User reviews

Back in 1967, a film producer visited my family and asked if they could use our home and our neighbor's home for a new film starring Eli Wallach and Anne Jackson. After negotiations, parts of the film were filmed in our home and our neighbor's home.

Since I was in about 6th grade at the time, and since it was the biggest thing to hit our neighborhood, I was allowed to stay home the day of filming.

Being curious, I approached the coach bus parked in front of my home. I stepped inside and sat next to a very nice (handsome) gentleman. We got to talking, as he was very friendly. He explained that he had a small part, not being filmed at my house, and we sat and chatted for awhile. He told me his name, Dustin Hoffman. After ten or fifteen minutes I left the bus.

Just a few years later when watching a movie with Dustin Hoffman, my dad said... isn't that the guy from The Tiger Makes Out? It sure was... and I remembered my conversation on the bus with him. Over the years, I've followed his career.

Last night I was telling a friend about this movie. We later sat down to watch "The Holiday".... I was saying, wow... ELI WALLACH...we were just talking about him. Later in the movie, when there was a short glimpse of Dustin Hoffman, did I really get the chills... Am very curious as to why Dustin made a quick appearance in another of Eli's movies.

Just wish I could get the movie on DVD... searched the internet, and it's not to be found. Too bad... what wonderful memories that movie would bring back!!

He's a curmudgeonly mailman with a big vocabulary but no social skills or common sense. She's a bored suburban housewife with a bored husband and some children who may or may not actually exist. He hasn't yet figured out that his building was sold 6 years ago and his basement apartment is now being used for storage. She wants only to return to college to finish work on her baccalaureate.

The first half of this movie provides some wonderfully irreverent satire in its depiction of New York City as a benign dystopia. It has the feel of a 1960s beach movie turned into a sophisticated PG-rated urban sex romp. It occasionally falls flat in attempts to imitate the zaniness of Richard Lester films, but this doesn't detract from the clever humor.

The film weakens, however, after the inevitable meeting of the main characters. It's unfortunate that the writers had to resort to a plot device so ludicrous and offensive. The movie becomes mainly dialog driven beyond this point but the dialog just isn't good enough to support that and Eli Wallach's excellent Eric Von Zipper imitation eventually grows annoying. Nevertheless, the movie still has a few surprises to offer and the quick, merciful ending provides an oddly satisfying lack of conclusion.

I saw this movie on late night TV out of Buffalo about 30 years ago and I'm dying to see it again one more time before I... well.. you know. The interaction between the main characters after the Tiger (Eli Wallach) "captures" his prey (Anne Jackson) in a botched kidnapping attempt is absolutely hilarious. Charles Nelson Reilly's portrayal of a neurotic university dean(?) or department head is priceless. How many films can you name which are able to illuminate humanity's struggle for meaning and fulfillment by making you laugh from beginning to end? This film reminds us that we are all in that same struggle regardless of class, race, sex or religion. And who can forget the scene of the suburban homeowner on his hands and knees attacking those few tiny weeds that have dared to appear overnight on his perfectly manicure lawn!

It's up there with Where's Poppa, The Groove Tube, Putney Swope. It memorializes the NY city mind set of the period, a wonderfully strange man with a bizarre plan, hoist by by own petard, and at last retreating into the bed of his adoptive parents. Totally absurd, its the life one sees through the magic glasses, seeing things as they "really are"... I don't think it is ever shown anymore. If so, surely someone would Tivo the thing and put it out there. A kidnap goes awry: mixed up in a rain storm, dashing in and out or storefronts, our hero tosses a raincoat over his prey and tossing her into his bicycle powered ice cream wagon spirits her off to his basement apartment in the village. He is amazed, surprised, and incredibly disappointed when the wraps come off: instead of a luscious lady, he has captures a middle ages suburban housewife who talks and talks and talks. The film is full of vignettes of the commuters life, the suburban life, the city officials, and all the attitudes so dearly held. It pushes the limits of comedy, such as magical reality might push a drama, much as Daffy Duck is able to draw on imaginative scenes to demonstrate his plight or desires, all at the very edge of plausibility. All of it is humorous, nobody is mean.

In this era when almost everything makes it on to DVD (I'm expecting to see the My Mother the Car collection any day now) this film has been unfairly neglected. There are innumerable stupid comedies from the 60's as well as many other eras that have received at least a cursory DVD treatment. This one wasn't even released on VHS to my knowledge, despite the talents involved in the making (Arthur Hiller, Eli Wallach, Anne Jackson, Murray Shisgal (notable later for co-writing Tootsie), even Dustin Hoffman in his debut). It's obviously a product of the sixties but so is just about everything else from that era. All films reflect the tastes and customs of the times in which they are made. This was released the same year as The President's Analyst, another absurd masterpiece. That film was finally released on DVD and has developed a cult following. This film has many memorable bizarre, goofy, wacky moments. Sure, it's painted in broad strokes and has silly go-go music throughout but that's part of its charm. It creates its own absurd universe. If whoever is in charge of DVD production for Columbia Pictures releases (I believe Columbia released it) takes polls for new releases this gets my vote.

