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"Emergency, everybody to get from street."
Apr. 6th, 2008 10:51 amWatched "The Russians are Coming, the Russians are Coming" last night. Directed by Norman Jewison and released in 1965, this was Alan Arkin's first major motion picture and also starred a relativey young Carl Reiner, Eva Marie Saint, Jonathan Winters, and Brian Keith (whom I otherwise really only know from Hardcastle and McCormick, I am sorry to say).
A Soviet sub runs aground on a sandbar outside of a small Cape Cod island, because the Captain is an arrogant dunce who "wanted to see America". Arkin is the ship's lieutenant, dispatched to land with a small force to find a motorboat strong enough to pull them off the sandbar. Arkin is the only english speaker, and that not so well either, so these guys are running around loose on this All-American island backwater and trying to variously sneak, steal, or pass themselves off as "normal" in an effort to just get away and get home without getting caught or triggering WWIII.
Charming and funny and sappy and heartwarming and of a slower pace no longer seen today, at least in NA-produced movies, that I love so well. Could have been an utter slapstick fest but the director held a very fine line at the EDGE of farce, with wonderful results. I cackled like a maniac all the way through. (Of course, I was braindamaged from the Sprout's birthday party earlier in the day, and had the better part of a bottle of wine in me, but anyway...) Arkin as the hapless Soviet lieutenant is STELLAR. Go look it up.
Seriously, go.
A Soviet sub runs aground on a sandbar outside of a small Cape Cod island, because the Captain is an arrogant dunce who "wanted to see America". Arkin is the ship's lieutenant, dispatched to land with a small force to find a motorboat strong enough to pull them off the sandbar. Arkin is the only english speaker, and that not so well either, so these guys are running around loose on this All-American island backwater and trying to variously sneak, steal, or pass themselves off as "normal" in an effort to just get away and get home without getting caught or triggering WWIII.
Charming and funny and sappy and heartwarming and of a slower pace no longer seen today, at least in NA-produced movies, that I love so well. Could have been an utter slapstick fest but the director held a very fine line at the EDGE of farce, with wonderful results. I cackled like a maniac all the way through. (Of course, I was braindamaged from the Sprout's birthday party earlier in the day, and had the better part of a bottle of wine in me, but anyway...) Arkin as the hapless Soviet lieutenant is STELLAR. Go look it up.
Seriously, go.
