The Insomniac’s Movie Review: Seconds
By Bud White on November 28, 2008 at 10:20 PM in Age Discrimination, California, Media, Television
Seconds (1966)
Director: John Frankenheimer
Rating: 4 Ambien (out of 5)
On the surface, Seconds is the story of the myth of the ultimate male fantasy. Imagine The Truman Show voyeurism with the lustiness and self-loathing of a Woody Allen character.
Arthur Hamilton (John Randolph) is a successful but miserable banker, the man in the gray flannel suit who is known for his silences. He has a loving wife but their marriage is on life support. His grim life will soon end, one feels, without him experiencing real passion or joy.
A mysterious phone calls leads him to a company who promises to a give him a new life. It’s the world’s swankiest witness protection program. Plastic surgery transforms him into the handsome Rock Hudson. He’s given a beach house in the Malibu Colony, a servant, and the life of an artist. On the surface it seems ideal.
Of course not all is well in paradise. Hamilton (now Hudson) is still the same morose man underneath the good looks and enviable lifestyle. He meets Nora Marcus (the beautiful and underrated Salome Jens) on the beach. She’s the divorced mother of two who is the opposite of Hamilton. Her beauty is faded by the weariness of her life. She left her wealthy husband and the lifestyle he provided in order to live as a bohemian. In the best scene in the movie, she takes Hamilton to a nudist grape stomping “bacchanal” in Santa Barbara. Hamilton can’t relax enough to enjoy himself in a genuine way and, later, he uses drink to loosen up enough to be the man he has been “reborn” to be.
The critic Peter Wilshire writes that Seconds “is a disturbing film to watch. With its unresolved, horrific ending, it’s possibly one of the most depressing films ever made.” I disagree. I didn’t find the movie depressing at all. The movie did leave me with the feeling of 1960s Cold War paranoia, although that’s not the topic in any respect. But I don’t think it’s an accident that Seconds feels foreboding. Frankenheimer directed the ultimate paranoid thrillers of that decade, The Manchurian Candidate and Seven Days in May. In a Frankenheimer movie, things are not what they seem; the world is disjointed, fragmented, and people wear masks — either of their own making or masks that have been forced onto them.
I believe that if Seconds had been directed by another young director of that era, Mike Nichols, for instance, it would have felt far less paranoid and more bittersweet, akin to Nichols’ The Graduate, released in 1967.
Seconds is an imperfect movie but exhilarating in its own way. It’s risky, and for that reason The Insomniac gives it 4 out of 5 Ambien.
Pauline Kael, in her famous essay, “Why are movies so bad?” says “if a movie doesn’t have an easily paraphrasable theme or big stars, it’s hard to sell via a thirty-second TV commercial.” Seconds is complex and disjointed. Does the trailer adequately explain the movie?
What did you think of Seconds? Did you find it depressing? What do you interpret as the main theme? Who was the best actor/actress?
What other movies from the 1960s do you love?
No review next week. The next review will be on December 12. We’ll be discussing The Salton Sea, which comes recommended by OBAMA IS A FRAUD.
h/t to TexasMirth for tonight’s recommendation.
******
In an interesting historical aside, Bobby Kennedy was staying at Frankenheimer’s Malibu home during the California Democratic Primary in June 1968. Frankenheimer drove RFK in his Rolls-Royce to the Ambassador Hotel on election night. RFK was gunned down by Sirhan Sirhan in the kitchen pantry. An interviewer asked Frankenheimer if RFK’s death was a defining moment in his life. He answered: “Absolutely. It was the defining moment of mine.”
(Release: November 13)
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Movie at eleven. Stay on the topic.
The movie I recall the strongest from the 60’s is “The Blob”. I can still recall like yesterday, running away from the black and white Zenith TV… shear horror.
I will look for the movie you recommend.
No idea where I ran across this movie, but I caught it during the opening credits late on night and watched it all. I really liked it even just as shallowly as a long Twilight Zone episode.
