Pépé

A throw-anything-in all-star bloat, designed to showcase the talents of "international favorite" (as he's billed) Cantinflas, but wedded to a wispy and misconceived screenplay padded out with pointless but attention-getting guest-star appearances. You'd never know he was a great comic from his portrayal of a nearly mindless patsy in 1960 Hollywood, catering to the charmless bellowing of a miscast Dan Dailey (the more Dailey condescends and insults, the more Cantinflas seems to like it) and a tough-talking Shirley Jones as a hard-bitten beatnik-of-sorts. That she and Dailey would form the love story at the emasculated title character's expense is a given in this xenophobic mid-century climate, but both characters are so unlikeable that they're impossible to root for. Jones does more dancing (and not terribly well) than singing, while Dailey is allowed one brief soft-shoe, to "Mimi." Highlights include one seriously hep Bobby Darin number, a comic interlude with Janet Leigh at Acapulco's Las Olas resort that almost works, and a Las Vegas sequence that attempts to show what nice, regular guys the Rat Pack were. It's an almost unremittingly terrible movie, but as others have pointed out, it's a valuable time capsule -- for 1960 fashion, architecture, autos, and offensive American-imperative bossiness.

Now any film with as many stars as they gathered together for bit parts as Pepe will automatically get me watching it in any event. There's no way I'd give this a bad review.

But in terms of the film itself, it might well have been oversold back then. Cantinflas got rave notices for his performance as Passepartout in Around the World in 80 Days, but failed to win audiences in the English speaking world. So this time Cantinflas played the title role and Columbia Pictures gathered together just about every star who had a free minute or so to appear in this. When you consider that Around the World in 80 Days was also such an all star extravaganza, did any other performer in history ever command such support?

Not that he didn't deserve it. In Latin America, especially in his native Mexico, Cantinflas was a national icon. I think that it was no accident that all these stars wanted to appear with him, it certainly would boost their market value in the Latin American area to be identified with him.

Seeing this film again 46 years after it first came out and I did see it in the theater back in the day, I was struck with how similar the Pepe character was to Forrest Gump. Tom Hanks who got an Oscar for his performance of someone as guileless as Pepe also during that film ran into as many famous folks as Pepe managed to.

Columbia cheated a little bit by going to Las Vegas for part of the story. This was the height of the Rat Pack era and a whole lot of the cast from Ocean's 11 took time from filming that to do some ring-a-ding walk-ons here.

There are some nice musical numbers. Shirley Jones is in good voice singing the title song. A real treat is Cantinflas, Dan Dailey, and Maurice Chevalier doing a reprise of Mimi. My favorite though is a star that appears only by voice, but Judy Garland's The Faraway Part of Town which is heard over a radio should rank as one of the best songs she ever sang.

Seen almost a half a century later, I'd say Pepe was undeservedly panned by the critics back then and is worth looking at whenever it gets broadcast.

While this film doesn't especially take advantage of Mexican actor Cantinflas's talent, it's not nearly the bomb that other IMDB reviewers might indicate. True, the plotline isn't particularly compelling (in fact, it's a bit absurd), there are many memorable moments in the film. Shirley Jones is particularly appealing, and we get vocal performances by Bobby Darrin AND Judy Garland (what's not to like there), as well as a rare screen performance by jazz pianist/composer/conductor Andre Previn. Together with cameo appearances by Edward G. Robinson, Billy Burke, and tons of other 30s/40s/50s luminaries, this film is well worth the 2-1/2 hours or so to watch.

I really want to write something good about this movie. I can't, though. I only saw it once, and once was more than enough. I was a teenager in Denver, Colorado, when "Pepe" previewed for the first time before an audience. A passel of studio bigwigs showed up at the Centre Theatre that evening, including, I believe, producer and director George Sidney. Cantinflas was a no-show; maybe he knew something.

Did you ever attend a movie where the audience greets it with...dead silence? Not the kind of silence for something cerebral, such as "2001: A Space Odyssey", but the kind of silence that lets you know you are watching a very slow, very long train wreck. And there were roughly 1,200 really silent people that night fifty years ago.

So why did I stick it out through the whole thing? Easy. The cameos. I would start looking for the exit when Edward G. Robinson would appear. Wow! This picture's got to get better now. Wrong. Ditto for Ernie Kovacs, and so on.

Since I viewed the preview print, I believe I saw the full 195 minute version. So what did the studio cut for general release? The only thing I clearly remember departing was a long, misbegotten animated sequence.

In retrospect I feel sorry for George Sidney, director of "The Harvey Girls", the 1948 "Three Musketeers", and "Kiss Me Kate". But the industry had changed a lot by 1960. He did his best to keep up, but "Pepe" has to be a nadir.

Some believe "Pepe" to be excellent family fare. If I compelled a child to watch the whole thing, even the cut general release version, I could probably be arrested for child abuse. You have been warned!

It seems Hollywood just didn't know what to do with Cantinflas; after his appearance in AROUND THE WORLD IN 80 DAYS, it took four years for him to appear in his next Hollywood movie - which was this train wreck that I'm sure had many of its participants licking their wounds for years to come!

Upon seeing PEPE, it seems even its filmmakers weren't sure what to do with him, given the fact that a great deal of the movie is devoted to the ton of cameo appearances, appearances where Cantinflas is more or less made to simply blubber statements that you can barely make out, or just sit back stunned. In fact, even in the scenes where he appears with the regular characters, Cantinflas really doesn't have that much to do. Needless to say, he ends up being completely unfunny. There's nothing he does here that gives me a clue as to why he was so popular south of the border. (One other possible problem may be that reportedly his style of humor was geared towards the language and customs of his part of the world.)

The whole movie is agonizing to sit through for its 158 minutes - the scary thing is that the movie was originally LONGER - over THREE HOURS LONG! (I am curious as to what was cut out - anyone know?) The only moment that provides anything of real entertainment is the "beatnik ballet" segment. Though it runs too long, and is somewhat goofy, some of the choreography is pretty spectacular.