Rampage (1963)....clearly comes from that kinder, gentler era when studios could afford to add volume to their line-ups with loads of modestly budgeted movies that studio chiefs could comfortably greenlight without putting their heads on the chopping block.....
As much BQ enjoyed many, many of these little dramas, thrillers. westerns, war and sci fi and horror films, we often wondered......who believed in these movies enough to want to make them? We can think of very few of them that were on any director's or writer's list of long sought after passion projects..... Watching them again in this day and age, more than ever they look custom made for TV..... which is where they all landed anyway.....
'Rampage' works on two levels.....first as a simmering, soon to boil over romantic triangle and secondly as a bring-'em-back-alive jungle trek.
A German zoo longs to capture an elusive tiger-leopard hybrid dubbed "The Enchantress". To nab this legendary kitty-cat, they've enlisted a seemingly at odds duo of alpha male hunter-killer Otto Abbot (Jack Hawkins) and animal friendly big game trapper Harry Stanton (Robert Mitchum, in usual semi-sleepy mode).
Otto and Harry don't waste a minute commencing their testosterone pissing contest over who's the more manly man. Adding gasoline to this growing fire is Otto's hubba-hubba live-in huntress Anna (Elsa Martinelli). Harry wants to stake his claim on her, but Otto ain't havin' any of that......he's been grooming Anna since he found her as 14 year old war orphan and his machismo's wrapped up in both her and the stuffed wild beasts nailed to the walls as his trophies.
What could possible go awry for these three.....heh,heh.heh.heh....
So it's off to Maylaysia with them to bag their quota of two tigers and The Enchantress herself. And it's a comforting sight to see their guide is none other than Sabu, the original, now middle aged Mowgli. Anna keeps Harry at safe distance, but you can tell from her disinterested expression that Otto's finally hit his expiration date \
As for as acting, all the heavy lifting falls on Jack Hawkins as we watch his Great White Hunter persona crumble before our eyes, undone by his own self doubt and barely contained jealous rages. Mitchum never goes beyond his usual just-picking-up-a-paycheck torpor and Martinelli simply stands around looking gorgeous, striking no real sparks with either of them. (You'll find no sign whatsoever of the opposites-attract chemistry she enjoyed with John Wayne in Howard Hawks' big game rom-com, "Hatari!".
We know right away this film's out of a different era as we see Mitchum's stand-in stuntman provoke and torment that poor tiger-leopard 'Enchantress' with a flaming torch. So nobody should hold their breath waiting for that 'no animals were harmed during the making of the film' credit.
But let's move to the movie's ultra bonkers finale......with rage-addled Otto uncaging the Enchantress to rip up Harry while they're on a train transporting the beast to Germany. Guess who leaps out for a fangs-for-the-memory meet 'n greet with the crowd anxiously awaiting the star pussy's arrival? You might say they find claws for alarm....
Well, with the cat literally out of the bag, our three humans have a fateful showdown with her (and each other) on the roof of an apartment building.....where all four let out their...uh...true felines.....
While we didn't mind gazing at the always stunning Martinelli, you're much better off watching her in 'Hatari'. Hawkins attempts a performance but he's playing to an oil painting when trying to elicit a rise out of the bored stiff Mitchum.......all of which combines to make 'Rampage' only a guilty pleasure in spurts. Nice Elmer Bernstein score, but unless you're a rabid completist fan of the actors involved, feel free to skip it.....2 stars (strictly for the Enchantress, whom we wish had eaten the entire cast....)
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