Word: beastes
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Banana Peel has a plot as tricky as its title. Named after a race horse, this free French comedy of crime and blandishment gives the beast a mere nod during the opening credits, then plunges into an orgy of intrigues on a pretty fast track. Viewers may occasionally wish they had a pony to keep abreast of what is happening. But they will never lose interest, thanks to two shrewd performers, Jean-Paul Belmondo and Jeanne Moreau, under direction from Marcel Ophuls...
...equally odd state law based on an English statute of 1533 that made homosexuality a capital offense. As adopted in 1837, the euphemistic North Carolina law reads: "Any person who shall commit the abominable and detestable crime against nature, not to be mentioned among Christians, with either mankind or beast, shall be adjudged guilty of a felony, and shall suffer death without the benefit of clergy." As it stands today, the law omits death and Christians, but prescribes a whopping sentence of up to 60 years...
...chin sprouts a day's growth of stubble. Tattered shirttails flap outside his trousers, and he tops the ensemble with either a disreputable yachting cap or a sweat-stained fedora. Coltish Leslie Caron sums him up succinctly as "a rude, foulmouthed, drunken, filthy beast...
...filthy beast is Gary Grant, somewhat whimsically cast as a Pacific island beach bum. World War II has begun, and Grant greets it with the disdain he might ordinarily show for a stale canape. Nevertheless, Australian Navy Commander Trevor Howard tricks him into a position as a plane spotter (code designation: Mother Goose) on a remote islet near New Guinea. Soon he has to rescue Caron and her seven giggling schoolgirl charges, who have fled the French consulate school at Rabaul...
...mood of the college intellectual is a curious mixture of hedonism and careerism, skepticism and small faith, Coolness and decency, social commitment and political caution," he said. Although the intellectuals are "far too sophisticated" for the beast' "simple-minded gestures" of revolt, bohemianism "has been assimilated into the main stream of their life," he added...