What: Stephen Sondheim (yes, the composer/lyricist) and Anthony Perkins (yes, from Psycho) co-wrote this 1973 mystery film. In The Last of Sheila, a successful movie producer invites several people aboard his yacht for a one-week cruise that is actually an epic "Sheila Greene Memorial Gossip Game." The unpredictable host's game involves disguises, puzzles, secrets, and nightly scavenger hunts. As anyone who has ever read a mystery novel knows, parlor games inevitably lead to murder, and this game is no exception.
Comparable to: It's a classic Christie set-up with a '70s Hitchcock vibe and a sharp, jabbing streak of cruelty. It's also kind of like Deathtrap.
Representative quote: "Just enough time to get dressed as a Catamite, if I knew what it was."
You might not like it if: The borderline-campy tone means that the genuinely unsettling parts take you by surprise. And you don't appreciate being taken by surprise.
How to get it: Watch it instantly on Amazon, or rent it, or buy it.
Connection to previous Wreckage: James Coburn plays the multimillionaire/movie producer/yacht owner/game master. Coburn's threatening drawl is also a key feature in the Audrey Hepburn/Cary Grant film Charade (Rec. #97). Also, when I refer to "a '70s Hitchcock vibe," I basically mean Family Plot (Rec. #120).
Two additional fun facts:
- The cast also includes Dyan Cannon, James Mason, Ian McShane, and Raquel Welch.
- The plot was inspired by the elaborate scavenger hunts Sondheim and Perkins used to arrange for their friends. (No one was ever murdered during these real-life scavenger hunts. As far as I know.)
[Originally posted 12/3/11.]
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