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ST. IVES (1976)
WB DVD (region 1)
d. J. Lee Thompson; pr. Pancho Kohner, Stanley S. Canter; scr. Barry Beckerman; novel. Ross Thomas; ph. Lucien Ballard; m. Lalo Schifrin; ed. Michael F. Anderson; cast. Charles Bronson, John Houseman, Jacqueline Bisset, Maximillian Schell, Harry Guardino, Harris Yulin, Dana Elcar, Michael Lerner, Elisha Cook Jr. (94 mins)

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Actor-Director Team Begins with US star at Career Peak and British Journeyman Abroad

In the mid-1970s actor Charles Bronson was at the peak of his popularity. 

Already a huge star in Europe throughout the 1960s, Bronson had to wait until the 1970s to break through to the American box-office.  That he did thanks to a lucrative partnership with British director Michael Winner in such films as Chato’s Land, The Mechanic and the hugely popular Death Wish.  Thus, through the 1970s, Bronson embarked on a multitude of films which expanded his range and cemented his image.  For St. Ives, he came under the direction of another Brit who had ventured into international filmmaking, J. Lee Thompson.  Thompson had made a name for himself in the UK before venturing abroad to much success in Cape Fear and The Guns of Navarone.  Following these works, Thompson began to ingratiate himself into genre cinema, American style, his path crossing with Bronson for the detective film noir homage of St. Ives.  Bronson and Thompson would get along so well that they would re-team for the offbeat experiments of The White Buffalo and Caboblanco.  After Bronson ended his films with Michael Winner following Death Wish 3, he became a regular feature at exploitation outfit Cannon, where Thompson soon became an in-house director and in the 1980s made a tough, misanthropic series of highly under-rated thrillers with Bronson, far bleaker in tone than was suggested by the rather playful St. Ives.

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Synopsis (contains spoilers)

St. Ives features a dense detective plot in the manner of classic 1940s film noir private eye stories.  Bronson is an author, a crime writer whose latest manuscript is having some difficulty finding a publisher.  He is told of a job opportunity and goes to follow it up.

At the estate of a wealthy man (John Houseman) he is told of the job – to be a go-between: Houseman has had some journals stolen and held for ransom and Bronson is to drop off the money.  Bronson in turn agrees but at the drop-off point he finds his intended contact dead and is arrested on suspicion of the murder.  He is interrogated by two policemen (the comical Harry Guardino and Harris Yulin) who let him go when he is recognized by their superior officer (Dana Elcar).  Bronson investigates further, now answering not only to Houseman but to his accomplice, a sultry woman (Jacqueline Bisset) and Houseman’s personal psychiatrist (Maximillian Schell).  Bronson is almost killed by three street hoods and takes it upon himself to investigate, even if this leads to his greater entrapment in the case.  He finally retrieves the stolen journals for Houseman only to find that several pages are missing.  Houseman is distraught and so brings Bronson into his circle of confidence.  Although warned by his police friends to stay away from the case, Bronson is drawn even further into what now emerge as criminal schemes by the team of Houseman and Bisset involving international intrigue.

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Narrative Convolution, Film Noir Contemporization & Offbeat Parody

St. Ives features Bronson in one of his more easy-going roles, as a man who likes to gamble and is essentially drawn to playing games with the circumstances of other people’s lives.

He takes on the challenge for the fun of it as much as the money and his smug sense of superiority carries through in certain scenes – as does his sheer delight in playing out the machinations of the game of intrigue between people.  This sense of human interaction as a game is ably put forward in the film’s sense of narrative convolution.  Bronson is an update of the 1940s tough guy icon here more suited to the easy-going 1970s, although more masterful of circumstance than that other noir update of a film noir icon played by Elliott Gould in Robert Altman’s far more iconoclastic The Long Goodbye.  Like Altman’s film, St. Ives feels like a contemporization of a distant form of movie-making – the 1940s film noir detective story.  It is more deliberately upbeat than Altman however and benefits from a slyly knowing script which treats the material also as offbeat comedy, although never in the vein of such outright 1970s noir parodies as the ill-fated Peeper.  Indeed, it appears that St. Ives is particularly indebted to the work of director John Huston and the team of Houseman, Bisset and Schell here recalls the bumbling ensembles in Huston’s Beat the Devil especially.  Indeed, St. Ives is a deliberate attempt to recapture the same knowingly offbeat humor as that film.

