Dennis Farina R.I.P.

I am saddened today to hear of the passing of actor Dennis Farina. Farina died Monday morning in a Scottsdale, Ariz., hospital after suffering a blood clot in his lung, according to his publicist. He was 69.

Like just about everyone else, I first witnessed his talent and screen presence when he played hardboiled police Lieutenant Mike Torello on Michael Mann's seminal period police drama, Crime Story series back in 1986. A true-life ex-Chicago cop, Farina brought hard-earned verisimilitude to his mob-busting, tough guy role.

Farina went on to play a wide variety of tough cops and criminals - sometimes comically (as in Get Shorty) - in dozens of television shows and films, including Code Of Silence, Manhunter, Snatch, and Midnight Run. He was well known for his recurring role on Law and Order, but I most fondly remember him as the titular character in Mark Frost's short-lived 1998 private eye series, Buddy Faro.

I'm definitely going to miss the guy. Rest in peace, sir.

Diabolik Returns!

A very stylish trailer for a new, Italian Diabolik television series, based on the classic Eurocomic. I wonder what the chances are of ever seeing this on my side of the Atlantic?

Cancelled 2 Soon And It's A Crime

A lot of interesting television series get cut down in infancy, usually because some network is too impatient to stick with a show through its early - and usually inevitable - growing pains and give it time to find its audience. Of course, some shows simply suck, and deserve to be strangled in the crib - to perhaps take the metaphor a bit too far....

Anyway, two cancelled-too-soon TV shows that I thought were pretty damned good right out of the gate and really wish would come out on DVD so I could at least enjoy repeatedly re-watching the few episodes that do exist are: 2003's Karen Sisco with Carla Gugino (sigh) and Robert Forster, & producer Mark Frost's Buddy Faro from '98, with Dennis Farina & Frank Whaley.

Karen Sisco was based on the character from Elmore Leonard's novel Out Of Sight with more than a little inspiration from its 1998 film version, which had starred Jennifer Lopez in the role of Miami-based Federal Marshal Karen Sisco. The short-lived (10 episodes) television series cast the always-gorgeous and intelligent Gugino in the role, and captured the breezy tone of Leonard's writing with remarkable success. Her father, a Miami P.I., was played by Robert Forster (Jackie Brown). The show looked terrific as well, with lots of sunny Florida scenery. ABC really screwed up by not scheduling  the show back-to-back with its then-hit show Alias, as the two programs were thematically similar and, as both had strong female leads, would probably have appealed to the same audience.

Buddy Faro was another breezy crime show with a fantastic, feature-film quality cast. Whaley (Swimming With Sharks) played Bob Jones, a struggling L.A. private investigator who idolizes a legendary private eye - the titular Faro (Farina) - a swingin' Rat Pack-type dick who disappeared in the late 70s on a case. Jones tracks him down in a gutter in Mexico, sobers him up, and takes him on as his partner. The stories were great fun, with Faro portrayed as a sort of fish-out-of-water, still living in the 60s, dealing with the modern world (of 1998) in his own retro-tough guy way.

Obviously, neither show managed the sort of ratings that would have kept them on the air, but man, I loved 'em both. Sadly, I don't think either show is a good candidate for DVD... but then, lots of oddball stuff has been hitting disc lately. Maybe there's still some hope.

Harry O Returns

The David Janssen private eye series from 1974-76, Harry O, is now available (at least, the first season is) on Manufactured-On-Demand DVD from Warner Archive. Highly regarded as one of the best - and best-written - private eye shows of its era, Harry O was an unusually melancholy and realistic crime show, with Janssen's Harry Orwell pretty much defining the term, "weather-beaten detective."

I was too young to care much about it when it originally aired, but in the 80s, when I was really getting into P.I. fiction - especially authors like Ed Gorman, Bill Pronzini, Robert J. Randisi, and Rob Kantner - I managed to catch the pilot film, Smile Jenny, You're Dead one afternoon on TBS and loved it. Somewhere around the same time one of the cable channels (maybe A&E) ran the series, and I watched it whenever I could. I like The Rockford Files better, but Harry O is probably the more sophisticated show.

The new DVDs from Warner Archive are admittedly pricey - as burned-to-order discs almost always are - but I'm going to try and find some way to add the set to my library eventually. According to the website, this first season set includes the first pilot film, Such Dust as Dreams Are Made On, which had some significant differences from the subsequent series. What's less clear is whether or not the set includes the second TV movie pilot, Smile Jenny, You're Dead - as Warner Archive has already released that title separately. I hope it's included; otherwise it'll cost another twenty-five bucks to complete the set....

Hammer Time!

I finally received the Darren McGavin Mike Hammer series DVDs that I ordered from Amazon a couple weeks ago, on Saturday. I watched the first disc last night. The picture quality on the DVDs is excellent (much better than the M Squad transfers). A&E did a great job on these discs. 

The first three or four episodes were fairly pedestrian (though still entertaining), but then things really picked up with a handful of fairly tough stories from Evan "Ed McBain" Hunter (as "Curt Cannon") and pulpster Frank Kane. I always enjoyed Kane's "Johnny Liddell" private eye novels, and his Hammer scripts are a lot of fun.

I think I'll alternate episodes of Mike Hammer and M Squad for the next couple of weeks, possibly a with a few Peter Gunns tossed in for variety....