Anyway, even without really digging in to the movie’s themes, it’s pretty enjoyable.
I don’t remember seeing this film — but I’m going to see if it’s on DVD.
The Graduate is one I did see — “Plastics” the career direction recommended in the film.
Twilight Zone — seems like the “do over” has been a theme in this old TV series.
If it were possible to start over, with a blank slate what would any of us want to change? Wisdom and maturity in a different body.
Those are interesting question, NWR. I think you’d like the movie.
I enjoy these side trips into non political subjects. AH — that’s what’s interesting about this movie — the SciFi dilemma. SciFi enables us to explore contemporary topics without the messiness of reality to intrude.
Since I don’t have a tv — I’ve been adding to my DVD collection.
I don’t have cable. I don’t think I could have survived this election with Keith Olbermann screaming about Hillary. Movies and NQ were my salvation.
Oh I do agree!! Movies & NQ!!
“LA Confidential” was at Costco — good price.
Frankenheimer infuses this film with creepiness. I first saw it at age 11, and the feeling of dread lingered for a long time, making adulthood seem too dreary to imagine. “About Schmidt” offers a similar, stilted middle-aged character but without the sense of foreboding that The Company added. I could paraphrase our president-elect at this point (please forgive me) to illustrate what “Seconds” said to me: “You can put lipstick on…Arthur Hamilton, but he’s still Arthur Hamilton.”
Rock Hudson did a great job in this film. “Seconds” is the movie I always think of when I hear his name.
I can understand that. I saw Taxi Driver when I was about 7 or 8 and there were images that have stayed with me the last few decades.
Thanks for recommending the movie. It was one of the more challenging, interesting movies I’ve seen in ages. What do think of the Frankenheimer/RFK connection? Isn’t that creepy that director of paranoid movies would take RFK to his death?
That is strange indeed – and something I had not heard before. His films are really paranoia-inducing. “The Manchurian Candidate” is another great example of that frenzied Frankenheimer style.
Thanks for the fun Insomniac’s Movie Review!
I like the movie review posts. I am looking for good movies to rent on Netflix. I am afraid of getting depressed though!
I always decided that I did not want to be someone else, or look like someone else, because then I would not be myself. I would not know how to be someone else. And, if I became someone else completely, I wouldn’t know it anyway! I thought about this as a kid, if you can believe it.
On the other hand, I don’t see how anyone, any man, could not enjoy being as good looking as Rock Hudson!
That saying, “grass is always greener” is very true. We often think other people are more fulfilled, more loved, more successful but I think most people know people who they envy (or just admire) in some way, and wish they had those qualities.
Cary Grant actually said that he wished he could be Cary Grant, the guy in the movies. So much for having it all. My mother, sister, and I used to stay up late and watch “creepy” movies. I recommend a really creepy one, late thirties, called The Return of Dr. X, starring Wayne Morris and Humphrey Bogart and Joan Vance. Truly creepy. I now prefer to watch really good films, which are mostly Brit films which I get through Netflix. Those who want to watch quality drama should check out The Grand (a miniseries), The Pallisers (another miniseries), Cranford (more miniseries), North and South (Not John Jakes brand but the Brit one). I love Random Harvest written by James Hilton and starring my all-time favorites Ronald Coleman and Greer Garson. And let’s not forget Mrs. Miniver and Pride and Prejudice with Greer Garson and Laurence Olivier…ah now movies depend on special effects and if I’m going to watch special effects I prefer Star Trek Voyager – my all time favorite captain, Captain Janeway.
There’s a great Ronald Coleman film noir, but I can’t remember the title. I’ll look it up….. A Double Life…amazing
I think even what would seem a good thing has its trappings? Please indulge me as I go off on a tangent now: One thing I like about text only internet communications is we don’t get biased by how someone looks, unless they choose to tell us what they look like. My thoughts can be judged on their merits and it doesn’t matter if I am an extraterrestrial with two noggins that breaths strontium 90 — no one can see me.
