Dead Heat on a Merry-Go-Round [HD]

Criminally Underrated
This is a unique and sensational 60s caper -- very well-written. There's no exposition - nothing is telegraphed. You have to pay careful attention to all Coburn's moves to find out how they play out. You're not even sure what the score is `til the final 20 minutes. It's seriously ahead of its time, although its time may not have yet arrived still, because if this were made today they'd overplay the cynicism of the piece and not let it all unfold for the viewer without irony.

Though it has a low-key, hip 60s vibe, it has more of the feel of a subversive 70s entertainment. (I winced when I saw Rose Marie's prominent billing in the credits, fearing a garish Mad-Mad-World-style comic cameo. She has only a couple of scenes, though and she's terrific.) Coburn's never been better.

The picture's a little too long, but it's a complete knockout. Remembered today mainly for Harrison Ford's three lines as a bellboy, this a subtle little classic.

A Solid Caper Film with Only One Real Flaw
James Coburn is among my favorite actors -- he might not have been as handsome as, say, Cary Grant or Gregory Peck, nor as suave as Sean Connery or Rock Hudson, but he could carry a film as easily as any of these leading men. What Coburn brought to his roles, long before it became de riguer, was a steady but self-effacing cool, with quite a bit more humor than Steve McQueen or Lee Marvin, who approximated him physically. That his career did not go further is a mystery to me, but thank goodness we have the films he did make. Dead Heat on a Merry-Go-Round is a cryptic title until you get the reference in the film, but it's a fine hold-up movie, and the sort that keeps you guessing as to what will happen next.

Coburn plays Eli Kotch, a grifter who, among other things, charms his way out of prison by bedding the state's psychologist (Marian McCargo, a cross between Barbara Billingsley and Dina Merrill) before making his way across the country in a series of interesting cons...

Dead Heat on a Merry-Go-Round 1966
Saw this movie while I was stationed in Germany 1966/67 Having grown up in and around the LA airport, it was like seeing a bit of home in a far off land. Didn't see this movie again until the 1980s and taped it on VHS. Was glad to see it available on DVD really enjoyed this movie.
The actors and dialog in this film, are classic. After I got out of the US Army in 1970 went to the LA airport and walked around, the area, the bank in the film was under a different name for the movie, When I went to visit the airport, it was a Bank of America branch.
Walked around the Encounter Restaurant and Observation area at that time, you could just walk about anywhere. Today all that
open area in the movie where you drop off and pick up passengers is now enclosed and is a double-deck area. For myself, its one of those movie I'll always remember and now own in my DVD movie collection...

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