In the effort to be a Beat the Devil of the 1970s, St. Ives emerges as a skillful combination of convoluted narrative and subtle genre parody, shot through with a knowing distance and a fine sense of the sheer absurdity of such narrative convolution. 

It is a case of sly serio-comic expositionary intrigue and is handled with aplomb by all concerned.  There are many comical interludes and a sense of underplayed eccentricity to the minor characterizations which also recalls director John Huston, as if here director J. Lee Thompson is allowing himself a gentle and knowing pastiche of a filmmaker he perhaps admires.  Nowhere else in Thompson’s fine work, even in his early comedies, is this meta-cinematic intent evident and the knowingness of his direction here is just one of the delightful aspects of St. Ives.  Also, as it is a knowing genre update, the film attempts to place new star Bronson not just as an iconic presence but as an actor in a knowing homage to other works.  Bronson may not carry the sense of needed allusion this film aims for but those around him work dedicatedly to perfect the balance of sly eccentricity and narrative density demanded by the material.  Bronson, however, perfectly latches on to the film’s sense of gamesmanship in his characterization of a man enlivened by such games of high stakes: he brings a sense of addictive edginess to the role just as much as he does assurance and the mix works ingratiatingly.

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Visualizing Bronson's Humour

The anamorphic widescreen transfer is most admirable.  The film has a concern for urban locations and simple street-life through which Bronson moves, nicely contrasting high and low society in its depiction of Houseman’s estate. 

Thompson stresses the opulence of rich and powerful Patriarchal figures, whom Bronson is drawn to because, like all characters in this movie, they enjoy playing games with other people.  This sense of gamesmanship as a kind of addiction to the intrigue of human interaction has its dangerous side and Thompson nicely suggests the thrill these people experience with each narrative convolution.  Thompson can alternate still shots with fluid camera movements and cuts and often adopts a stop-start sense of camera fluidity of short movements.  The presence of iconic Elisha Cook Jr. is an intended homage to classic film noir and works as that.  Location work and sets vary nicely, suggesting the social diversity of the city and the idea of a journey.  Action scenes are effective and here Thompson adopts a shadowy and increasingly constricting sense of mise-en-scene to build the needed tension.  The supporting performances are all just slightly mannered to suggest a comical eccentricity which works wryly.  The costuming also recalls 1940s formality and has a sense of clash with emerging 1970s liberalism, although not as heavily as Altman had earlier pursued in The Long Goodbye.

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Jazz-Funk Ambient Detective Noir

The sound transfer is available in a crisp and concise Dolby digital mono. 

There is no major hiss nor artifacting and the transfer preserves the hip, funky score by veteran film music composer Lalo Schifrin who alludes to 1940s musical methods just as he updates them with his signature jazz-funk, nicely in keeping with Thompson’s sense of gentle genre update and of period hybrid, alternating jazz-funk and lush romantic scoring for a contrasting affect.  The needed ambient details are well rendered, bringing a sense of aural presence to many of the individual sets (most notably the diner Bronson frequents).  However, this ambience is kept just as minimal as required and never as full as it could be.  There is a sense of open space to some of the setting and the street has a minor presence when needed although exists more as the open air people move through in their breaks from interiorized spaces.  As has been mentioned, the expositionary script is shot through with a knowing humor and the slight eccentricity of performance is also carried through in slightly offbeat vocal mannerisms by the supporting cast, most notably the mismatched trio of villains – Houseman, Bisset and Schell – who do truly emerge as a deliberate homage to the work of John Huston.  Foley effects are all clear enough in the flattened but effective mono and the car chase scenes make good use of the necessary screeching tyres.  Selective scoring enhances the final suspense.

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Bonus Treats for DVD Enthusiasts

In the way of special features are a theatrical trailer and a brief making-of documentary which offers a profile of Bronson made at a time of his superstardom.  It combines Bronson promotional material with behind-the-scenes footage and several of the other actors talk of working with Bronson.  Bronson also talks of his approach to acting (using his body) and, interestingly considering the violence that Bronson’s films were increasingly becoming known for, the Bronson publicity machine here claims the actor is a star for the times whose films favor entertainment rather than violence for violence’s sake.  There is otherwise nothing about Thompson, background to St. Ives or information about other Bronson / Thompson films.

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Saint Ives

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