Well, Galt(’s), you have a point. It works both ways. I am too old for it to matter now, but when I was younger, men did not care that I was ’smart’ (a good student, anyway). I was pretty enough to work as a model when I was in college. So, you can imagine what they responded to. But, I cared much more for ideas and writing. Modeling gave me a headache (literally).
I understand your need for income back then but it must have sucked being objectified and no one even knows or cares what makes you tick or who you really are inside. I think the human mind is hard wired to judge on (skin deep) beauty and symmetry (equating to health) for breeding purposes. But we also have minds and should use them to balance these hardwired impulses with being judged on who we are and not what we look like.
Wrong men!
Smart trumps flash, every time.
Galt, Can I’ll have the “Strontium 90″ pizza to go? It stay’s warm all the way home I’ve discovered.
What is sight in the Zen world?
Frankenheimer, and the script writer, knew you always take your demons with you.
[...] The Insomniac’s Movie Review: Seconds : NO QUARTER by Hillary Rodham Clinton. Gusher of Lies: The Dangerous Delusions of Energy Independence. Seen on 60 Minutes: daltonfury160.jpg · Kill Bin Laden: A Delta Force Commander’s Account of the Hunt for the World’s Most Wanted Man … [...]
I love your movie reviews Bud. Thanks for this creative distraction from the world of terror and politics.
I wish I was watching Seconds right now Bud. I’m being forced to sit through King Arthur…and I don’t mean John Boorman’s Excaliber either, I mean, some weird ass retelling of King Arthur as a Roman soldier with no sword, no Holy Grail, and a half naked women with blue body paint, a leather strap for boob support and archery skills. How the hell can she manage to keep her eyebrows waxed when they didn’t even believe in bathing back then? And why do I even care. My husband owes me bigtime for this one.
That’s too funny
anyway…… I suspect that the movie is more about how society warps us.
Why is the man so unhappy with himself that he wants to be someone else?
That is much stronger than admiring someone for their qualities. As a young person, I used to choose people I admired, to emulate. I wanted to develop the qualities that I admired in them, in myself.
There is always someone with more and there is always someone with less. Plenty of people who don’t get high grades, have good looks or money, are happy, and vice versa.
Back in the day, movies dictated our youthful behavior.
Boys tried to be the good guy in westerns or the heroes of countless chivalrous movies.
Being Lauren Bacall got me through job interviews with sexist male interviewers before women’s lib.
Now I don’t know who young people have to emulate.
The corporation had warped this man. Plastic surgery didn’t help, but Frankenheimer suspensfully builds a story of man trapped by society.
Great performances by everyone and surprise all the way. No happy ending here, but a deep look at the edgy dissatisfied culture that bred our anti hero.
Not to be missed after seeing our escalated plastic surgery culture becoming suffused with the unbridled greed of Wall Street and the Mortgage Lenders.
Why is Hudson unhappy? Our culture, our corporate structure and his foolish belief that plastic surgery and a new identity would change his unhappiness.
This sickness is within a
society that produces the kind of robots that wrote bad mortgages, and those on Wall Street who bundled them into a Ponzi scheme of overvalued if not worthless assets to any takers. Moral bankruptcy at its peak.
Mad Men currently running on Cable is about the same kind of man in the Ad Business of the 60’s.
All of this is repeating itself today. Greed, emptiness, destruction. Unless regulations occur that set parameters, this will continue and currently is affecting all of us negatively.
Never saw “Seconds” but thanks for the info. I like to get into old classic flicks from time to time, it’s an education as to how society was int different decades. Saw “Reflections in a Golden Eye” (thinks that’s the name) and was stunned by the quality of the acting of Brandon and Taylor.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0062185/
Reflections looks very interesting. I haven’t seen it. It’s from the same period, 1967
Frankenheimer films I’ve seen and highly recommend:
The Manchurian Candidate (1962)
Seven Days in May (1964)
Ronin (1998)
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I’ve seen a lot of old movies, but I sure never saw this one! I’ve kind of glad I didn’t! Creepy movies give me the creeps!
