The August Shadowplay Impossible Film Quiz
As always, amusing answers are just as welcome as correct ones!
Hand-painted movie posters from Ghana are the way forward.
Round [One] Who said that? And where?
a) “Can I wait awhile? Before I’m you?”
b) “Tasteless, odorless crud!”
c) “Shall we allow an angel to pass?”
d) “I am a thief — honest!”
Round [Two] Role ‘em! (AKA The Bull Montana Round) What roles connect the following –
a) F. Murray Abraham, Rod Steiger and Jason Robards Jnr?
b) Claude Rains, Kenneth Williams, Alain Delon?
c) Asta Nielsen, Bull Montana, Mischa Auer, Carmelo Bene, Arnold Schwartzenegger?
d) Peter Wyngarde, Marlon Brando, Olivier Debray?
Round [3] The Mann Act –
(Just name the films, if possible)
Not THE WHISTLER!
Round [4] Location, location. What structures link –
(a) THE MAN WHO KNEW TOO MUCH (both versions); THE KNACK… AND HOW TO GET IT
(b) BRANNIGAN; THE LODGER (1944)
(c) GORGO; THE THIRTY-NINE STEPS (1978)
(d) THE WHITE BUS; SID AND NANCY; IS THAT ALL THERE IS? (1993)
Round [5] Directors. What links ~
(a) Anthony Mann; Seth Holt; Ernst Lubitsch?
(b) Sam Fuller; William Friedkin; Emilio Fernandez?
(c) Henri-Georges Clouzot; Marcel Carne; Harmony Korine?
(d) Harold Reinl; George “MAD MAX” Miller; Lucio Fulci?
Round [6] Murdered by Dario Argento. Which films contain the following outrageous homicides?
(a) Flogged/strangled with own intestines?
(b) Drowned in scalding hot bath?
(c) Bisected by falling stained glass?
(d) Gnawed to death in water by rodents?
Round [7] Music.
(a) What’s exceptional about Tristram Carey’s soundtrack for THE LADYKILLERS?
(b) What’s unusual about Neil Young’s score for DEAD MAN?
(c) When, to the exact film, did John Barry stop being awesome?
(d) “A mixture of Duane Eddy and Puccini recorded in somebody’s bathroom.” What is being described?
Round 8: Answer the following film titles –
a) HAS ANYBODY SEEN MY GAL?
b) WHO IS HARRY KELLERMAN AND WHY IS HE SAYING THESE TERRIBLE THINGS ABOUT ME?
c) WHY DID BODHI-DHARMA LEAVE FOR THE EAST?
d) WHERE EAGLES DARE?
Round [9] The Pazuzu round. Name the films, including identifying which of the demons is/are Pazuzu.
Round [10] Casting capers
a) What film finds room for Sylvia Kristel, Beau Bridges and Olivia DeHavilland?
b) Where can you find Richard Attenborough, Patrick McGoohan and Charlie Parker?
c) Richard Burton, Ringo Starr, Sugar Ray Robinson?
d) Murray Hamilton, Vincent Gardenia, Jake LaMotta?
Bonus question:
Who is THIS?
August 17, 2010 at 10:42 am
2c They all played Hamlet
2b They all played Julius Caesar? mad doctors?
2d They all played Peter Quint
6b Profondo Rosso
6c Suspiria
6d Inferno
7d Andrew Lloyd Webber’s The Phantom of the Opera?
I don’t really understand the directors’ round. Are we supposed to guess what links them? Or what structures link them?
August 17, 2010 at 10:49 am
All correct, and I don’t blame you for not knowing 6a. Stay that way!
Julius Caesar, rather than mad scientists.
Oh, except 7d, that’s wrong.
Have clarified the directors.
August 17, 2010 at 11:02 am
Oh, in that case I would guess 6a is in one of those latterday Argentos I’ve been putting off watching because everyone says they’re awful. Giallo? La terza madre?
5d They all directed films in which chimpanzees set fire to hospitals.
7a Is it that piece of classical music which is played by fewer and fewer musicians as members of the gang are bumped off? (Like Salve Maria at the end of Poulenc’s Les Dialogues des Carmelites, in which the voices diminish as each of the nuns gets her head cut off. Interspersed with guillotine sound effects. I recommend it.)
10c I bet it’s Candy.
August 17, 2010 at 11:11 am
6a, yes Mother of Tears / La Terza Madre.
5d Awesome! But untrue. Or is it? Can you back it up?
