Films

Al Capone is a semi-documentary, un-hysterical and somewhat one-dimensional reminiscence of gangsterism in the grand style. As the Naples-born, Brooklyn-raised hood imported to Chicago to bodyguard a member of thugdom brass only to become kingpin himself, Rod Steiger is a kind of whimsical Scarface, touchy about his rights as an American citizen and the way his name is pronounced. Working from a screenplay that names a few names and overlooks others, director Richard Wilson has taken time to develop character shadings (they're pretty shady) and has delineated the casual manner in which the public and public officials reacted to killings at the time. Storywise, the picture glosses over the true viciousness of Capone, his thugs and his procurers, the misery they brought, the terror they inspired. He's seen mainly through the eyes of gangster rivals, a woman (Fay Spain) whom he marries after rubbing out her husband, and an honest cop (James Gregory). Steiger brings an earnestness and a naïveté to the portrayal that take it way out of the stereotype, but when all's done you don't feel you know who Capone was, or why he happened.

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Poland's a mighty sad place to be, judging from the goings-on in The Eighth Day of the Week, the most powerful picture we've seen this year. It's from Marek Hlasko's angry novel, a Polish best-seller in 1957, when there was a loosening of Big Brotherhood. The picture, starkly shot under the direction of Alexander Ford and superbly acted, has been banned by Premier Gomulka for obvious reasons. The story is remarkably simple: young architect-student Peter (Zbigniew Cybulski) and his girl Agnie-shka (Sonja Ziemann) are determined to sleep together. But it's a logistics problem. When they arrange to meet in his plaster-strewn room, war bomb damage causes the building to collapse almost over their heads. The housing shortage prevents Peter from getting a place, and they can't go to her room because her father, sick mother, drunk brother and a boarder live there. Everywhere they slosh in the endless rain they're spied on, hooted at, threatened. A friend with an apartment disappoints them. Then, while Peter's being quizzed by police on suspicion of burglary, Agnieshka has a tragic, drunken affair with a newspaperman. Most of this is pretty upsetting and about the only thing that saves the audience itself from despair is its belief in the quiet valor of Agnieshka, who sets her jaw and rolls with every punch -- besides which, she's beautiful. Hlasko and Ford did the screenplay. You miss this one at your own risk.

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Taken from The Darling Buds of May, by H. E. Bates, The Mating Game pits a ledger-brained, dedicated and prudish American income-tax agent (Tony Randall) against a pretty formidable combo: a Maryland farmer and junk man, Paul Douglas, who never has any money, and his bubbly, well-stacked daughter, Debbie Reynolds. Douglas' casualness about income-tax payments (he's never made any) has been brought to the attention of the Internal Revenue Department by that slimy specimen, the income-tax informer, and Randall drops by to squeeze money out of him. Randall is confused by Douglas' bookkeeping (it's all mental), terrified by a friendly goat, gets necked by Debbie, does a very amusing drunk scene and is finally corrupted by the others and changes sides. His irascible boss (Fred Clark), a good man with a thumbscrew, hurries down but also finds he's dealing with geniuses. Thus remissness triumphs. Under George Marshall's cheery direction, Debbie frolics in the hay and belabors swine with great good nature, the animals perform their parts sullenly but well, and Randall is properly obnoxious. The humor's generally predictable, but if you're game for a mildly gamy gambit, you'll have a ball with Game.