When crime boss Scarlotti is murdered, private investigator Peter Gunn is distraught and angry. Scarlotti saved his life once and, with Scarlotti gone, Gunn is now at the mercy of his successor, Nick Fusco, who has a dim view of Gunn. Fusco is the prime suspect for the murder but it's going to be a struggle for Gunn to investigate him, let alone make anything stick.
Created by Blake Edwards, the TV series 'Peter Gunn' ran from 1959-61 and was reasonably entertaining. The plots were of a film noir crime drama variety, captured in 26-minute episodes. The length of the episodes was easily the biggest drawback to the series: there was far too little time for decent plot or character development, resulting in the episodes feeling rather formulaic after a while.
In 1967 Blake Edwards wrote and directed a feature-length film version of Peter Gunn, once again with Craig Stevens as Peter Gunn. Considering the main shortcoming of the series, surely a film would rectify the duration-caused issue?
Well, it should, but it didn't. Instead of using the extra time to create an intriguing plot and engaging characters, Edwards basically just takes a TV episode and pads it with silly sub-plots, random detours and heaps of shoehorned-in action scenes. The initial plot is even a copy of the very first episode of the TV series!
It's like a stretched out version of a TV episode, so is worse in that it takes even longer to be resolved without any additional intrigue or heightened tension to lock in your attention.
While not entirely without some entertainment value, it is quite disappointing.
Created by Blake Edwards, the TV series 'Peter Gunn' ran from 1959-61 and was reasonably entertaining. The plots were of a film noir crime drama variety, captured in 26-minute episodes. The length of the episodes was easily the biggest drawback to the series: there was far too little time for decent plot or character development, resulting in the episodes feeling rather formulaic after a while.
In 1967 Blake Edwards wrote and directed a feature-length film version of Peter Gunn, once again with Craig Stevens as Peter Gunn. Considering the main shortcoming of the series, surely a film would rectify the duration-caused issue?
Well, it should, but it didn't. Instead of using the extra time to create an intriguing plot and engaging characters, Edwards basically just takes a TV episode and pads it with silly sub-plots, random detours and heaps of shoehorned-in action scenes. The initial plot is even a copy of the very first episode of the TV series!
It's like a stretched out version of a TV episode, so is worse in that it takes even longer to be resolved without any additional intrigue or heightened tension to lock in your attention.
While not entirely without some entertainment value, it is quite disappointing.