Shack Out on 101

When the producers at lowly but lovable Monogram decided to sell an upgraded product, they replaced their banner with that of Allied Artists. This AA release definitely retains that absurd old Monogram spirit. Is it a comedy/satire? A spy spoof? An anti-commie rant? An Ed-Woodian comment on twisted sex mores? A love story? All these things? None of the above? No one knows for sure. The late David Newman said it best in his seminal "Guilty Pleasures" article for Film Comment -- "at no time is it possible to get a handle on this movie." There's a scene where Wynn and Marvin attack a neon swordfish sign that is as nutty as any George Zucco and a guy-in-a-gorilla-suit nonsense from the studio's glory days. Lee Marvin's outrageous method-acting licks seem to come from another planet, and why is everyone so crazy about Terry Moore? Or are the boys really crazy about each other? Fans of Seinfeld be sure to look out for Uncle Leo when he was a young thespian -- and already doing the annoying shtick he later perfected in that series.

Lee Marvin's "Slob" character alone makes this worth viewing, although the espionage film is a bit talky and stagy. Still, Marvin is a real hoot, right from the beginning, and provides a few neat surprises near the end. "Slob" is the name of his character, and it fits.

Otherwise, the film is an insult-fest with everyone trading barbs at one another. Some of them are pretty funny. Keenan Wynn as "George," the diner owner, is involved in many of the put-downs but Terry Moore has a lot of good lines, too. They reminded me some good film noir dialog.

Moore plays the blonde bimbo, "Kotty," a self-proclaimed "hash-slinger" who has good looks and figure and isn't as dumb as she sounds. The guys all call her "tomato" during the story, a popular slang term for babes back in the '50s. All the guys in here are hot for Kotty, and you can't blame them.

Several characters in here aren't who they appear to be, beginning with Frank Lovejoy's professor role, so the movie does keep you guessing.

This is an odd film, a B-atmosphere with an "A" cast. It includes some strange scenes such as the goofy weight workout at the diner with Marvin and Cobb, and later a dry-land snorkel-thon between Cobb and Whit Bissell. Speaking of the latter, Bissell is a familiar face. He did a ton of TV shows in the 1950s through the 1970s. I saw him on a number of Lone Rangers episodes but he also had multiple appearances of Wagon Train, Peyton Place, The Virginian, Perry Mason, World Of Disney, The Rifleman and many, many more shows.

This is one of those strange films where overall, it sucks - let's face it, but many individual scenes make you just laugh out loud, meaning it had enough entertainment to have made my (and others here) time watching it worthwhile......barely.

Now here's some trash like it oughta be. Keenan Wynn's greaseball diner becomes the crux of a commie spy ring featuring the much-maligned Slob (suddenly I LOVE Lee Marvin). It's up to babyfaced waitress Terry Moore to set things straight. The rapport between Marvin and Wynn when they're not on the let's-get-into-Terry's-pants bandwagon is something to behold - this movie is casual in a delirious way, feels like it was shot on break from a really fun beach party. In their effort to add variety to what is basically a one-set movie, there is SO much going on - there's a goofy workout scene, Wynn gets uncharacteristically introspective and soft-spoken and then suddenly he's running around in flippers and snorkel, and a pacifist veteran shoots a commie with a spear gun. The plot contrivances have to be seen to be believed, especially the triple-macguffin love interest subplot with the State Department lunkhead and Moore walking straight in and out of the spy conference without being noticed. Lots of political speeches, all somehow overwrought and vague at the same time.

The shack out on Highway 101 just north of San Diego is an oceanside greasy-spoon hung with nautical bric-a-brac like a Red Lobster franchise. It's also the regional headquarters for an subversive spy ring and the claustrophobic setting for one of the oddest fish spawned during the Red Scare paranoia of the post-war years.

Keenan Wynn owns the joint, with short-order cook Lee Marvin and waitress Terry Moore as his live-in help, an arrangement as uncomfortable for Moore as it is convenient for Marvin, who can't keep his hands or lips off her. Regulars include Frank Lovejoy (as an unspecified 'professor' romancing Moore), salesman Whit Bissell, an old fisherman making 'deliveries' right off the boat, and a couple of drivers for theAcme Poultry Company who come in for coffee and cherry pie. In this entrepôt big wads of cash get traded for tiny slivers of microfilm. And operatives losing their nerve or asking too many questions get dead.

Few of those movies which the studios felt constrained to issue in testimony to their rock-solid Americanism were much good (and audiences shunned them like week-old mackerel). But they shared an utter lack of humor and a suffocating tone of moral urgency. This one is more perplexing. The prevailing tone remains light, at times veering toward farce, to an extent that the very real possibility presents itself that the whole thing is a very sly put-on.

One morning when Wynn and Marvin, stripped to their waists, engage in some weight-lifting, Wynn insists that his chest muscles be referred to as 'pecs.' Marvin retorts 'I'm very happy with my pecs,' whereupon they call in Moore to judge which of them has the better legs. In another scene, Moore, lighted through the holes of a hanging colander, looks like she contracted some exotic contagion. But then the movie shifts abruptly into cloak-and-dagger episodes right out of B-movies of the international intrigue genre. Towards the end, the heart sinks as it becomes clear that the movie means us to take it seriously. But serious about what? Never is the word 'Communist' uttered.

I find it tremendously rewarding to see all these enthusiastic comments about this movie here on the IMDb. This is a film that no-one ever seems to have heard of, and it's a guilty pleasure in every way. It makes NO sense, it is essentially claustrophobically confined to one cheap set within which a stream of unlikely characters played by great quirky actors parades by. There is no narrative structure at all, and you're not even sure what the point is by the end, but thanks especially to Lee Marvin and Keenan Wynn, you're fascinated all along the way.

I haven't seen it in years now (something happened to my videotape of it, recorded off of TNT many years ago), but I'd consider it one of my favorite movies on the basis of the fact that I could watch it over and over and always find it satisfying.

It's hard to recommend it for any rational reason, and yet I'd urge any film buff with even a tiny sense of the absurd to watch it some time before you die. You'll never see anything remotely like it, for good reason. But it gives you faith in the concept that just about anything can get produced, if you only believe strongly enough.....