Surprise Package

You can only wonder why theyou bothered to make such a woefully unfunny film.YulBryner next film would be zThe Magnificent Seven,in the role of Chris.Coward would appear in a few more films.This was to be the end of Gaynors film career.What was Stanley Donenen thinking of.In fact the best part of the film were the opening credit titles which were designed by the great Maurice Binder.

I can not understand the negative comments about this film. I think that Yul Brunner is great in this film, mainly because he talks so mauch, which is completely atypical for him. Usually he played rather laconic characters. Noel Coward as ex-king is a perfect choice. Mitzi Gaynor is not the stupid blonde gangster bride, but basically very clever, only she is hardly taken seriously. She is also able to differentiate between good and bad, which the two main male characters, Nico and the ex-king, obviously cannot do. All in all a successful comedy that I can definitely recommend.

Gangster Brynner is exiled back to a Greek Island where he hatches a plan to steal the crown of the king of Anatolia played by Noel Coward.

Underrated comedy with a sparkling script of witty one liners, delivered really well by Brynner. In support, Coward is well...Coward and there's a nice turn by Guy Deghy as a thief who helps Brynner. Best of all is Mitzi Gaynor, who plays Brynner's moll. Her performance is wonderful as is she, making this all in all a really quite charming film.

The only bum note the Coward / Gaynor title song duet - could have done without that.

In this fast talking, mostly comical movie- Yul Brynner plays an American gangster, Nico March and dressed appropriately for the part, that has been deported to the country of Greece. Along for the ride is his goody-two-shoes girlfriend Gabby Rogers, played by Mitzi Gaynor, and they are living the boring life of visitors on the coast of Greece.

Nico meets a laundry load full of suspicious characters while cooling his heels and even meets the exiled King Pavel II played by Noel Coward. He comes up with a clever plan to steal the King's crown but there are just as many other criminals waiting to do the exact same thing.

If you are reading this review without watching the movie then you may believe that it is a nice semi-mystery and cunning portrayal of the criminal mind. Perhaps it would have been a better movie had the writers decided to go that way. Instead we have Brynner and Gaynor playing a comedy team that was so ill-matched it took away from the entire story. When a person thinks of Yul Brynner- 'Comedy'- does not come to mind, nor does comedy come to mind in this presentation. First of all, some people have a hard time clearly understanding words that Brynner speaks. Now throw in Brynner speaking like the fast talking Fed-Ex commercial man, and even the most noted linguist teacher would have a problem with the dialog.

Mitzi Gaynor added very little to the script by just playing the sweet unintelligent girlfriend and doing nothing that caused interest to the character. The only time that the viewer really takes notice of Gaynor is when she, along with Coward, is singing the title song 'Surprise Package' and that comes too late to help the movie.

Not to take anything away from Yul Brynne but he appear a miscast for this type of movie. Perhaps another actor could have helped with the interest of this film. But that is a moot point. But I will say that the movie did have some nice 'one-liners'.

Yul Brynner is very hard to understand in this movie because he talks fast and his accent gets in the way, but he is still eye candy to me nonetheless. He does play a good brat. Not the same sort of brat Rameses was in The Ten Commandments. The brat he plays in this movie is a wealthy gangster who was exiled back to his birth country of Greece. He's not smart by any means, maybe street smart, but he spelled the only correct word in the Scrabble game between he and Gabby. He pouts, he name-calls, he tells people to shut up, he has a tantrum, etc.

Mitzi Gaynor (Gabby) is a cute girlfriend/sidekick to Yul's gangster character (Nico). Noel Coward's character (King Pavel) bores me to tears.

Cute movie, but not brilliant by any means. Some funny parts, but could be funnier.