THE BOYS FROM BRAZIL (1978) You've gotta love Nazi revival sci-fi Laurence Olivier and Gregory Peck - with stars like that, you know the movie's gonna be pure class all the way, right? Well, Peck is playing doctor Josef Mengele, the Angel of Death, who abacinated, and, uh...dammit, where's my Slayer thesaurus? I wish I knew how this movie was received when it came out. Its concept is outrageously tacky, but with stars like these and with such an irony-absent presentation, the average moviegoer (y'know, the ones which were making Smokey & The Bandit a big hit at the time) probably wouldn't notice. Olivier plays a Nazi hunter, Peck as I said plays Dr. Mengele, and Mengele wants 94 65-year-old men knocked off in the next 2 ½ years. It'd be kind of unfair to reveal the rest (as, I hear, the box does in large print) but it gets pretty wacky after that. Yes, this is like me not telling you that Norman Bates thinks he's his mother, but hey - I didn't know what the hell the plot twists were in this movie before seeing it recently, so I figure there'll be more people like me out there. It's hard to think of much to say about this movie when I'm restraining myself from spoiling this much of the plot. But I'll give it this: it's fun, and it's fun BECAUSE it's outrageous without being done in the wink-nudge trendy style a movie like this would be made in today. Nazi's always make fun villains; not just because their ideology is so easy to hate, but because they have scary uniforms and accents and names like "Murderhoff" and "Dismemberkreig" (okay, I made those up). That's why neo-Nazis aren't nearly as interesting as villains; on top of their having failed to actually do anything dastardly of substance like the real Nazis did, they're essentially a bunch of bald men named "Billy" and "Jeff". Anyway, it's definitely a hoot to see Peck ham it up like I never thought he could. Less fun is an early screen appearance by Steve Guttenburg, who thankfully doesn't last long in this movie. This is based on a novel by Ira "Rosemary's Baby" Levin, which I've never read, and I have no idea how that one was received either. Like a lot of science/psychological thrillers from the 60's and 70's, this one gives new meaning to the term "long-winded" while explaining the art of cloning. Funny how if you'd listened to the movies, you'd think we've been on the verge of cloning humans since the fifties. Not a heck of a lot to say about this one, except that it's a hoot. A little sincerity goes a long way in a movie like this. There's even a Nazi-themed dinner party, so goofy in and of itself that gags aren't even needed. The real Josef Mengele died (in Argentina?) shortly after movie movie was released. I hope he saw it before he keeled, I really do. BACK TO THE B's BACK TO THE MAIN PAGE