Dead Heat on a Merry Go-Round (Blu-Ray)

I’m a sucker for clever movie titles.  The best example I can think off the top of my head is I’m Gonna Git You Sucka.  Or perhaps you need something from yesteryear, like Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia or They Shoot Horses, Don’t They?  Along the lines of Sucka, we can’t also forget about Don’t Be A Menace to South Central While Drinking Your Juice in the Hood or The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford.  So imagine my surprise when I saw the title of today’s movie and jumped at the chance to provide a review.  Hopefully it is as good as the title suggests.

We get some light orchestral music (score by Stu Phillips) as the credits roll.  After the credits, we are taken to a prison where we listen to an inmate tell a story about his alcoholic father who would drink vanilla extract when he couldn’t find something stronger to drink.  Therefore, he always associated his father with the smell of vanilla extract, and he couldn’t stand the scent.  Perhaps we should move on to another story.

Before Marion Hague (played by Marian McCargo) , the female psychiatrist leading the session can comment, another inmate, Eli Kotch (played by James Coburn) interjects and tells his own story about scents.  Scents that aroused him and made him feel good.  This leads into a story I won’t spoil (because I found it quite clever) about his mother and a run in her stockings.  With that, it looks like we have run out of time, and the session is over for today.

After the session, Marion receives some good news.  It would appear that out of 47 applications, 18 prisoners have been granted parole.  (This certainly isn’t Texas.)  Three of these she is personally responsible for, R.C. Smith, Henry Miller, and our very own Eli Kotch.  Apparently it is also Christmastime, and the inmates are caroling and being merry.  Off to the side, Eli talks to Red Thompson (played by Wolfe Barzell) about a plan to make a lot of money once he gets out of prison.

In the following scene, Marion sings to herself while in front of a mirror.  She gets up and walks over to the bed, and we see Eli, who she immediately embraces passionately.  She talks about his parole officer, William Simpson (played by Paul Birch) and how Eli should dress to impress.  This includes the right suit as well as the proper tie.  But this romance does not last for long as we soon learn that Eli has missed his first parole meeting and skipped town.  Marion, Marion, Marion … what are we going to do?

The rest of the movie has Eli Kotch jumping around from city to city.  From Denver to Boston but primarily focusing on Los Angeles, in particular the International Bank of Commerce at the Los Angeles Airport.  There he is planning a heist which should get him a sizable amount of money with which he hopes to escape to Mexico.  In the process, he won’t stop swindling beautiful women out of money and other fancy, expensive items. One woman in particular, Inger Knudson (played by Camilla Sparv), whom Eli takes with him to Los Angeles, becomes a major focus in the film.

James Coburn does a fantastic job with the character of Eli Kotch with his enigmatic charm, especially when it comes to romancing the ladies, even as a shoe salesman.  Even the audience can easily be charmed by his whims.  I also appreciate his strong conviction to committing crimes even when a buxom lady is practically throwing herself at him.  The ladies in this film also do a good job in playing their part even if they are easily duped by Coburn’s character.

The major problem I have with this movie is that the job seemingly goes too well.  Every angle, every side mission, the execution, all seemingly goes according to plan. All of the thieves in the crew do their part right down to the smallest detail.  The only failing, really, is the extreme dedication of the lead character, and you really don’t understand why until the final scene.  Selfishly, I also wanted the good Dr. Marion Hague to show back up as well, but alas, she never did.

Video 

The video is in its 1.78:1 slightly cropped aspect ratio.  The restoration is excellent here; the resolution really pops, and everything is full of color.  We could obviously tell from the outfits and the cars that were in the 60’s, but this master looks like it was well preserved.  This movie was primarily filmed in Los Angeles (obviously because of the airport) and Boston.  The cinematography also shines and is shot well.  It’s very hard to find any faults in the video presentation done by the Kino video team.

Audio

The audio for this one is DTS-HD 2.0 in English.  Subtitles are also provided in English, and I did not notice any problems there.  This is your fairly basic audio track and is represented well.  Dialog has little to no issue, and the music score mentioned earlier has a lot of fun moments that the viewer should be able to pick up on.  Sound effects and environment noises are what I would expect, like with the planes flying in and out of Los Angeles airport.  Everything seemed to be on target, but nothing was particularly impressive.

Special Features

• Trailers: Dead Heat on a Merry Go-Round, A Fistful of Dynamite (Duck You Sucker), Harry in Your Pocket, The Internecine Project, Kill a Dragon, Gambit, Arabesque, Masquerade (1988), Grand Slam, The Anderson Tapes, and Masquerade (1965).  

Final Thoughts

Interestingly enough, Camilla Sparv (who plays Inger) received a Golden Globe for “Most Promising Newcomer (Female)”.  She would go on to have a fairly long career consisting of a few other movies in the late 60’s and then a ton of TV series once she got to mid to late 70’s.  Her last role was from the film The Naked Truth in 1992 (which has a nice Criterion Blu-ray release).  Dead Heat on a Merry Go Round shows us what careful planning, dedication, and a whole heap of charm can provide a mastermind thief on the run.  If only he opened his eyes to those events around him.

The Blu-ray here provided by Kino has some great video and better than average audio.  Unfortunately, no extras were included, which is a bit unfortunate, since there are a few surviving cast members still alive today (and plenty of historians who are well versed in James Coburn film history if nothing else).  This certainly gets a recommendation for fans of his and heist aficionados as well.  Enjoy.

By the way, if you have read this far, look for the brief cameo of one Harrison Ford who plays a bellhop.  Take care.