Word: aspic
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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...Department planned to save $75.000 by climinating the post of night watchman at the House, we went to talk to a night watchman and find out what his job is all about and what it feels like to be eliminated. He put down his copy of "A Dandy in Aspic" and agreed to talk to us but asked that his name not be used. "I may get in trouble with my supervisor for this." he said. "He may tell me to mind my own business...
...people trooped through the Union, registered, ate vichyssoise, cold turkey, and tomato aspic salads, then trooped out again carrying immense bundles of Class of 1943 Paraphernalia: '43 wastebaskets, '43 combs, '43 razors, '43 lipstick, '43 keychains, '43 showercaps...
Given the tricky and unpolished style and the ultimate anticlimax of the plot, A Dandy In Aspic isn't half bad. Although Laurence Harvey's acting capabilities enable him to register only an emotional strain of the kind plainly treatable with low-level patent medicines advertised on television, several scenes are genuinely moving, conveying the agony of a very trapped and very unhappy man. A secret service conference between Eberlin (Harvey) and his superiors contains some masterful close shots (chiefly of Harry Andrews), and indicates the high level of photographic composition and lighting in the interiors. A later confrontation between...
LESS flashy than Aspic, Donald Siegel's Madigan is a quiet tour de force. Describing his own style as "classical," Siegel (director of Invasion of the Body Snatchers and The Killers) subordinates camera pyrotechnics to dramatic purpose, his close-ups often revealing an obvious love for the excellent performances of his actors. His stated admiration for Richard Widmark is completely justifiable, and Widmark remains one of the finest and most underrated actors working. Siegel likes to keep his camera on the actors as long as possible, often following them in medium close shot over long distances, thereby establishing character detail...
...lean, often tough, style. Occasional spurts of fast cutting, Madigan intimidating a suspect and the final gun battle, are doubly powerful because of the stylistic restraint in the preceding scenes. Steve Ihnat's high-style performance as a psychopathic satyr is a welcome change from the suave ruthlessness of Aspic's urbane spies...