Seven Classic Made-for-TV Movies...that you can watch for free!

In an interview in its February 2023 newsletter CMBA Today, the Classic Movie Blog Association asked me an intriguing question: "If you could program a perfect day of classic movies for TCM, what would be the seven films on your schedule?"

I tried to think of seven movies I'd like to see again as well as share with others. Assuming TCM could get the broadcast rights to these films, I’d opt for a day of classic made-for-TV movies. The 1960s and the 1970s were a “Golden era” for television films and featured stellar writers (e.g., Rod Serling, Richard Matheson, Gene Roddenberry) and good actors (e.g., Angie Dickinson, Suzanne Pleshette, Ray Milland, Myrna Loy). I’d limit my seven picks to lesser-known films that appeared on the wonderful ABC Movie of the Week (1969-75).

I've previously reviewed all but one of my movie selections on this blog. Click on a film's title to read the review. One of my Twitter friends, @CED_LD_Guy, uploaded all seven picks to his Rumble channel. Rumble is a free platform, like YouTube, that allows you to view media content online or on your TV by adding the Rumble channel to your streaming device. Click on the "watch" links below to enjoy these fascinating made-for-TV movies. Remember, these are rare films, so the video quality will vary from excellent (The Birdmen) to fair (Dr. Cook's Garden).

Milton Berle and Sean Garrison.

Seven in Darkness (1969) watch – A plane crashes in the wilderness and only its blind passengers survive. This was the first ABC Movie of the Week and stars Barry Nelson, Dina Merrill, Lesley Ann Warren, Season Garrison, and Milton Berle (in a dramatic role).

Daughter of the Mind (1969) watch – A psychic researcher (Don Murray) investigates when a famous scientist (Ray Milland) claims his dead daughter has been appearing to him. Gene Tierney and Ed Asner co-star.

Suzanne Pleshette.

Along Came a Spider (1970) watch  – Suzanne Pleshette headlines this twisty thriller about a widow who goes undercover to discover her husband's murderer(s).

How Awful About Allan (1970) watch – A man (Anthony Perkins) suffering from psychosomatic blindness returns home to live with his sister (Julie Harris), but thinks someone is trying to kill him.

Dr. Cook’s Garden (1971) watch – Is there a pattern to the deaths in a small rural town where a kindly physician (Bing Crosby) practices? Frank Converse and Blythe Danner co-star. Ira Levin (Rosemary's Baby, The Stepford Wives) and Art Wallace based their screenplay on Levin's short-lived stage play starring Burl Ives.

Richard Basehart as a German officer.

The Birdmen (1971) watch – During World War II, POW prisoners try to fly to freedom by building a glider. Incredibly, part of the film really happened! The unusual cast features Richard Basehart, Chuck Connors, Doug McClure, Tom Skerritt, and Max Baer, Jr. There's about eight minutes of stock footage at the beginning--but stick with it and you'll be rewarded with a very entertaining adventure.

Assault on the Wayne (1971) watch – Enemy agents plot sabotage aboard a nuclear submarine in this Cold War thriller. The cast features Leonard Nimoy, William Windom, Lloyd Haynes, and Sam Elliott.

The Black Hole Sinks into Itself

In the wake of the massive success of Star Wars (1977), Walt Disney Productions mounted its own science fiction adventure in 1979 with The Black Hole. The concept must have looked promising on paper: A 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea set in outer space for a new generation of young people. However, The Black Hole teeters on the brink of a total disaster with its uneven mixture of seriousness and silliness.

It opens with the crew of the the spaceship Palomino discovering a black hole and a nearby ship capable of defying its gravitational pull. The mysterious spaceship turns out to be the Cygnus, which was assumed to have been destroyed 20 years earlier. After getting too close to the black hole and suffering damage, the Palomino docks inside the much larger Cygnus. The latter ship turns out to still be functional and occupied by its commander, Dr. Hans Reinhardt, and a crew of robots.

Maximilian Schell as Reinhardt.

Reinhardt claims that meteors disabled the Cygnus, causing him to evacuate almost the entire crew. He assumed that their escape ship had reached Earth. Reinhardt remained behind with a handful of others--all now dead--and repaired the spaceship with the goal of entering into the black hole.