7a I’m learning lots here today but no, that’s not it.
10c You win!
August 17, 2010 at 11:57 am
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August 17, 2010 at 12:05 pm
2a Al Capone
2d Quint
7c The Day of the Locust (IMHO!)
9a The Reptile (I think)
9d The Exorcist (That’s Pazuzu)
10a Airport 79 The Concorde
10c The Magic Christian (I think)
August 17, 2010 at 12:39 pm
Bonus question:
Deborra-Lee Furness? Rachel Ward? Leilani Sarelle?
Where is everyone? Usually I’m jostling for position here. I don’t want to answer too many questions (always supposing I could answer them) and not leave anything for anyone else.
August 17, 2010 at 12:50 pm
7d) One of Ennio Morricone’s spaghetti western scores? I have no idea which.
August 17, 2010 at 12:54 pm
10a – The 5th Muskateer
6c – Susperia?
August 17, 2010 at 1:03 pm
And
1b – Edward G. Robinson in Soylent Green
August 17, 2010 at 1:04 pm
“Where is everyone?”
Unfortunately, my brain (as Vivian Stanshall would say) is done in, today. The questions swirl before my eyes like pretty little ballerinas. Been fun reading the answers though.
August 17, 2010 at 1:14 pm
5a They all died in the middle of directing a film and somebody else had to take over? Mann died during A Dandy in Aspic and Laurence Harvey finished it; Holt during Blood from the Mummy’s Tomb, which Michael Carreras had to finish. I would have to look up Lubitsch, but I’m pretty sure this is the link.
4a the Royal Albert Hall
4c Big Ben – only thing I can remember about the 39 Steps remake is Robert Powell hanging off the clockface. Gorgo knocked the whole thing over.
August 17, 2010 at 1:25 pm
9d – THE EXORCIST (and thus Pazuzu).
August 17, 2010 at 1:32 pm
1c – Herbert von Krolock in his Dad’s castle.
August 17, 2010 at 1:42 pm
8a – No, Mr Fulton. The last few years, she’s been very… quiet.
August 17, 2010 at 2:31 pm
Mann Act: T-Men; The Man from Laramie; The Tall Target; Railroaded.
August 17, 2010 at 2:49 pm
5d – voodoo doll-stabbing.
August 17, 2010 at 3:06 pm
1d Elizabeth Lipp (Melina Mercouri) in front of the TOPKAPI palace
7a What ISN’T exceptional about that score?
7c ALICE IN WONDERLAND, for my money
August 17, 2010 at 4:08 pm
Bonus question:
Luciana Paluzzi in A BLACK VISOR FOR LISA.
August 17, 2010 at 4:44 pm
10b) All Night Long
August 17, 2010 at 4:47 pm
7b) It was created by Neil Young improvising solo while watching the film.
August 17, 2010 at 5:33 pm
I’m back!
Apologies to Steve, whose replies had to wait until my return to appear.
Steve is right about 2a (Capone) and 2b (Quint), but ROse pipped him to the post on that one. His suggestion of The Day of the Locust as marking the moment John Barry’s mojo deserted him seems uncannily accurate to me.
He’s wrong about The Reptile (9a) and right about Pazuzu (9d). He’s heroically wrong on 10a and 10c.
Rose is wrong (multiply) on the bonus.
7d Mark Medin gets most of the way there on 7d — Morricone is correct.
Stuart is right on 10a, it’s The Fifth Musketeer (yes, the soft-porn version of Man in the Iron Mask, how could any of you forget?) and pipped by Rose to Suspiria. And 1b is indeed Eddie G in Soylent Green.
Rose nails the directors connection. Lubitsch’s That Lady in Ermine was completed by the ill-suited Otto Preminger. And the Albert Hall and Big Ben are also correctimundo.
Experimento is correct about Pazuzu too, and wasn’t to know that Steve got their first. Herbert Von Krolock is absolutely correct for the quote. And I like his answer to 8a.
David Boxwell mops up the Manns very nicely.
Experimento — voodoo doll-stabbing isn’t what I had in mind, but I think you might be right. Witches of Eastwick for Miller, what about the others? I was thinking of something more… professional.
Randy, you’re bang on with Topkapi. I agree re 7a, but there’s a clue in that I asked about the SOUNDTRACK, not the SCORE. Actually, I’m inclined to agree re the earlier date for John Barry’s decline. Looking at his music department creds on IMDb, which I did first, Day of the Locust looks pivotal, but scroll down to the composer list and we see only a couple of half-good Bond themes after that point.
