Heller in Pink Tights

Heller in Pink Tights is directed by George Cukor and adapted to screenplay by Walter Bernstein from the novel "Heller With a Gun" written by Louis L'Amour. It stars Sophia Loren, Anthony Quinn, Margaret O'Brien, Steve Forrest, Eileen Heckart and Ramon Novarro. Music is by Daniele Amfitheatrof and cinematography by Harold Lipstein.

In simple terms this is Cukor trying to be clever whilst doing his only Western film. Plot basically follows The Great Healy Dramatic and Concert Company as they represent civilisation and culture coming to the Wild West. It's part spoof, part period farce but always narratively shallow. The costuming and colour lensing are sublime, undeniably, but these can't compensate for such a turgid story being performed by miscast stars.

Quinn called the picture unfortunate, Loren (looking painfully thin and sporting an unfortunate blonde mop on her head) was unhappy with the direction she received and serves solely as a clothes horse, while Cukor himself bemoaned cuts made by Paramount that further damaged what he thought was already a weak story. Receiving mixed reviews upon release, "Heller" was a box office flop, and really it's not hard to see why. Even if there's some value for Loren and Edith Head (costumes) fans. 4/10

Decent western/comedy/drama with awesome actors giving splendid interpretations, and set in the untamed border in which many people strugge simply to survive . Revolving around a traveling rep company called "Great Healy's Dramatic and Concert Company" in the Old West, it is a seedy vaudeville troupe in the 1880s when they arrive in Bonanza, a mining and smelter town . It features Tom Healy : Anthony Quinn, as the company manager, along with Angela: a bewigged Sophia Loren as his leading asset. In the way the latter dallys with a gunfighter named Clint Mabry : Steve Forest, who chases her out of Bonanza town. They are well accompanied by others members of this especial company : Eileen Eckart, Margaret O'Brien, Edmund Lowe. Centering the plot in this particular troupe and being well explored as the company performing to ramshackle communities in an untamed frontier. There's also Indian attacks and more risks until the troupe arranges to encounter a safe haven.

Offbeat Western and curiously some boring with a great main and support cast. Being based on a novel by prolific Louis L'Amour that follows faithfully the fun and dramatic adventures of a peculiar troupe acting out heroic tales of passion, tragedy, love and honourable death surrounded by altogether less romantic reality in which abounds gunslinging, more confrontation and Indian assaults. Including account for the unusual roles as well as confused plot, and playing much of adventure for comedy. The action includes entertaining extracts from various plays as La Belle Helene in the company's repertoire. Outstanding the duo protagonists, Anthony Quinn as a manager who stays hardly ever ahead of his creditors and Sophia Loren as the main stage actress who becomes involved with a pistolero played by Steve Forrest. Sophia Loren's assets are the movie's highlights.

The motion picture was professionally and sympathetically directed by George Cukor, but resulted to be some dull, briefly tedious and with some unbelievable roles . Cukor's one stab at the Western genre was an ordinarily personal response to the conventions, being partially sophisticated, Cukor's especiality. Cukor was a classic filmmaker who made a lot of films, many of them considered to be classic movies. It contains sensational main cast and support cast. Old time idols Ramon Novarro and Edmund Lowe prop up the casting. Along with other secondaries as Eileen Heckart, the ex prodigy child Margaret O'Brien, George Mathews, Edward Binns and brief appearance of Ken Clark.

It packs colorful cinematography in brilliant Technicolor by Harold Lipstein. Colour sets and production designs from Hal Pereira and Eugene Allen are excellent. As well as evocative and atmospheric musical score by Daniel Amfitheatrof. Interesting but tiring script by the prestigious writers Dudley Nichols and Walter Berstein. Adequate direction under the expert eye of George Cukor, but with no passion. Cukor worked from the Thirties to seventies making pretty good films with penchant for sophisticated comedy and drama, such as : One hour with you, What price Hollywood?, Dinner at eight, Camille, Unconventional Linda, Zaza , Susan and God ,Two-faced woman, Keeper of the flame, A double life ,A life of her own, The marrying kind, I should happen to you, The actress , Let's make love, The Chapman report, Justine, Love among ruines, The Blue Bird. Being his big hits the following ones : Little women, David Copperfield, Sylvia Scarlett, The Philadelphia story, Gaslight, Adam's rib, Born yesterday, Pat and Mike, A star is born, Bhowani Junction, My Fair Lady and his last movie : Rich and famous.