While some of the Palomino crew believe Reinhardt, others remain skeptical. Their suspicions are reinforced by an unusual robot funeral, a robot that limps, and a garden much larger than required for one human. Could it be that Reinhardt's silent "robots" are actually what's left of his human crew?

As evidenced from above, The Black Hole is not a sci fi romp along the lines of Star Wars. It's a picture devoid of any fun and lacking any action until its final half-hour. The only character with any heft is Reinhardt, who is played with passion and menace by Maximilian Schell. Good actors like Anthony Perkins, Yvette Mimieux, and Ernest Borgnine flail about trying to make sense of their parts. Borgnine eventually resorts to playing the stereotypical crew member concerned most with self-preservation--but at least he becomes relevant.

Vincent the robot, Yvette Mimieux, and Ernest Borgnine.

Apparently because this is a Disney film, the writers plop two cute robots into the proceedings. They don't belong in the movie and it's awkward when one of the robots banters with Timothy Bottoms when the crew should be focusing on avoiding its demise. Still, the robots are voiced by Roddy McDowall and Slim Pickens, which makes it almost impossible to criticize them.

The Black Hole was Disney's most expensive production to date and most of the budget went toward the special effects. Instead of farming out the effects (which is now the norm), Disney relied on its in-house technicians. The results are sometimes spectacular and sometimes surprisingly shoddy. The entrance into Reinhardt's control room and a sequence with a meteor hurling toward our heroes are jaw-dropping. On the other hand, you can see wires attached to the actors in some of the scenes where they're supposed to be in zero gravity. And some of the matte shots don't match, so it looks like live actors were placed into a cartoon.

The massive control room inside the Cygnus.

In my opinion, John Barry is one of the all-time great film composers. However, his score for The Black Hole rates as one of his weakest efforts. The opening theme is simply disturbing--perhaps indicative of the screenwriters' confusion over whether The Black Hole should be a sci fi adventure or a watered-down version of 2001. Even worse, the background music seems incongruent with the action scenes in the climax.

To be sure, there are some interesting ideas in The Black Hole, such as one character's ability to communicate with a robot through ESP. However, the film is mostly just a jumbled mess. I'm still not sure what to make of the scenes inside the black hole which show what appears to be hell and includes an angel  floating swiftly through the air. Maybe Stanley Kubrick could have made some sense of it.

Screenwriters Tony Perkins and Stephen Sondheim Team Up for "The Last of Sheila"

The six suspects--and a key clue.

A Valentine to Agatha Christie's murder mysteries, The Last of Sheila may be best remembered for its off-screen stories. First, though, let's start with the product on the screen: an all-star whodunit set aboard a yacht cruising the Mediterranean. The yacht's owner, film producer Clinton Greene (James Coburn) is a widower, whose wife Sheila died in an apparent hit-and-run car accident.

Clinton's six guests include an actress (Raquel Welch), two talent agents (Dyan Cannon and Ian McShane), a screenwriter and his wife (Richard Benjamin and Joan Hackett), and a director (James Mason). Under the pretense of entertaining his guests, Clinton has devised "The Sheila Greene Memorial Gossip Game," a nightly event in which guests try to uncover a "pretend secret" about one of their fellow passengers. Clinton distributes the following six secrets at the start of the game: shoplifter, homosexual, informer, ex-con, little child molester, and alcoholic.

Joan Hackett and Richard Benjamin.

The "game" turns serious, though, when one of the group is discovered dead. The police rule it an accidental death and the cruise continues. However, it soon becomes apparent that a murderer is aboard the yacht--especially after another corpse is discovered.

Like the best mysteries, The Last of Sheila displays all its clues clearly for the viewer. And, while I may not be the most observant individual, even I noticed a discrepancy...but which actually turned out to be a critical clue. The film shares much in common with Dame Agatha's superior Death on the Nile, right down to the climatic "reveal" in which one character describes the killer's motive and methods. The only difference is that Hercule Poirot would have had all the suspects in the room, instead of just the murderer and the self-appointed detective.

Dyan Cannon as a talent agent.