Experimento, that sounds like a SUPERB film — somebody get me a copy of A Black Visor for Lisa!
Chuck V is right on the money with 10b and 7b.
August 17, 2010 at 5:42 pm
Duane Eddy was the tipoff for me. Nobody used that twangy, reverb-laden electric guitar tone as much as Morricone. Guess (to get all the way there, probably wrong): The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly?
August 17, 2010 at 5:56 pm
Nope! (Apparently he was inspired by The Thunderbirds et al). Imagine it’s somebody’s first response to hearing Morricone — so which film would it be?
August 17, 2010 at 6:50 pm
9b) Equinox aka The Beast?
August 17, 2010 at 7:44 pm
No, it doesn’t help me since I never heard any of his early scores up til Fistful of Dollars. Not even the Wertmüller.
August 17, 2010 at 7:49 pm
8a) I saw her die.
8b) Because you forgot the incredibly strange Mercy Humppe and learned to love the glorious nation of Kazakhstan.
8c) Musidora and the blue Paris moon
8d) Dare eagles. Dare castle.
August 17, 2010 at 8:00 pm
7a Was Tristram Cary’s soundtrack for The Ladykillers the first electronic film score?
August 17, 2010 at 8:09 pm
Chuck, nope, not Equinox.
Mark, you named the film!
Chuck, 8a, very fine! Also the answer to another movie title! Very fine work on c, d, and especially e!
Rose, alas no. If you think of the ladykillers falling into a coal train, you might get there.
August 17, 2010 at 8:41 pm
Ohhhhh…..(7a) Were most of the sound effects actually musical? Not so in barrow boy sequence, i think, but still…
August 17, 2010 at 9:12 pm
is that Wise Blood ,the second picture in 9?
August 17, 2010 at 9:20 pm
Randy, yes. Carey did music and FX and was able to make them work TOGETHER, for the only time in cinema history. Not all of the effects were produced musically, but they were under the control of a musician.
Nope, Chris, that’s a very special one I can’t wait to tell you about. (Clue: it IS Pazuzu, or close equivalent.)
August 17, 2010 at 9:51 pm
5d – Florinda Bolkan mutely stabs voodoo dolls in Fulci’s DON’T TORTURE A DUCKLING. Unfortunately haven’t seen enough (or indeed any) Reinl. Hm, I see that Miller and Fulci both studied Medicine and Reinl was sometimes billed as “Dr”.
Bonus question, 2nd attempt:
Elvire Audray in MURDER IN AN ETRUSCAN LAUNDRY.
August 17, 2010 at 10:21 pm
a) HAS ANYBODY SEEN MY GAL?
She’s Working Her Way Through College
b) WHO IS HARRY KELLERMAN AND WHY IS HE SAYING THESE TERRIBLE THINGS ABOUT ME?
Because You’re Mine
c) WHY DID BODHI-DHARMA LEAVE FOR THE EAST?
For Love of Ivy
d) WHERE EAGLES DARE?
Trouble Follows
August 17, 2010 at 10:44 pm
Is 9b the Turkish version of The Exorcist?
You know, like the Tiurkish Star Wars: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cufQD5Y31ZA
August 17, 2010 at 11:03 pm
Experimento, yes, you got it! They’re all doctors, or “doctors” or something.
Bonus: no, but it sounds nice!
David E, beautiful!
Rose, yes! The Turkish Exorcist, Seytan (1974). I haven’t actually seen it. I wonder what the Turkish Jack MacGowran is like?
August 17, 2010 at 11:30 pm
1a – Sgt Joe Friday at the Courthouse (Dragnet)
7b) Young watched the film and recorded the soundtrack as a live improvisation.
9a – Gargoyles – Not Pazuzu
9b – Seytan – Fake Turkish Pazuzu
9c – The Exorcist – Pazuzu
9d – The Exorcist – Pazuzu
10a – The Fifth Muskateer
10d – The Hustler
Bonus Question- Rachel Ward in Night School?
August 17, 2010 at 11:44 pm
Very nice work! That’s the original Dragnet movie, of course.
9c is NOT Pazuzu, I regret to inform you.
10a had been guessed, but you’re the first to get The Hustler. Weird that Scorsese made the sequel to a film featuring LaMotta.
And STILL nobody has the bonus question right.
Clue: Veni, Vidi, Vitti.
August 17, 2010 at 11:54 pm
Then it must be Monica Vitti in Blonde in Black Leather.
