moosish-628-965954

My title for this review says it all. The script was predictable and sophomoric, more like a high school play. The make-up and hair-dos were perfect for 1969, instead of the silent film era. Dick Van Dyke does the most with what's there, but even his (and Carl Reiner's) gigantic talents couldn't save this spoonful of nothingness.

What a waste of talent! So many familiar, capable actors in an embarrassingly bad movie! Is it trying to make a statement about slavery and racial exploitation? A little, here and there. But if that's the point, it's lost in a nonsensical plot with trite dialogue and stereotypical characters. The most glaring issue (besides the plot, with many scenes making no LOGICAL, temporal sense) is the clearly 1950s dress styles masquerading as antebellum fashions, but with hoop skirts. The other production values are fine -- typical mid-50s stuff. The music score from the master (Max Steiner) is fine, but again, it's lost behind the senselessness of the plot. It's always fun to see movie stars in their earliest roles, but even the fun of seeing young Sidney Poitier, or the pre-Lily Munster Yvonne De Carlo, or the late-in-career Clark Gable, isn't worth having to watch the rest of this stupid attempt to make a meaningful statement about race and values in the antebellum South.