Another difference between The Last of Sheila and a Hercule Poirot mystery is that Agatha Christie was much more gifted at creating memorable characters. Screenwriters Perkins and Sondheim based some of their characters on real-life people (e.g., Dyan Cannon's character was based on talent agent Sue Mengers). While film buffs may have fun trying to guess what character was based on whom, this "inside joke" doesn't make for great drama. Additionally, there's a shortage of likable characters; even the film's "hero" has a suspect past.

The idea for The Last of Sheila can be traced to party games devised by puzzle enthusiasts Perkins and Sondheim to amuse their friends. These games ranged from treasure hunts to a "murder game" devised by Sondheim. Herbert Ross, who knew Perkins and Sondheim, suggested that they write a murder mystery.

Raquel Welch as the actress Alice.

The original intent was to film aboard a real yacht in France. However, the production was plagued with problems ranging from bad weather to sea sickness to conflicts among the cast members. Eventually, it was completed in a studio aboard a yacht set. In regard to the on-set friction, James Mason famously said of Raquel Welch: " I have never met someone so badly behaved."

The Last of Sheila was a modest hit and earned generally favorable reviews. Tony Perkins and Stephen Sondheim collaborated on a couple of other scripts, but none of them made it to the screen. By the way, Sondheim did not compose the score for The Last of Sheila (Billy Goldenberg did). He didn't even write the closing song ("Friends" performed by Bette Midler).

ABC Movie of the Week: How Awful About Allan

Allan discovers the blaze...too late.

Allan (Anthony Perkins) has spent eight months in a state hospital, being treated for the trauma caused by a fire that killed his father and scarred his sister. You see, Allan left the paint cans and thinner by the heater that caused the inferno. Physically, there is nothing wrong with Allan, but he remains emotionally fragile--and partially blind. As he explains: "There is nothing organically wrong with my eyes. The blindness is all in my head."

Following his discharge, Allan (perhaps unwisely) returns to his home to live with his sister Katherine (Julie Harris). She informs her brother that they need to take in a lodger to afford the house payments. Allan hates the idea, but a room is quickly rented to a college student named Harold Dennis. When Allan begins to hear whispering voices at night, he becomes convinced that Harold is out to murder him.

This reminded me of Psycho.

Made in 1970, How Awful About Allan was originally broadcast on the ABC Movie of the Week. It boasts an exceptionally strong pedigree for a made-for-television film. In addition to major stars Perkins and Harris, the cast includes Joan Hackett (The Group) as Allan's former fiancee Olive. It was directed by Curtis Harrington, a once promising filmmaker that helmed the cult movie Night Tide (1961) and Games (1967), a semi-remake of the 1955 French suspense classic Les Diaboliques.

In fact, there are several similarities between Games and How Awful About Allan. Both films center on three major characters, two women (Katherine and Olive) and one man (Allan)--with the female characters being much stronger than the male. And, in each film, nothing is what it appears to be.

Julie Harris as Katherine.

The central mystery in How Awful About Allan is the identity of the mysterious lodger, whom the viewer sees only as a blurred image (as Allan sees him). Is Harold Dennis really Katherine or Olive in disguise? Could he be Eric, Katherine's former lover who was forced to leave town? Or is he really Harold Dennis, an innocent college student--meaning that the voices and fleeting shadows are all in Allan's mind?

A creepy shot of Allan.

It's an interesting premise, but it also makes for a thin plot. Fortunately, How Awful About Allan has a running time of only 73 minutes. Harrington also piles on the atmosphere, making Katherine and Allan's house one of those creepy abodes with dark hallways and weird noises. Even in daylight, it looks grim and uninviting--especially when viewed through Allan's eyes.

The suspense/mystery genre was a popular one on the ABC Movie of the Week. While How Awful About Allan doesn't rank with the best of them (Along Came a Spider, Isn't It Shocking?), it's still an above-average suspense tale with a fine cast.

Coop's a Quaker and Hayley Buries Dead Animals

Gary Cooper and Dorothy Maguire.

