Ela Topou a Parada

You know if this were a serious film, Lana Turner would have hustled off Dean Martin to Gamblers Anonymous and that would be the end of it. But movie comedy demands a crazy scheme as a premise.

In a scheme worthy of Lucy Ricardo, Lana decides to take over Dino's action. She enlists his lecherous law partner Eddie Albert in on it. Albert pretends that he's got a new bookie who's the best in town. Martin goes for it.

Of course the idea is based on the fact that Dino will lose, but the money will then stay in the family. Instead Dino gets on a hot streak causing all kinds of unforeseen complications.

Who's Got the Action has a cast full of familiar faces doing what they do best. I suppose tops in the supporting cast is Walter Matthau, playing big time bookie who's wondering who's the new competition in town stealing the action from a mounting list of his heaviest bettors.

Not the best that either lead has ever done, but still fine entertainment.

One of Dean Martin's least-known films and while not a total success, it's fairly enjoyable.

The initial scenes feel like a fairly conventional romantic comedy but once Turner's plan to be Martin's secret bookie gets into full motion, it becomes a full blown farce.

And as a farce, it's a pretty good one. It develops some fine momentum with running gags (like the car collision scene or whenever Jack Albertson's policeman character appears) and revelling in the consequences and complications of when Turner's plan gets out of hand.

Alas, when the film tries to wrap up its convoluted goings on, it runs out of steam and the final 15-20 minutes are fairly cumbersome and unfunny.

The cast is stacked with talented performers; perhaps too stacked as several are underused. For example, Eddie Albert as Martin's friend and work colleague is funny and amusing but because of the plot goes missing for long stretches in the film's second half.

The one weakness in the cast is Lana Turner, someone who I never found to be a particularly interesting performer. She is competent in her role but doesn't have the same comedic mindset as the rest of the cast and as a result her character is easily the dullest in the film.

So while not what it could've been, this film is an amusing timewaster. It's certainly better than a lot of other films Martin made in the 1960s.

Dean Martin, Lana Turner, Eddie Albert, Paul Ford, John McGiver, and Walter Matthau star in this pretty funny movie about gambling, the mob, and horse races. Mom was confused by the plot and while part of me was too, I managed to laugh at many of the visual and verbal gags and characterizations that abounded. Especially seeing Matthau do some of his familiar deliveries brought a smile to my face. In other words, Who's Got the Action was enjoyable passable entertainment.

Listless little comedy which drags on and on for an hour and a half.Lana Turner,one of the queens of melodrama -"The bad and the beautiful","Madame X","Peyton Place",the sublime "imitation of life"- or film noir ("the postman always rings twice") has not the great comical presence the part asks for.Walter Matthau steals the show:ahead of his time,his character uses a big computer;although a dirty man,he lectures his subordinate about his poor old mother,whom he must support even at his own expense.

A distant relative of "the sting" .People who are allergic to bets,bookies and stuff like that ,take to your heels.

This is an example of what Hollywood was doing, or becoming, in the 60s. Basically television.

The opening scenes of this motion picture were bizarrely generic. A middle aged couple leaves an apartment building for a cab ride to a restaurant all of which plays under the opening credits. It's dialogue-free and the couple turns out to be Dean Martin and a matronly Lana Turner. The silly nothings continue as Dean is interrupted, continually, by phone calls from (his bookie?) and his romantic date, with his wife, goes down the... I don't know this is where I bailed.

Hollywood was trying to squeeze the last drop of revenue from existing resources (sound stages, big name stars and supporting actors, technical and administrative support). I didn't recognize Lana Turner even after she started talking. Never a big fan but aware of her work. The middle-aged Turner was not instantly recognizable, like Joan Crawford or Bette Davis or more recently Jane Fonda or Helen Mirren. This was essentially a domestic sit-com with lies, misapprehensions and bizarre inferences (no doubt) throughout. Supporting cast upholds the resource theory: mostly contract support players from the 40s and 50s.

Post-war Hollywood was teeming with "guys" who could write this stuff, with experience dating back to the 30s, and endless reserves of pretty people who could sell the same old three-act formula ad infinitum, hour-long for dramas, 30 minutes for comedies.

It went on through the 70s before new formats began to emerge in the evolution of what we now call long-form serial entertainment. So this movie? Blech.