This is NOT the bookend to IN THE HEAT OF THE NIGHT
9 September 2011
I give it a one, just for Jane Fonda's 'hair' (a lot of us are obsessing about it...), which - seems to be what's most interesting in a very dreary, creaky RomDram from '63.

I don't know the story of where the title a actually came from, but, the fact that it's 'opposite' (IN THE HEAT OF THE NIGHT) titled film was such a well-received film came out AFTER this (as well as the book that film's based on) is probably one of the more interesting aspects going on in it's making.

In her interview with Robert Osborne (PRIVATE SCREENINGS), Angela Lansbury said that it was a 'difficult' project for her, and, while she did her best, she didn't think it was 'that good.'

Thus was an early vehicle for the young, gorgeous Fonda. She was still not fully comfortable on camera, and it shows. The film tries to showcase her as the typical 'sexy, young girl,' this time playing married (to the older Arthur Hill), who shares 'common interests' with the also married - to Angela Lansbury - Peter Finch.

ICD tries to be too many things, but fails in them all.

This was put out at a time in Hollywood before the 'revolutions' of sex, politics would play out in the real world. MGM - desperately trying to find a direction to navigate this tidal change - ends up with a film that might've been 'ahead of it's time' had it come out a few years earlier, but, as the grounds were already trembling, MGM ends up behind-the- times, with a product that - besides the natural beauty of Greece (where this was shot on location) feels very forced and dated.
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