Friendly Persuasion (1956). This pleasant, heartfelt tale of Quaker life in southern Indiana during the Civil War lacks the drama that went into bringing the film to the screen. Jessamyn West's 1945 novel was comprised of short stories published in various magazines beginning in 1940. William Wyler acquired the rights in 1948, but the project languished for several years. It didn't help that the House Committee on Un-American Activities proclaimed screenwriter Michael Wilson to be an "unfriendly witness." Despite winning an Oscar for co-writing A Place in the Sun in 1952, Wilson was blacklisted in Hollywood. When Wyler finally produced Wilson's adaptation of Friendly Persuasion, the credits did not list a screenwriter (in 1996, the opening credits were updated to include Wilson). As for Wyler, he intended to shoot the film on location in Indiana, but the budget spiraled out of control, forcing him to finish it in California (some outdoor scenes were clearly filmed in a studio).

Anthony Perkins.

Gary Cooper stars as the patriarch of the Birdwell family, although the film focuses on his oldest son Josh (Anthony Perkins) and daughter Mattie (Phyllis Love). Mattie has fallen in love with a Union officer and Josh can't decide whether to fight alongside his friends in the war or whether to remain faithful to his Quaker beliefs. It's a leisurely, episodic movie that doesn't build to a strong climax, but there are effective scenes along the way (e.g., when Mrs. Birdwell, played by Dorothy Maguire, deals with the Confederate soldiers). Cooper, then in his mid-50s, had doubts about playing a father--and a pacifist one at that. Just five years earlier, he starred as a strong-willed sheriff with a 23-year-old Grace Kelly as his bride in High Noon. Still, Cooper anchors Friendly Persuasion and provides the film with some much-needed humor, some of it centered around the elder Birdwell's desire to beat a neighbor in a weekly "unofficial" buggy race.

The surprisingly plush Birdwell home.

Friendly Persuasion won an Oscar for Best Sound and earned other nominations for Best Picture, director, supporting actor (Perkins), song, and--incredibly--screenplay (though the nomination was for the script and not the writer because Wilson was blacklisted). Pat Boone crooned the title song, written by Dimitri Tiomkin and Paul Francis Webster, which went to #5 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart.


Sky West and Crooked (aka Gypsy Girl) (1965).  At the age of 19, Hayley Mills had pretty much wrapped up her highly-successful career as Walt Disney's biggest child star. She could still play teenagers, but adult roles were just around the corner. During this period in the mid-60s, she made several "transition" films such asThe Chalk Garden and The Truth About Spring--both personal favorites. She also starred in the unusual Sky West and Crooked, a Mills family project directed by Hayley's father, acclaimed actor John Mills, and co-written by her mother, Mary Hayley Bell.

 

Ian McShane as Roibin, the gypsy.

Set in rural England, Sky West and Crooked casts Hayley as Brydie White, a seventeen-year-old girl who has mentally blocked out a childhood tragedy. Her widowed, alcoholic mother possesses no parenting skills--leaving Brydie to fend for herself. The townsfolk think the girl is a bit daft (I surmised that was the meaning of the film's title). The local vicar and a coffin-maker's family treat her kindly and she has become the unofficial leader of the village children. Indeed, when Brydie buries her two dead hamsters in the church cemetery (she forgot to provide them with water), the other children follow suit. Soon, the children are scouring the countryside for dead animals to bury in the cemetery--much to the dismay of their parents. Brydie's life is further complicated by the arrival of a handsome gypsy lad (Ian McShane).

An animal's grave.

Sky West and Crooked is an obvious attempt to duplicate the success of the superior Whistle Down the Wind, a 1961 classic starring Hayley and based on a novel by her mother. Both films feature rural settings, uninvolved parents, and a group of children led by Hayley. They also explore religious themes: in Whistle Down the Wind, the children believe an escaped convict is Jesus; in Sky West, the coffin-maker's children launch into an unexpected discussion about souls during afternoon tea with their parents.

The entire cast is convincing, with acting honors going to Hayley, Geoffrey Bayldon as the vicar, and Ian McShane as Hayley's love interest. While Sky West and Crooked certainly doesn't rank with Hayley's best films, it's still an interesting--if slowly-paced--tale about the need for love and the challenges of becoming an adult.