Ellery Queen: Don't Look Behind You

This is clearly a pilot intended for the NBC MYSTERY MOVIE series, which began 2 months earlier in late 1971. While the first season had 3 shows on Wednesdays, the second season moved those to Sundays and added a 4th, while adding 3 new ones on Wednesdays. (Yes, unless you're a fanatic about them like me, chances are you need a scorecard to keep track.) "But it didn't sell". And watching the first 5 minutes, I could tell you WHY.

Barry Shear, who did a ton of TV (starting out in comedy & variety shows) just had too much "style" and "gimmicks" before and during the opening credits, with still shots, B&W, short clips, and what I personally found was an intensely-annoying animated cartoon thing involving a many-headed snake. I found myself yelling at my computer screen, "When does the STORY start?"

I've been watching every Ellery Queen movie I can find online; some are fun, some are terrific, some are just annoying. Between the various movies in the 1930s & 40s, plus no less than 4 separate TV series in the 1950s, Peter Lawford was actually the 9th actor to play Ellery on-screen! And while they most definitely hit paydirt with #10, just this moment, all I want to say is, Lawford is NO Ralph Bellamy. HE was too old, also, but not this old, NOT this smug, over-confident and aloof, and NOT this... English. Seriously, what was anybody thinking when they decided to change the relationship between Inspector Queen and his SON, and make it a questionable uncle-nephew thing? (I have to assume someone cast Lawford first and then everything else flowed from that.)

Harry Morgan is PERFECT as Inspector Queen. I can easily see him and Charlye Grapewin-- or David Wayne-- as being the SAME character.

Once past the annoying style & casting problems, the rest of the film isn't bad. But-- and I must stress this-- it suffers from a problem MANY of the NBC Mystery Movies did in the 70s-- being too long. When they started, a 90-minute format (with about 75 minutes of film and 15 of commercials) was not unique, but was still unusual. And on repeatedly re-watching the 2nd season of "McCLOUD" (1971-72), I've noted that maybe half of those feel like they were written for a one-hour format-- then, PAINFULLY padded out for the 90-minute slot. Later, when some fool at NBC decided "all" the movies would be in 2-hour slots, you had the same problem amplified, with 75-minute scripts suddenly having to be padded out to 100 minutes. Well, THIS Ellery Queen movie felt REALLY padded out to me! I kept seeing all number of things that could have (should have) easily been CUT, which would have improved the film in the process. (Usually, episodes butchered for syndication murder the flow of the stories-- but this one, it would have helped.)

Among the highlights for me were the cast (E. G. Marshall, Skye Aubrey, Bill Zuckert, Bob Hastings). And then of course there was Stephanie Powers. No surprise, Barry Shear directed her in 7 episodes of "THE GIRL FROM UNCLE", and, one of my all-time favorite episodes of "McCLOUD"-- "Butch Cassidy Rides Again"-- one of the longer ones that DID NOT feel padded out! Funny enough, that one also involved computer analysis. Maybe Shear was really into that?

I recognized Jerry Fielding doing the music, as some of his jazz riffs sounded identical to ones he used in the Dirty Harry movie "THE ENFORCER".

I also recognized the observation platform of The Empire State Building, where that really-suspenseful scene was shot. (I've been up there twice.)

All in all, the Jim Hutton-David Wayne "ELLERY QUEEN" was way better than this, DID go to a series (albeit a regular, one-hour format), and DID deserve to go on a lot longer than it did.

Don't Look Behind You does deserve to be judged separately, but the comparisons will be inevitable, it's just that when you watch this film and then the TV series or vice versa it is easy to see which is superior(in this case the TV series with Jim Hutton, one of my personal favourite shows of the 70s). Don't Look Behind You is not bad though, certainly better than it is given credit for despite its debits being really quite problematic. It is far from cheap, the soft grained image has a real charm to it, the lighting does give off a sinister and not too obvious atmosphere and it is evocative detail-to-period wise. The music has a real suavity and liveliness, there is some amusing smart dialogue especially between Ellery and Inspector Queen and the story and mystery is mostly diverting and keeps us guessing. The animation images for the hydra are genuinely creepy and still look good today, and the acting is serviceable with solid if fairly careful support acting and good chemistry between them. Harry Morgan is very good as Inspector Queen and Stefanie Powers is beautifully seductive. Peter Lawford from personal opinion however is miscast, that he is too old is not so much a problem but, while there are moments where he is very suave(and he has a pleasant speaking voice), he does come across as too aloof and too self-assured. The opening credits are cool but go on for far too long, the suspense is rather dragged out at times and when my house mates and I watched this all of us correctly guessed the identity of the killer too early. Some of the lighting at the end is a little too bright and somewhat surrealist as well. In conclusion, better than it's given credit for but not great. 6/10 Bethany Cox

