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Last week's Movie Quiz winners

Last week's quiz movie in question was The Anderson Tapes (1971), a terrific heist movie directed by Sidney Lumet, and starring Sean Connery, Dyan Cannon, and-- in his major feature film debut-- a 27-year-old Christopher Walken. Lots of quiz winners were surprised that Walken was in it, as well as by Connery's appearance in his picture clue. "My first reaction was . . . Bob Hoskins? Ben Gazzara? A shot of caffeine and I was finally able to recognize Sean, from the beginning of his 'I'm no longer Bond, and I won't wear that damn toupee any longer' period." "Didn't realize Connery was getting that bald that fast-- looks like Walken could have lent him some hair."

Christopher Walken, Sean Connery, and a heavily-hairpieced Martin Balsam.

The Anderson in the title is Duke Anderson (Connery), a recently-released con who makes a deal with the mob to rob an entire luxury apartment building. But what Anderson doesn't know as he plans and carries out the caper is everything he says and does is being recorded, because everyone he deals with is under surveillance! Although the movie is an unpretentious crime film, it not only came before The Conversation, but foreshadowed Watergate.

The equipment used throughout the story is vintage analog all the way. How they're going to deal with digital in the remake-- and it's coming-- is anybody's guess. (The Anderson Mp3s just doesn't cut it.) Even better than all the recording gear, though, is this great shot of the NYC police department's computer system-- here's what they used to find bad guys in 1971:

Besides the intelligent, exciting story and (as usual) inspired direction, everything else about it was first-rate, too. The score by Quincy Jones is a great one, a blend of Quincy's usual soul-jazz with bloop-and-bleep electronic sections that are surprisingly tense. The film speeds along with lots of good performances, major and cameo, especially Connery's. (And yes, that was Garrett Morris in last week's first picture clue.)

And needless to say, Christopher Walken was fully formed from the very beginning-- here's his first big movie closeup:

"America, man! It's so beautiful, you know, I wanna eat it!"

Lots of winners this week, so lots of congratulations and a meal with Chris to the following: Wayne Palmer, Song-Un Lee, Joe Rosenberg, Christina O'Sullivan, Bob Redwing, Corey Anderson, Nancy Louise Rutherford, John Middleton, Fred Lorence, TMiss, Mick Arran, Thomas Miller, Bill Hearne, letra minuscula, Dean Carlson, Michael Mattson, Shaun Faulkner, Dave Mallow, Denny Lynch, Kevin Musolino, Vince Tuss, and E. Yarber.

(Send Steve an email at couchpundit@yahoo.com.)

Posted by Steve Monaco at July 27, 2008 11:56 PM

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