My favorite film from the 60s is Dr. Strangelove (Or How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love The Bomb).
Peter Sellers was at the top of his game, playing several characters in the film. His Dr. Strangelove characterwas hilariously quirky… a wheelchair-bound spastic ex-Nazi who developed a Doomsday Machine for the Soviet Union. The Doomsday Machine was a network of atomic explosions designed to be the ultimate deterrant: nobody would dare bomb the USSR for fear of setting it off, thus wiping out humanity.
But I think my favorite scene is the penultimate scene of Slim Pickens straddling the atomic bomb that is stuck in the bomb bay doors, getting it loose, and riding it down to earth, waving his Stetson and whooping like a rodeo cowboy. This of course sets off the Doomsday Machine. And the film ends with various shots of atomic explosions while the music plays, “We’ll meet again, don’t know where, don’t know when…”
Stanley Kubrick directed it, and it’s one of his best.
I did not see Seconds.
One of the movies of the time that made people think was ” The Bedford Incident”.
The feeling was that it really could happen.
I haven’t seen Seconds, but have now added it to my Netflix queque. Another interesting movie from the sixties era (this with a political premise) is Advise and Consent. To me, any movie designated as film noir is also worth a watch. (I personally would call Road to Perdition film noir, but most are from the forties and fifties.)
I loved Road to Perdition. So atmospheric.
I saw SECONDS several times during its initial release.
Found Hudson’s performance compelling and Salome Jens was also terrif. What was so futuristic about the movie was Frankenheimer’s use of the metaphor.
The perfect corporate man wanting to escape himself, but the “system” not allowing him to do so. Love was also elusive to this man, inspite of his makeover. Plastic surgery, anyone??
Hudson played this haunted soul to perfection, and it’s a mystery,drama,and metaphor for corporate corruption of the soul. A very under rated Frankenheimer masterpiece. It should be seen.
I dont get it, has NQ morphed into a chat site about movies?
dont get me wrong I love sci fi especially old sci fi but??
Im seeing a few things on here that seem to make it more like a chat site. All well and good for you all I guess, but since basically no one ‘chats’ with me here maybe its time to move on (so to speak)
Since the election is over and Friday nights are usually pretty slow, so we decided to do a movie chat once a week. There’s still plenty of politics and national security at NQ. Do you have anything to contribute?
I think mine from the 60s was the Plane of the Apes…
A bunch of us had gone downtown on the bus…That ending had most of really kind of scared on the way home..
Remember this was the time when we were doing the drop and cover drills in school. I lived in Houston just a missile throw away from Cuba.
I meant “Planet of the Apes”
I remember seeing this as a first date with my future girlfriend and jokingly saying something about Heston finding the Statue of Liberty (which I had no idea about at the time.)
“Get your hands off me, you damned dirty ape!”
I like a movie when the ending takes me by surprise. So a good scary movie for me was “The Others” with Nicole Kidman.
I LOVED that movie. I didn’t realize until the end that it was Kidman who was dead!!! Awesome!
The movie is based on a book that I read decades ago. If you get a chance, read the book by David Ely. I remember liking the book more than the film, although the ending in the book is even more depressing.
Really…Thank you, I’ll see if Amazon has it.
My Favorite Science Fiction movie of the 60s was the Brit film, Day of the Triffids, (1962). You ought to review it here.
Also enjoyed Steve McQueen in the Blob(1958).
These two were my favorites for the late fifties, early sixties.
Greatly enjoy your movie reviews on slow Friday nights.
Keep on bringing them on, my advice.
Thanks for the feedback. I have never seen The Blob. That will have to go into my Netflix queue.