(Which I’ve never seen, but would love to.)
August 18, 2010 at 12:19 am
Yup, and I’ll make a copy for Fiona to hand over when she meets you!
August 18, 2010 at 5:08 am
Aw, I got here late again. Was gonna say the bonus looks like Charlie Sheen in The Wraith, and I knew the Neil Young improv bit, but otherwise my brain is done in like Viv’s and Paul’s.
New year’s resolution (is it time for those yet?) is to watch more movies based on awesome titles (“A black visor for lisa!”) and not on popular or critical acclaim.
August 18, 2010 at 11:13 am
The real giallo is “A Black Veil for Lisa” and it’s pretty good!
Answers soon!
August 18, 2010 at 12:27 pm
To help anybody who’s thinking of guessing but can’t work out what’s been answered –
4b and 4d I think remain unanswered. Actor Brian Pettifer, who’s IN Lindsay Anderson’s Is That All There Is?, got in touch to say he couldn’t answer this. I guess it’s a trick question since the structure is more vehicle than building.
5b and 5c, director links.
8a,b,c,d — we have answers, but more are welcome!
9c is a tricky one, and since it’s TV, possibly even unfair.
August 18, 2010 at 12:38 pm
Oh! Is 9c one of the weeping angels from an episode of Doctor Who?
(SO excited about Blonde in Black Leather BTW! with Cardinale too!)
August 18, 2010 at 1:09 pm
Alas, not Dr Who. That’s 16mm film grain!
August 18, 2010 at 1:59 pm
5b – anything to do with broken arms or severed heads? (Btw fast worker Friedkin deserves some kind of medal for being married to AND divorced from Jeanne Moreau AND Lesley-Anne Down within a ten-year period.)
Monica Vitti in BLONDE IN BLACK LEATHER sounds even better than what was to have been my final guess: Marianne Faithfull in WHAT HAVE THEY DONE TO YOUR LEATHERS?
August 18, 2010 at 2:45 pm
8a – ALL NIGHT LONG
8b – HE’S JUST NOT THAT INTO YOU
8c – MOSCOW DOES NOT BELIEVE IN TEARS
8d – I’M NOT THERE
August 18, 2010 at 2:50 pm
Beautiful!
No, nothing to do with severed heads or broken arms, although injury seems possible given these antics…
August 18, 2010 at 6:10 pm
8a – NEVER ON SUNDAY
8b – GIVE ‘EM HELL, HARRY!
8c – HE’S JUST NOT THAT INTO YOU
8d – ON TOP OF THE WHALE
August 18, 2010 at 7:05 pm
Great!
Now, answers:
4b Tower Bridge.
4d barge on Thames
5b Directors who fired pistols — Fuller and Friedkin shot in the air to startle performers, Fernandez shot the performers. Robert Mitchum liked to imagine him on the phone to Central Casting, “Get me another actor, this one leaks.”
5c is incomplete films. Korine abandoned Fight Harm (what a wimp) after getting his ankle broken, Clouzot had a heart attack while filming Romy Schneider and Dany Carrel making out for L’Enfer, and Carne’s follow-up to Les Portes de la Nuit was shut down by censors.
9c is the BBC version of Night of the Demon, entitled Casting the Runes!
Now to decide who gets a prize.
August 18, 2010 at 9:24 pm
An amazing 13 correct answers for Rose Murasaki! Fiona will deliver prize when they meet face to face in London!
5 for HSG.
4 for Steve Saragossi and David Boxwell.
3 for Experimento (plus lots of amusement).
2 for Randy (I can’t really count the John Barry question!), 2 for Stuart, 2 for Chuck V (plus amusement).
And amusement from David E!
August 18, 2010 at 9:30 pm
Thank you! Was it really 13?
But I did have an advantage in that, for once, I was first on the scene and had my pick. Usually by the time I turn up all the easy questions have been answered.
August 18, 2010 at 9:39 pm
Congrats to Rose! Ya know, I’d thought that Fuller and Friedkin had shot guns to startle the cast but I couldn’t clearly remember any anecdotes. If you’d thrown in David Cronenberg, who did it in The Dead Zone, would have probably got that one.
August 18, 2010 at 11:29 pm
Didn’t know that Cronenberg had tried it!
August 19, 2010 at 3:20 am
10b: All Night Long – but it’s Charles Mingus, not Charlie Parker.
August 19, 2010 at 10:41 am
You’re right! Thanks — I have an underdeveloped jazz brain.