Loot (1972)

Excellent, Without a doubt!!

best movie i've ever seen.

Absolutely the worst movie.

To all those who have watched it: I hope you enjoyed it as much as I do.

On stage this was reasonably funny but then on stage it wasn't lumbered with Dickie Attenborough trying desperately to turn in an inept performance, or Hywel Bennett and Roy Holder and a pathetic excuse for a music score. Hardly anyone comes out of this with any credit; you know a film is in trouble when you're constantly aware of how referential it is - the hiding the proceeds of a robbery in a coffin was done much more convincingly in Ocean's Eleven back in 1960, the nurse who offs her patient and then marries the widower is something of a cliché but if you want to see how the big boys do it take a swivel at Billy Wilder's Double Indemnity where Barbara Stanwyck as Phyllis Dietrichson brings it off to a fare-thee-well. This would make great banjo picks.

From his subsequent work, this film comes closest in spirit to the director's best-regarded effort, namely GEORGY GIRL (1966); incredibly enough for such a light-hearted farce, it officially competed at the Cannes Film Festival where it vainly faced such tremendous contenders as THE GO-BETWEEN, DEATH IN VENICE, JOHNNY GOT HIS GUN, TAKING OFF and WALKABOUT – albeit all being released in 1971! The film was also the second play (which, for the record, was staged locally not too long ago) by the controversial if short-lived Joe Orton to be turned into a movie after ENTERTAINING MR. SLOANE, released earlier that same year and which – like Stephen Frears' biopic of Orton, PRICK UP YOUR EARS (1987) with Gary Oldman and Alfred Molina – I also own but have yet to watch (the latter on the strength of LOOT itself!).Anyway, to get back to the film at hand, the central casting is certainly splendid: Richard Attenborough's character may be a caricature but he is undeniably funny (his Scotland Yard Inspector poses as an officer from the water board and whose professed integrity proves as much a sham as his act); Lee Remick is served with a sluttish role (as a go-getting and husband-killing nurse!) that actually takes the actress back to her debut in Elia Kazan's A FACE IN THE CROWD (1957): I do not know how she ended up in Britain just then (being reteamed with Attenborough soon afterwards for the Iris Murdoch adaptation A SEVERED HEAD {1970}), but it is safe to assume that she would never have been involved in anything this crude in Hollywood!; Hywel Bennett was fashionable for a brief period (this, in fact, came towards the end of his heyday) but he is terrific as the delusional – as much about romance as get-rich-quick schemes – morgue attendant who conducts his escapades inside a hearse!; Roy Holder's name was unknown to me but he is delightful as the effeminate half of the bungling criminal duo (calling his partner "baby" and who repeatedly gets them convicted because he has a compulsion for telling the truth!) – he also comes up with the film's funniest line, describing his 'close' relationship with his mother's corpse "a Freudian nightmare" (the couple stash the money from a bank robbery in her coffin, while the body is constantly turning up at the most inopportune moments!); Milo O'Shea, another familiar face from this era thanks to his lead role in the movie version of yet one more classic source i.e. James Joyce's ULYSSES (1967), is Holder's flustered father who also drools over Remick (she, in turn, has already eyed him for her next victim!).Perhaps the wildest idea here is having the criminals undertake the robbery in their birthday suits, so as not leave 'forensic' traces; the comic highlight, then, is a funeral procession that develops into a Keystone Kops-type chase(!), while its brightest touch is the adoption of a song score (not particularly outstanding but still quite nice and loud) to intermittently comment upon the silly-cum-tasteless (albeit rapid-fire) action! Interestingly, the busy finale is a combination of morality (characters owing up to a deed they are innocent of so as to make amends for past mistakes), cynicism (the fact that one cannot even trust authority figures anymore) and a curious 'honor-among-thieves' attitude (Bennett not only gets the girl after all but there is every reason to believe that, with Remick along for the ride, the gang's exploits can only get better and grander still!). By the way, I may be wrong but the film's manic style would seem to have anticipated some of the more stylized episodes in the long-running (and beloved) "Fantozzi" series from Italy!

I wonder if it would be possible to re-edit this comic gem to eliminate the dreadful backing song(s). Its a play in which the absurdity of conventional attitudes is lampooned and the stirling performances by Milo O'Shea and Attenborough carry it off in the larger style required for big screen. It may mystify those hooked on two modern types of comedy film: those which mock the people who don't conform and those which don't ever rise beyond crude vaudeville. Loot sympathises with those who defy and subvert social codes. It has more in common with the intelligent humour of Harold and Maude or The Producers than with the raucous Eddie Murphy / Chevvy Chase shout-fests. Of course, its difficult. The hard of thinking may have to replay some of the one liners to appreciate the ironies - the targets are attitudes rather than personal blemishes. This is not the world of Joan Rivers either - there is no bitchy 'humour' Orton, while deliberately offending against 'good taste' never sets his sights on anything quite so grubby. The cast are all likable but absurd. Even in Orton's more bitchy plays like 'What the Butler Saw' he doesn't aim at vindictiveness - its the institution he undermines. Loot is satire, not sarcasm. The well paced direction and the crisp, non-self-indulgent acting make this a forgotten treat which should be revived, as it has been for such diverse actors as Leonard Rossiter and Kenneth Williams on stage within living memory.

You can tell throughout "Loot" that it is trying real hard to be an edgy black comedy. However, it doesn't even compare to the much funnier "Weekend At Bernie's". Why do I compare the two? Because both involve a corpse that moves around a lot.A couple of young men easily steal a bunch of money from a bank vault. The bank is right next to a funeral parlor and they hide the money in a coffin. Not an empty coffin...one with a body in it. Well, they can't fit all the money into the coffin so they take the body out in order to make room for their stash of cash.Craziness ensues as the two men try to hide both the money and the corpse from relatives and the police. It seems to go on and on and on. To make things worse, most of the story takes place in a hotel. This probably would've made a more interesting play rather than a movie. 2/10