I remember seeing this film years ago, precable. It made me laugh sooo much. Why doesn't some SMART Columbia person put this out on DVD already. Since Eli is still with us and I think he is in good health, would'nt it be great if he could do a commentary on the film,(or at least an intro, or small interview, like he did for The Good The Bad And The Ugly reissue), prehaps along with Anne as well, if they are both up for it. But anyway it is a real shame that this gem has never been released for home theater viewing. Columbia finally released Good Neighbor Sam, but you have to get it in a box set. Other 60s funny ones I'm waiting for are; The Film Flam Man, The Art Of Love, Cold Turkey, and John Goldfarb Please Come Home.

I rarely write reviews but this film simply demands more attention than it gets as it contains the most hysterical kidnapping gone comically wrong sequence ever filmed.

I have only seen this once and found it to be the funniest film I had ever had the privilege to watch. I laughed from beginning to end. It is such a shame it is not out on DVD or video.

You can only compare its cinematography with that of It's A Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World or Promise her Anything. Only this storyline isn't nearly as complex as Mad World.

I hope in the near future this film is released as it would be a shame to lose such a comedy gem amongst the dregs we have nowadays.

THE TIGER MAKES OUT is an urban black comedy by Murray Schisgal that stars Eli Wallach as an alienated US mailman who life is in the toilet. He tries to kidnap a young woman to get back at an uncaring society but snags instead, a "middle-aged" suburban housewife (Anne Jackson), who has come into the city to try to finish her baccalaureate degree. In his basement apartment, they find they have much in common and suffer from the same urban malaise and dislike of modern society.

Sterling performances by Wallach and Jackson and many funny bits make this a neurotic delight. There's also a terrific supporting cast of familiar "New York" actors (and others) like Rae Allen, Sudie Bond, Bob Dishy, Charles Nelson Reilly, Dustin Hoffman (film debut), Ruth White, Jack Fletcher, Elizabeth Wilson, Frances Sternhagen, Bibi Osterwalkd, Judith Lowry, etc.

I'm not sure we as a society have improved much in the 50-odd years since this film was made.

This was written to the writer of a play that featured Eli Wallach

Sheila and I just watched the film"The Tiger makes out" on TMC starring your associate and friend, Eli Wallach, and I have to write to you about it. While this is rarely mentioned among important films-- script, directing or acting, it connected with me for particular reasons that I want to share with you.

I actually lived, in many ways, Ben Harris, Wallach's character. When we started to watch the film, (recorded so we could repeat scenes) at first we guessed the year of shooting- since much of it was on location in Manhattan, where I was living after dropping out of college in 1958. While working in the printing industry, I actually attending a half dozen colleges, very much what both Harris and ironically his wife Gloria Fiske (Anne Jackson) aspired to.

This gets more eerie, as there was a scene in the film where Harris explained to Gloria why he was not able to complete his treasured quest for that holy grail, a "baccalaureate" degree. It recapitulated something almost forgotten, that before I moved to N.Y.C. I had attended G.W. university in my home town of Washington. I was doing O.K that first semester except in one subject, which was French, that I could not learn no matter how hard I tried --

The scene where his captive- the woman who would be his wife for more years than probably any pair in the history of filmdom- was beyond the arts of acting, method or any other school. It could have been no less than the genuine affection that the two shared, a connection of loving concern by one human towards another. It came through with clarity, as it wasn't technique at all, but two people sharing what they were blessed to find.

Her sensitive, and clear explanation of the artifact of french pronunciation flowing between words, conveyed the pleasure of both teacher and student, the feelings between lovers or a mother and her child. As I watched, not realizing that this was between two people who had found each other in real life, I felt soothed by such caring, and genuine affection.

There's a darker side to the existence of Mailman Ben Harris, that resonated with me, his not knowing the name in the very first scene of a man he had known for a decade- showing that he had nothing that all human's need, companionship and belonging. So he set out to capture it, entering the fantasy land where he would do it by force. It could be that watching this in the movie house of 1968, where one couldn't pause and savor each scene on home TV, couldn't know how genuine was that life of the mailman- that "nut case" Ben Harris.

How lucky are those fortunate folks who have found human connections, friendship or identity groups. Those who don't suffer greatly, so relish the love of another human being in ways that "normal" people can't ever understand.

I didn't really care for this. Had they gotten rid of the comedy/slapstick and focused on the dramatic/philosophical aspects of the script, this might have been worthwhile.

The more the film went on, the less I liked the protagonist/mailman. He does have interesting things to say, but he's also a hypocritical, insecure jerk.

3/10

Performed 1965-66 season. Director by Jim Leighton; Porterville, Ca The Barn Theater's production of Murray Schisgal's one act plays: The Typists (with Ann B. Davis, Jim Leighton) and The Tiger (Ann. B. Davis, Bill Striglos). Information from 4 page playbill