Ted Kotcheff

When the highlight of a career as a director is Weekend At Bernie’s (1989), you might think it would be difficult to base a column on this recently deceased guy. And you would be right. But perhaps Mr. Movie is up to it? Let’s find out.

    The film mentioned above is about two young guys who work for an insurance company in New York. They are invited to the Hamptons home of their boss, Bernie, for a fun party week-end. On arriving they find that he is dead. But they’re having such a good time they decide to pretend Bernie is still alive. And they continue to hold him up and convince others he’s okay. Well, that’s the premise. It’s a one-joke movie with a few laughs. It actually made money and spawned two sequels. Ted Kotcheff not only directed but has an acting role to boot. 

And speaking of sequels, Ted Kotcheff directed the very first Rambo movie, First Blood (1982). Sylvester Stallone is a tough Viet Nam vet that everyone for some reason wants to capture or kill. He evades them and kills a whole bunch en route to a somewhat successful conclusion. This action-packed blood fest made lots of money and spawned four (!) sequels, all with Stallone mowing them down.

North Dallas Forty (1979) with Nick Nolte and Mac Davis as aging pro football player paint such a shoddy picture of the NFL that’s it’s no wonder the league refused to help with the filming. Players are hooked on pain killers and forced to play when they should not be, and the drug and alcohol fueled lifestyle is endemic. Coaches, trainers and owners turn a blind eye to all the shenanigans as long as the players suit up and perform. Based on a novel by NFL receiver Peter Gent, this is not a glorification of a gritty, selfish business. This is, perhaps, as close to the truth as a movie ever got to the NFL. Kotcheff’s direction is quite good.

Fun With Dick and Jane (1977) stars George Segal and Jane Fonda as a California couple who appear to have everything until Dick gets fired. Every attempt at recovering their lifestyle legally falls flat. So they decide to pursue a life of crime, carefully robbing only those who can afford it. Like the phone company. They break into their boss’s safe and get $200,000 in cash he kept as a slush fund to bribe politicians as needed. He decides to let them keep it when it appears as though the police will confiscate it and it will be gone. So the moral here is: Crime pays if you’re cute enough. And this Kotcheff outing spawned a sequel that isn’t any better in 2005.

The Human Voice (1966) is the filming of a one-act Jean Cocteau play. It starts Ingrid Bergman who shines as a jilted middle-aged woman in a series of phone conversations with her ex-lover. It’s only 50 minutes long but has quite an impact. This was not an easy film to direct, and Ted Kotcheff here shows that he can pull off a winner out of not much. Bergman is of course worth the price of admission, as always. This film does not seem to be readily available as far as I can find out. 

The other films in this article are available somewhere. All are for adults.