CARAVAN TO VACCARES

UK, 1974, 98 minutes, Colour,
Charlotte Rampling, David Birney, Michel Lonsdale, Marcel Bozzuffi, Manitas de Plata.
Directed by Geoffrey Reeve.

Alistair Mc Lean has been recurring regularly on our screens for several years. His plots - enterprising hero, derring-do in colourful situations, an inevitable surprise villain - are familiar despite the varied trappings; so one looks to the excitement of the adventures and the locations for enjoyment. Excitement is average here, although the helicopter-bullring finale is elaborate, the hero a sardonic forced-to-be hero. The treatment never lives up to its potential. Credit side includes Charlotte Rampling's vigorously attractive heroine, Michel Lonsdale's aristocratic Duke, gypsy carnival events in the wonderful marsh and horse territory of Provence. All in all, OK adventure entertainment and that's it.

1. Was this a good adventure film? Did it have credible adventure situations? Or did it have more the style of comic adventure series?

2. Comment on the style of the film: the ingredients and the execution, the Panavision and colour, the use of locations, the gypsy background, the situation in Provence? Helicopter flying, aerial photography etc. How enjoyable was this? was the full potential utilized?

3. Was the film a successful mystery? Were the clues well given? Was it unravelled clearly? Satisfyingly?

4. How sympathetic was Bowman? The American drifter in Europe, the easy life, the nonchalant hero? His moving away from things all the time, his attraction for glamour? The encounter with Lyla, the danger and the deaths, his toughness and his capacity for chasing? For fighting and his ingenuity for saving Zuger? The climax and crisis for him at the end? Was he presented well as a person or just as an adventure film hero?

5. How attractive was Lyla? An adventure film heroine or a person? Her strength and her independence? Her career, her glamour and her style, her role in the plot itself, the kidnapping, her ingenuity for getting rescued?

6. The character of the duke: how well was he explored? His French style, his deceit to Bowman, his master-minding and his failures? His emotional reaction to his daughter's death, his use of English language, his imperturbability?

7. How obvious was the villain? The smooth style etc.? His manifestation at the end and the bull-fight sequence?

8. Was the character of Zuger well explored? A mysterious character, his importance, his reckless behaviour, the credibility of his plan for solar energy? The deaths on his behalf.

9. What influence did the gypsies have in the film? Their initial appearance, the festival, as victims?

10. How obvious were the villains themselves - the psychotic murderer at first, the man with the stirrups and the horse, the pursuit, the guarding of Zuger and Lyla etc.?

11. How well done was the horse chase with the cross-cutting with the guitar playing? The car being chased by the helicopter? The helicopter fight? The bull-ring episode? were these highlights well filmed? What excitement did they generate? The importance of deaths in the film - audience response to the initial deaths, the gypsy, to the villains?

12. What emotional responses do films like this demand - the response to the glamorous comic world? How real or unreal does it seem? Was this a successful film?