Samson can't be beat
| Movie | |
|---|---|
| German title | Samson can't be beat |
| Original title | A fine madness |
| Country of production | United States |
| original language | English |
| Publishing year | 1966 |
| length | 104 minutes |
| Age rating | FSK 18 |
| Rod | |
| Director | Irvin Kershner |
| script | Elliott Baker |
| production | Jerome Hellman |
| music | John Addison |
| camera | Ted McCord |
| cut | William H. Ziegler |
| occupation | |
| |
Simson can't be beat (Original title: A Fine Madness ) is an American comedy film directed by Irvin Kershner and starring Sean Connery , Joanne Woodward and Jean Seberg . Screenwriter Elliott Baker also wrote the novel A Fine Madness (1964).
action
Simson Shillitoe is burned out, the writer, poet and womanizer, who lives in well-ordered circumstances in Greenwich Village with his wife, doesn't want to think of anything more. Wife Rhoda is very long-suffering and knows how to take the quirks of her eccentric husband and excesses of violence with some long-suffering. In order to finally be able to dissolve his stuck writer's block, Simson, who is more and more contentious and sees himself shortly before the onset of depression , even messes with the police. She accompanies a debt collector on behalf of his first wife, who finally wants to have outstanding alimony claims collected. Simson also loses a (moderately paid) part-time job as an office cleaner after having sex with the company secretary. Meanwhile, the carpet cleaning machine had flooded the office with soap bubbles. Finally, Samson managed to end a lecture evening with a poetry reading of his works in a catastrophe.
Now finally Rhoda intervenes, without her husband's knowledge. She sees only one possibility: Samson must absolutely undergo psychotherapeutic, if not psychiatric treatment. She contacts the recognized psychiatrist Dr. West, who assures her that he can cure Samson and solve his writer's block. According to Rhoda, West should do his best to rid her husband of any suicidal thoughts and give him new creative impetus. Initially not very enthusiastic about this assignment, Dr. West quickly came up with his opinion when he saw Samson for the first time and was fascinated by his very idiosyncratic personality. According to West's suggestion, Samson should absolutely be admitted to his clinic, away from the familiar surroundings and the hustle and bustle of the big city, in order to find his way back to himself and thus back to his creative creativity. And so Simson Shillitoe enters the sanatorium. West's colleague Dr. Menken is very interested in the newcomer, whom he would love to use as a guinea pig for his surgical experiments with which he hopes to get Samson's outbursts of anger and violence under control. Rhoda is supposed to support Menken in his intention, but Dr. West and his colleagues Vorbeck and Kropotkin are vehemently against it, as this procedure entails massive dangers for the patient.
Lydia West, the clinician's wife, is dissatisfied with her marriage. While her husband is selling himself in public as a smart society doctor, also cuts a good figure in television programs and knows how to rally a growing (female) following, the young, attractive wife feels left alone by him. By chance she meets Simson in the sanatorium, who does not know that she is with Dr. West is married, but remembers that he had recently seen her at a reading in the audience. The author's old behavioral patterns immediately break open and he seduces them. The two sleep together in a therapeutic bath. When Dr. West in search of Samson secretly observed the two, matures in him the realization that in the upcoming vote regarding a possible consent to Menken's surgical intervention, his original voting behavior will be changed and his colleague will be okay with the operation on Samson's skull. Lydia wants to prevent this delicate operation at the last moment, but comes too late. She sees her husband with his head bandaged.
When Simson wakes up from the anesthetic, his voice is initially very weak, so that his attending physician Dr. Menken has to bend down to understand him. Simson takes advantage of this and strikes Menken down with a punch in the face. The operation was a complete failure and Samson's Shillitoe is dismissed as not cured. The writer then returns to New York. When Rhoda hears of his release, she immediately rushes to her husband. The maintenance claims of the first wife are still pending and in his quick-tempered way Samson wants to be given the choice: pay or go to jail, beat up an officer. Suddenly Lydia West shows up and pays the requested sum for him. Lydia tells Samson that she has left her husband and makes it clear to Samson subliminally that she wants to start an affair with him. Rhoda is furious about this immoral offer and thinks she can't believe her ears when Samson replies why one couldn't start a ménage à trois. Lydia is no less shocked by this suggestion and leaves the scene furious. With Rhoda at his side, Samson is walking down the street when she tells him that she is pregnant. Samson then knocks them down too. An outraged mob of pedestrians beat up Samson.
Production notes
Simson Cannot Be Beat was written in 1965 and premiered in New York on June 29, 1966. The German premiere took place on October 7, 1966.
Jack Poplin designed the film structures, Ann Roth the costumes.
Connery shot these Hollywood productions between his two Bond films Fireball and You Only Live Twice .
Reviews
The assessments were mixed to tend to be poor. Here are four examples:
"A no man's land somewhere between Nouvelle Vague and the crazy comedies of Old Hollywood."
The Movie & Video Guide said that the film was "an inconsistent, but sometimes incredibly funny satire".
Halliwell's Film Guide found the film to be "an inconsistent current comedy" that "suffers from having too many mood swings."
“The film is evidently meant as a parody, but in its ostensibly loud staging it breaks any attempt at it. Sean Connery plays the poet as a clichéd caricature of a poet. "
Individual evidence
- ↑ in the US original: S a mson
- ^ Leonard Maltin : Movie & Video Guide, 1996 edition, p. 425
- ^ Leslie Halliwell : Halliwell's Film Guide, Seventh Edition, New York 1989, p. 346
- ↑ Samson cannot be beaten. In: Lexicon of International Films . Film service , accessed September 22, 2018 .
Web links
- Samson can not be beat in the Internet Movie Database (English)