"Ellery Queen: Don't Look Behind You" was a super stylish pilot for a projected NBC series for the 1971-72 season.

"Ellery Queen" was up for a slot on the new "Wednesday Mystery Movie" wheel that wound up including "Columbo", "McCloud", and "McMillan and Wife". NBC almost picked "Ellery Queen" over "McMillan and Wife".

Barry Shear's direction of "Ellery Queen" was really stunning (including cartoon segments of the "hydra" killer).

Peter Lawford gave a light, suave, likable performance as Ellery Queen, even if he was miscast. Lawford was an appealing actor, who had been fine in "Good News", "The Longest Day", and "Advise and Consent". He even made a good Nick Charles in "The Thin Man".

I wish "Queen" had sold. "Ellery Queen" was really a who-done-it mystery, which you can't say for "Columbo" or "McCloud". "Ellery Queen" could have been a fine fourth detective on the mystery wheel. I think it would have been a success.

I could well have lived with the charming Peter Lawford as Ellery, but if the role had to be recast I think James Wainwright, Roy Thinnes, Mike Farrell, Michael Douglas, Michael Parks, or Bradford Dillman might have been interesting.

Andrew Duggan or Jose Ferrer would have been cool as Inspector Richard Queen, Ellery's father. But Harry Morgan made an excellent Inspector Queen in the movie.

To produce the show, I would have tried to get the great Richard Alan Simmons ("Trials of O'Brien", the "Banyon" movie pilot).

The writer of this "Ellery Queen" pilot movie was "Ted Leighton", which was a pseudonym for Richard Levinson and William Link ("Columbo"). Levinson/Link later produced the fondly remembered "Ellery Queen" series with Jim Hutton and David Wayne. (Edward Herrmann was also considered to play Ellery in the series in addition to Jim Hutton.) Levinson/Link sold their first story to "Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine" when they were teenagers. They must have been big fans of the writer/detective. Levinson/Link later created "Murder, She Wrote" about a woman writer/detective.

In this adaption of an Ellery Queen novel obviously meant to be a TV pilot for a series, Peter Lawford essays the part of the famed mystery writer Criminologist. The case that he solves for the NYPD involves the seemingly random strangulations of certain men and women who have no apparent connection to each other. They're strangled with ribbons, blue for the men and pink for the women. And the press has given the serial killer the name of the Hydra.

The colors of the ribbons might give you a clue to what common denominator the victims have. And the motive is a twisted one from a very twisted mind.

Harry Morgan was a very good choice to play the part of Inspector Queen of the NYPD. Given their relative ages I thought that Peter Lawford was too old to be believable as Morgan's son. But fans of Ellery Queen must have been shocked when Morgan becomes Ellery's uncle and only a half brother at that to his father.

That helped the believability in ages, but Lawford turns out to be quite the swinger, something the cerebral Ellery Queen never was in the novels. Purists must have been aghast. Later on in the Seventies, Jim Hutton was perfect as the cerebral intellectual Ellery with David Wayne as his detective father. Too bad that series didn't have a longer life as well as it star should have.

E.G. Marshall plays a consulting psychiatrist who has an agenda himself and Coleen Gray his wife. Possible suspects and victims include Stefanie Powers and Skye Aubrey.

The film is all right, but Ellery Queen fans no doubt were disappointed.

The 70's Ellery Queen series is a joy for any mystery buff like me. I have the ones from the 30's and would love to obtain all of the ones from the 70's. Hutton is the best yet. Today' movies just cannot compete They depend too much on special effects The earlier movies gave you a chance to become part of it. You were able to think along with the characters. Solve the crime or at least attempt to.