For the only western in the film credits of George Cukor he sure couldn't be faulted for the source of his material. This film is taken from one of the books by the great western novelist Louis L'Amour. It concerns the escapades of a traveling theatrical troupe in the west headed by Anthony Quinn with the leading lady being Sophia Loren. This was her only trip to the American west on film also.

Theatrical people did not exactly have the same kind of prestige back in those days as they do now. We first meet our players fleeing across the state/territorial boundaries of Nebraska and Wyoming evading a sheriff with a writ. They arrive in Cheyenne and get themselves involved with the villainous doings of Ramon Novarro and his hired gunman Steve Forrest.

After Forrest does a couple of jobs for him, Novarro tries a doublecross maneuver similar to the one Laird Cregar tried on Alan Ladd in This Gun For Hire with the same sorry results. Forrest of necessity joins the theatrical troupe and both get an opportunity to use their respective skills to help each other out of some tight spots.

This film had potential to be better. Maybe in the hands of someone like George Marshall or John Ford it might even have become a classic. George Cukor was not the director for it.

The film marked the last feature film appearance of both Ramon Novarro and Edmund Lowe. Novarro did do some television work until his tragic murder in 1968. Here he's a smooth and polished villain. Edmund Lowe does quite well as an old ham actor which at that point in his life was I'm sure one easy role for him.

Heller in Pink Tights is enjoyable enough, but no classic.

The film is the story of an acting troupe (Anthony Quinn, Sophia Loren, Eileen Heckart, Margaret O'Brien) who run into various monetary and Indian problems as they travel across the Western United States.

George Cukor, who directed this film, supposedly never liked how the usual western looked. They lacked color, according to him, and in "Heller in Pink Tights," Cukor set out to remedy that. The film is full of vivacious color. From Eileen Heckart's orange hair to Sophia Loren's platinum blonde wig and the various pieces of clothing that they wear. Visually the film is quite arresting. It mixes such loud, bright colors with the colors of such a rigid and tough landscape.

While the use of color is certainly interesting, the film never gets quite as far. The story is entertaining, but in a silly way. The chemistry between Loren and her two love interests (Quinn and Steve Forrest) is non-existent. She also looks totally uncomfortable with the blonde wig she is saddled with. Eileen Heckart is fun as the loudmouth actress/stage mother to O'Brien's character, and Anthony Quinn is his usual "dramatic" self.

"Heller in Pink Tights" certainly is a different kind of Western. I just only wish the film's story would have been as interesting as its use of color.

The look alone is worth the trouble. Rich, colorful, slightly baroque. Sophia Loren is as good as when she's directed by a great actor's director, this time is not Vittorio De Sica but George Cukor and her timing, her intention as a character is total perfection. Her sympathy is not merely believable but contagious and sympathy was Loren's secret weapon. True, it's not your Ford or Hawks western if anything it's closer to Sergio Leone with a slightly more refined if not feminine sensibility. The showdowns here are not of gun powder but of love power. The Art Direction is superb and the film shouldn't be dismiss because it doesn't fulfill the rules of the genre. This is a Cukor film and that in itself makes it a cut above most movies. Anthony Quinn is also traveling unknown territory very successfully. Eileen Heckart is, as usual, a scene stealer: "She's only sixteen!, only sixteen, do you hear?" she shouts trying to protect her most valuable asset, her daughter, played by Margaret O'Brien wanting to be accepted as a 20 year old. An extra plus for film lovers is a glimpse of Ramon Novarro one of the biggest stars of the silent era.