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Murder by Death (Robert Moore, 1976)
With a star studded cast, a script by Neil Simon and a creepy old mansion filled with spoofs of literary's greatest detectives, 1976's Murder by Death should have scored a knock out comic punch.
Instead the jokes are as stiff as a dead butler, the premise as thin as the hair on James Coco's head, and the sets are spartan. But what really killed the film for me were the low hanging fruit jokes. Those broad comedy, one liners, were delivered by actors who seemed to be sleep walking their lines. As a result, comic timing and delivery nuance, which is everything, was missing. Very few of the jokes were funny to me and some of the ethnic slander jokes were hard for me to watch.
The plot is paper thin, the detectives arrive at the mansion and are seated at the dining room table...then one of them will leave the room and later return to find that it's mysteriously empty. Then in the next scene all guest are back in the dining room. And that's, the big mystery of the movie.
We later learn that the house has a 'sliding dining room' that can be electronically moved around the house. In other words there wasn't enough money to build additional rooms for extra scenes. The simple plot reminded me of Scooby Doo. I half expected Truman Capote to say at the end, "I would've gotten away with my plan too if it hadn't been for you meddling kids, err...I mean detectives."
Yes, it was nice to see so many stars, though most were mediocre in their roles which surprised me. Elsa Lanchester is usually the highlight of any movie, but here she was wasted. David Niven and Maggie Smith's characters were the only ones I really liked. Peter Falk's take on Sam Spade was downright creepy.
I'm really surprised to learn that this wasn't a made for TV movie. One good thing about watching this, I now have a desire to rewatch William Castle's House on Haunted Hill.
Murder by Death (Robert Moore, 1976)
Instead the jokes are as stiff as a dead butler, the premise as thin as the hair on James Coco's head, and the sets are spartan. But what really killed the film for me were the low hanging fruit jokes. Those broad comedy, one liners, were delivered by actors who seemed to be sleep walking their lines. As a result, comic timing and delivery nuance, which is everything, was missing. Very few of the jokes were funny to me and some of the ethnic slander jokes were hard for me to watch.
The plot is paper thin, the detectives arrive at the mansion and are seated at the dining room table...then one of them will leave the room and later return to find that it's mysteriously empty. Then in the next scene all guest are back in the dining room. And that's, the big mystery of the movie.
We later learn that the house has a 'sliding dining room' that can be electronically moved around the house. In other words there wasn't enough money to build additional rooms for extra scenes. The simple plot reminded me of Scooby Doo. I half expected Truman Capote to say at the end, "I would've gotten away with my plan too if it hadn't been for you meddling kids, err...I mean detectives."
Yes, it was nice to see so many stars, though most were mediocre in their roles which surprised me. Elsa Lanchester is usually the highlight of any movie, but here she was wasted. David Niven and Maggie Smith's characters were the only ones I really liked. Peter Falk's take on Sam Spade was downright creepy.
I'm really surprised to learn that this wasn't a made for TV movie. One good thing about watching this, I now have a desire to rewatch William Castle's House on Haunted Hill.