Leo the Last

I worked on this movie as a driver for the Directer, John Boorman. I remember he was very easy to get on with, and his wife Crystal was a pleasure to know her. The 2 younger twins, Daisy and Charlie were only very young then and were great kids. The family lived in Connaught Sq London, near Marble Arch, and I enjoyed many amusing lunches there particularly when Peter Cook turned up and the red wine was flowing like water.

By the time I joined the movie most of the filming was done and a lot of work was being done on the sound track. John was a perfectionist and the recording sessions often went late into the night. I remember the "end of shoot" party quite well, It was only across Hyde Park but the traffic was so busy John and his wife decided to catch the tube instead, but I cut through Mayfair and got there first. I thought maybe John would be annoyed at me arriving first, but he was very laid back that it wasn't a problem. He had 3 Au Pair girls, 2 Americans, and 1 Australian. I was going out with the Australian girl and she was mainly responsible for me moving to Australia.

In short, I enjoyed my experience working on the movie.

Yes, it's a weird movie filled with 60s/70s excess & exuberance of the sort Boorman later displayed in Zardoz. But it's a fun movie if you go along for the ride. Marcello alone is worth the time spent. His English is serviceable, but Marcello's comedic skills are not limited to language. His childlike expressions & physicality are formidable. It's not Divorce, Italian Style, but it's pretty damn good.

As a huge fan of early Boorman I finally had the chance of seeing a nice 35mm print of this at the Cinematheque here in Los Angeles last night, (opposed to horrid bootleg copies i'd seen previously) There must have been about 5 people in attendance, which isn't unusual lately for the Egyptian Theatre, especially for rare 70's films. It seems the crowds get smaller and smaller, nobody seems to care. While dumb rap clubs throb away on the streets of Hollywood and people file in to see disposable tripe like Pirtates of the "Carribbean 3" or "Knocked Up" down at the mega multiplexes, this little oddity from 1970 plays away to a small few. A film that will likely never be screened again, anywhere, at any time. This is a strange time we live in, it's over. This is it folks, there is no future for cinema, there is no future at all. At some point after the 70's ended we took a wrong path. it is over.

I totally get the reservations of some of the other reviewers, but I don't share them; I love this film, in fact it just about shades it as the John Boorman film that I would take to a desert island.

The streets in the film - Testerton (the main street which we see a lot) and Barandon, were demolished after filming and replaced by the Lancaster West Estate, and the junction of the far end of Testerton Street and Blechyden Street - seen in the background much of the time - is where Grenfell Tower now stands. Oddly, these very same streets are mentioned, disparagingly, at least twice by Colin MacInnes in 'Absolute Beginners'; and events in Blechenden Street and outside nearby Latimer Road tube station, were major factors in sparking the Notting Hill riots of the late '50s.

Interestingly, there are two other John Boorman films where a house is destroyed at the end: 'The Exorcist II - The Heretic' (1977), and 'Where The Heart Is' (1990).

In one of the more bizarre movies I have ever seen, Mastrianni stars as a rich, but somwhat shy rich person who spends his days spying with his telescope on his black neighbours across the street and the antics they get into. When I thought this was going to be nothing but a very strange variation of Rear Window, Mastrianni soon joins their cause in fighting for better living conditions... Soon he finds out that he actually owns the buildings in the first place..

Whoa, this is a John Boorman film? I should have expected actually, because his work wildly fluctuates. I have NO idea why Marcello Mastrianni is in this movie, as he either acting for the money, or curiously oblivious as how dated this was going to look after a number of years. A curious Movie indeed.