The Smugglers

When I watched "The Smugglers", I was a bit surprised. After all, it was a TV movie from the late 60s...yet it was incredibly violent...more like a film made for the theaters. Several rather brutal murders occur during the course of the film...more brutal than I'd have expected for TV at the time.

The story is about an extremely dumb woman (Shirley Booth) and her daughter (Carol Lynley) as they travel through France and Italy...and unwittingly help smugglers ply their craft. Dumb because the woman NEVER questions nor checks to see what, exactly, she's carrying. This makes her so dumb, that it has a negative impact on an otherwise interesting movie. Not a great picture by any stretch but worth seeing.

Poorly written and directed TV-movie from Universal has blissfully naïve American tourist Shirley Booth agreeing to 'smuggle' a religious statue over the Italian border from Austria for a charming man she's befriended at the inn; incredulous step-daughter Carol Lynley fears the mysterious crate contains drugs, while French detective Donnelly Rhodes suspects contraband arms. Mixture of lighthearted folly and macabre elements really needed a graceful, nimble touch to come off, yet this thing is far too heavy and flat to be much fun. Michael J. Pollard turns up as an Italian half-wit with a homicidal streak; his accent seems picked up from a local Italian restaurant--and he's nothing compared to Rhodes' quasi-Frenchman (with wiggly eyebrows!). Intended, I'm sure, to be a pleasant whiff of an entertainment designed as a showcase for Booth's joie de vivre (which is reminiscent of Thelma Ritter's in her later period). Shirley is indeed colorful and hammy, but this below-average script plays like a failed TV pilot (and one chock full of European stereotypes). The darker, meaner overtures are interesting, but do not work in this la-di-da context, while Lynley passes the time rolling her eyes and making exaggerated faces. "The Smugglers" is harmless after all, which may be one reason why it has all but been forgotten.

An uneasy comedy about a pair of innocents (Shirley Booth, Carol Lynley) touring Europe who get duped into smuggling what they think is a religious statue from Italy into Austria. Despite the espionage and murder that goes on around them, they remain unaware as they snoop around an old castle and cheerfully go along with the inept police and border guards, having fun duping them.

The pair totally unaware of whatever is inside the boxes they happily drive back and forth across the border and at one point believe they are carry crates of apples.

Plot aside, Booth (after her long run in the ht TV series "Hazel") and Lynley are fun to watch; the others less so. Kurt Kasznar and Michael J. Pollard inhabit the old castle, Charles Drake is the first smuggler, Donnelly Rhodes is an undercover French cop, Ilka Windish is the hotel manager, and David Opatoshu and Gayle Hunnicutt seem to be spies.

Worth a look to see Shirley Booth.

The film is not a masterpiece but still delightful to watch. And that is because of the performances of some excellent actors: Kurt Kasznar, Maurice from "The Last Time I Saw Paris" (1954), Bonello from "A Farewell to Arms" (1957), Csepege from "The Journey" (1959), Smernov from "Casino Royale" (1967), Quintana from "The Ambushers" (1967), Alexander B. Fitzhugh from "Land of the Giants" (1968-1970) to name just a few. Then the young and beautiful Carol Lynley, Nonnie from "The Poseidon Adventure" (1972), Ann Lake from "Bunny Lake Is Missing" (1965). There is another very beautiful young actress, Gayle Hunnicutt, but she got a very short screen time. Shirley Booth is the one who has the biggest part and she is talented as always. Other two good actors are Emilio Fernández and David Opatoshu, great in many other films. Ilka Windish and Charles Drake are OK and Michael J. Pollard is annoying as in all his films.