The Formula (1980)

The Age of Commercialism

It's no definitive masterpiece but it's damn close.

As somebody who had not heard any of this before, it became a curious phenomenon to sit and watch a film and slowly have the realities begin to click into place.

There are moments in this movie where the great movie it could've been peek out... They're fleeting, here, but they're worth savoring, and they happen often enough to make it worth your while.

Spoilers from the off. At least five people get shot dead in this film. Colour me stupid, but although I've seen it three or four times I still can't figure out the motivation. Their shootings seemed arbitrary and unnecessary: who gained? A misleading cocaine-dealing trail had apparently been laid down (by who?) for stolid, stone-faced cop George C Scott, but it had been deliberately framed for him not to fall for it. So what was the point? I can't figure it out. What had Mrs Kate Neeley got to do with it? Who was doing the shootings? Seems as though it was Marthe Keller, according to her body oil --- but hang on, who sent her to LA? Was Steiffel ordering the killings? Or was it the Baader-Meinhof Faction? I've read more than one summary of the plot, but none of them seem able to get it straight.Site plot summary: A detective uncovers a formula that was devised by the Nazis in WWII to make gasoline from synthetic products, thereby eliminating the necessity for oil, and oil companies. A major oil company finds out about it and tries to destroy the formula and anyone who knows about it. Site plot synopsis: There is no plot synopsis. Still, it seems like Steiffel must have been responsible.Perhaps, as one reviewer says, just talking to Lieutenant Scott gets you shot. Was Shagan enrolled in the Raymond Chandler school of thriller-writing? Chandler said that writing thrillers is easy: if you don't know what to make happen next, bring on a man with a gun. Even better: just have somebody shot. "Happy Days are Here Again" is not precisely rock 'n roll, so add a dash of sex and drugs.Listening to the Avildsen (born 1935) and Shagan (born 1927) special feature commentary is enlightening. Add some stimulating one-liners from the script. "We are the Arabs." (Steiffel). "Fiction ruins factual research". (Shagan). "Walls make good neighbours". (Robert Frost --- weird that A & S wouldn't remember that famous quote). "You're in the oil shortage business". "No enemies --- just customers".The puzzles multiply the closer you look. Obermann's next of kin was in his wallet. That's how they got to Keller. Then how come he never had a niece? Why did phony old Gielgud dismiss Fraulein Spangler? Vy vosn't Dr Abraham Esau shot? Vy vosn't he more hairy? Shagan said he had the book in his head. This shows, since the requisite smooth transition to film never happened. Some of the shots, and sets, were visually adequately attractive, but they were static, not cinematic.Finally, if I heard him right, and it sounded as if it was confirmed by either A or S, Marlon mumbled that "Jefferson said that 'Money, not morality, is the principal commerce of civilized nations'." This doesn't make any sense, if you think about it. Also, what Jefferson actually said, in his letter to John Langdon, 1810, was that "Money and not morality is the principle of commerce and commercial nations". Now that does make perfect sense. Perhaps the jumbled mumble was simply Brando's quirky take on his decidedly oddball character.Brando and Scott used to play chess, when Scott was sober. Both giants were a tad tired and over-weight. Neither looked at all comfortable in his ill-fitting clothes. The film is a chess problem without a solution, but it's fairly amusing trying to find one. Could be a Queen's Pawn opener, and a draw. I must check the moves again. That old-fashioned notation is definitely dated, however.Could somebody please produce a good, clear summary/synopsis, so I can get shot of the whole hangover. It's given me a headache. By the way, I've ordered the book, in hopes it may help me clear my head and sort it out.Book arrived. Stap me vitals; and split me windpipe. There's that Jefferson misquote again ! "Money not morality is the principal commerce of civilized nations". Why can't Yanks speak English?

Of course any chance to see a film with George C. Scott and Marlon Brando is not to be missed, but I do so wish that they had done something better than The Formula.The Formula referred to in the title is in fact a formula that the Nazi scientists developed for getting oil fuel out of coal. The only source of it in all of Europe is in Ploesti in Romania. Which was why the Nazis made damn sure to occupy the place and also wanted to get to the Soviet Union oil fields as well.Anyway a former cop who in retirement found working on the other side of the law, a lucrative supplement for his pension is murdered in Los Angeles. George C. Scott is the LAPD detective put in charge of the case. The former cop's widow Beatrice Straight is also murdered along with just about everyone else who talks with Scott during the course of the investigation.Said investigation takes Scott from LA to Germany and back to LA and mysterious gazillionaire Marlon Brando. The story takes in old Nazis, new Nazis, Arab terrorists, and the oil establishment who wants The Formula on its terms.What I don't understand is that if the powerful conglomerate that Brando controlled wanted things shut down, why in heaven's name was Scott put in charge of the investigation? Doesn't make a lot of sense when you think about it.Brando and Scott together in their final confrontation scene are fabulous. Would that the rest of The Formula was done so well.

What happened? The film had all the earmarks for success: two of the generation's greatest actors (Scott and Brando); a subject that is topical, even to this day; an international co-star that had made an impressive appearance years earlier in another political thriller, the film adaptation of Thomas Harris's "Black Sunday; and a director that had been responsible for two critically praised films ("Rocky" and "Save the Tiger").Unfortunately the screenplay, penned by novel author Steve Shagan, just fell as flat as filling one's gas tank with water: no get up and go. There were no thrills in what should have had many; there were no chills, in what should have had more action. Even the two stars seems as though they were just drawing a paycheck, and possibly a free trip to Europe, where most of the film was made.Even Bill Conti, who had written one of movie's most memorable melodies ("The Theme from 'Rocky'"), composed a score that was as exciting as listening to radio static.The film's sole saving grace is the appearance of perennial heavy Richard Lynch as a former Nazi general with information about the sought-after formula.Sadly, the movie just doesn't click with this viewer.

This is an excellent, thought provoking plot which could, with a little imagination, be closer to the truth today than when filmed 26 years ago. Delivered by two actors among other greats, Marlon Brando and George C.Scott weave a convoluted story line which centers around a formula to make oil an obsolete fuel. Jump to present day with Exxon/Mobile posting record profits of $8.4 billion the first quarter of 2006 against a back drop of record profits in 2005, Brando's comment about, "We Are The Arabs", becomes even more poignant as gas prices continue to climb over $3.00 per gallon. It makes one wonder, particularly since the known fact that our present leader and his father have been in bed with the Arabs the last 15 years or longer and the VP, an old oil man himself, "We are the Arabs", indeed! Another movie that broaches oil greed is "Local Hero" with Burt Lancaster playing the part of CEO Armand Hammer and his quest for acquisition of land on the northern edge of Scotland and his description of the Scottish people as "blue eyed Arabs". Since the days of John D Rockefeller, oil has, for all practical purposes, ruled the world. How ironic that we are now at war with a country with the world's 2nd largest oil reserves and our leader was the one pulling the trigger.