, Harold "Oddjob" Sakata, Colonel Sanders, Ed Sullivan, Jay Silverheels, Rudy Vallee AND Johnny Weissmuller. Whew! Pretty amazing, right? The film was directed by somebody named Lee H. Katzin and in all is as mind boggling a 90 minutes as you're ever likely to come across. A recommended time capsule, to be sure!

Somebody's stealing the celebrities of Hollywood's Golden Age, and that somebody is in Communist Albania. Our Super Secret Agency spies get the idea that the way to bring the celebrities back is to create some new celebrities, in the form of a pop band who will get invited to Albania themselves. Thus the band "The Phynx" is created. (The less said about the music of Lieber and Stoller, the better. Although, there was one song that kept reminding me of the Fifth Dimension's "Up, Up and Away".) The movie is normally considered a bomb, although I found it not quite as bad as that. The build-up is exceedingly slow, and most of the celebrities are underused. Thankfully, most of the celebrities - at least, the ones in Albania - are introduced red-carpet style so nobody will have trouble putting names to faces. The people playing the band members, of course, have no acting talent, although they could probably dance as well as Ruby Keeler.There are a lot of celebrities in this one. Maureen O'Sullivan and Johnny Weismuller; Rudy Vallee; Huntz Hall and Leo Gorcey, the latter looking like death warmed over (he died before the movie was released); George Jessel; and even Col. Sanders are among those in captivity in Albania. Joan Blondell plays the First Lady of Albania. Martha Raye is one of the few who gets a chance to shine as the Agency's contact in London. James Brown comes next closest to shining. Richard Pryor is woefully underused.One other good thing is the sequence in Rome. The band members are looking for a piece of a map tattooed on a woman's abdomen; they're given x-ray glasses to look through people's clothes. This sets up several opportunities for sight gags, some of which actually work. There's one of a man chatting up a woman in a club, where it turns out that both of them are actually men, and another of two young women talking to two nuns.If you like "so bad it's good" movies, this one is actually worth watching since you'll find a whole bunch of "What were they thinking?" moments. I give it a 7/10 on that scale, not on the same scale I would rate Casablanca.

I finally bought a copy of this film on DVD from an online seller, and it is truly dreadful. It has a running time of 81 minutes but it felt like 4 hours. I only bought it to see the many cameo appearances of stars young and old, but some of them are so brief that you have to watch every second of the film to catch them. Richard Pryor introduces himself and then he's gone! The best part of the film is at the end when Pat O'Brien is reunited with former Dead End Kids Leo Gorcey and Huntz Hall. Leo looks positively ancient, even though he was only 51 at the time. He died of liver failure shortly after shooting his scenes. His heavy drinking really took its toll. The writing on this film is horrendous, and the acting is worse than any Ed Wood film. I completely agree with Warner Brothers' decision to shelve this film and never release it, even though they probably spent a good deal of money to make it. It's an embarrassment and painful to watch. I hope to someday see Jerry Lewis' never-released "The Day the Clown Cried," another legendary bad film, so I can compare it to "The Phynx."

Nice to see the old TV Stars from the 50s and 60s but the movie overall is not worth watching for any other reason. It was nice to see actors like Clint Walker and Johnny Weismuller on the screen once again. The movie, however, has no character to it what so ever.