More 50's Crime -- Lee Marvin's M SQUAD

After ordering the 50's Mike Hammer show the other night, I didn't plan to buy any more DVDs for at least a week or two. That was before going household shopping with Brandi last night and finding the complete, 3-season, 117-episode Lee Marvin series M Squad (1957-60) on sale new for only twenty bucks ($100 off the SRP) at our local warehouse store.

From long and sad experience, I knew that if I passed it up then, I would never find it that cheap again, so... yep, I bought it - with Brandi's blessing. I'm a lucky guy that way.

So far, I've watched a half-dozen episodes, and while I'm really enjoying the show, with its jazzy musical score and Marvin's tough-as-nails portrayal of Chicago Police Detective Lt. Frank Ballinger, it is a little distracting how obvious it is that M Squad was the template that the 70's spoof Police Squad was based on. In fact, the opening scenes of the first episode are nigh-identical to the beginning of the first episode of Police Squad. Marvin's character (and voice-over narration) are also very clearly the model for Leslie Nielsen's Lieutenant Frank Drebin.

Picture and audio quality aren't that great (another reason to be grateful for the low price I paid) and vary from episode to episode, but frankly, I think we're lucky that the show survives at all. 

Apparently, while Universal licensed the show out for DVD to Timeless Media, they didn't provide the company with any source prints, so the company had to use beat-up 16mm syndication prints that had been in circulation since the 50s. And even then, they were only able to get their hands on 100 of the 117 episodes, so they actually put a call out to private collectors in order to get copies of the 17 remaining shows.

It's great stuff. When my Mike Hammer discs show up, I'll have to start alternating between shows for some serious 50s crime overload!

If I Had A Hammer...

I was over at Amazon on Thursday night, checking the tracking info on an order I placed a week or so ago, when the site helpfully informed me that one of the items that I'd had on my "Wish List" since last Fall - the A&E Home Video DVD collection of the 1956-57 Mickey Spillane's Mike Hammer television series - was currently on sale, at more than 50% off its suggested retail price.

So, I did what I usually do in such situations: I whined to Brandi until she couldn't take it anymore and told me I could order it, just to shut me up.

What can I say? It works.

Anyway, I've placed the order, and I can't wait to get my hands on this set. It should come as no surprise to anyone that I'm a huge fan of actor Darren McGavin, and ever since I found out back in the 80s that he had played Hammer on TV, I've wanted to see the show. According to the customer reviews over on Amazon, the audio and video quality of this DVD set is excellent. I'm especially glad that A&E released all 78 episodes in one set (even if I couldn't afford it until it went on sale); frankly, I'm still disappointed/annoyed that they never finished releasing Peter Gunn on DVD.

Now if only someone would release the 80s Stacy Keach Mike Hammer series - and the 1981 version of I, The Jury - on disc, I'd be one very happy Spillane fan.

The Girl From U.N.C.L.E. on DVD

It's April in August -- According to Stephanie "April Dancer" Powers herself, the complete The Girl From U.N.C.L.E. television series will be out on DVD from Warner Archives next week! Man, I love Manufactured-On-Demand DVD.... of course, I'd love it more if the discs were a little cheaper.

More Mike Hammer coming to DVD!

2011 has been a good year for Mike Hammer on DVD so far, even if the Armand Assante I, The Jury and the 80s Stacy Keach TV series (both of them) are still among the missing. We've had Criterion's amazing restoration of Kiss Me Deadly (my review HERE), and the MGM Limited Edition Collection has made available the rather less-than-stellar (but still appreciated) My Gun Is Quick (my review HERE) on manufactured-on-demand DVD.

Now, it looks like A&E Home Video will be releasing the 50's syndicated television series, Mickey Spillane's Mike Hammer, starring the incredible Darren McGavin to DVD in September, with a 12-disc set containing the entire series. The suggested retail price is astronomical (at least, for me), but at least they're releasing the whole series at once, so if I do manage to scrape up the lettuce, I won't have to wonder if the rest of the seasons will come out.

Yeah - damn right, I'm still burning about their Peter Gunn DVD releases ten years or so back, which dried up incomplete after two volumes.

Thanks to Bish's Beat for the head's up. You can pre-order the set from Amazon (at a slightly less astronomical discounted price) here: Mickey Spillanes Mike Hammer-Complete Series

Hey, Warner Archives!

A few years ago, when my wife and I lived in Florida, our cable package included the GoodLife Network. This channel specialized in old TV shows and Rascal scooter/men's enhancement product commercials. But one night a week, they ran a spy night (I Spy, The Avengers and The Persuaders) and on another, it was Warner Brothers private eye night, with back-to-back episodes of the "shared universe" P.I. shows 77 Sunset Strip, Hawaiian Eye and Surfside Six. (No Bourbon Street Beat, though. I wonder why?) 

Anyway, although my wife can be kinda picky about old television shows, we both enjoyed 77 Sunset Strip and Hawaiian Eye a lot. The shows were stylish, witty and featured fun ensemble casts and charming leads.

I'd love to have them all on DVD, but they've never been released on disc. I was talking about it with Brandi the other day, and it occurred to me that these shows would be ideal for the Warner Archive manufactured-on-demand DVD program. Like the many Hanna-Barbara cartoon shows that they've been issuing in complete series sets, the WB private eye shows would probably only be of interest to a comparatively small group of fans - but those fans would certainly be willing to pay to have them in authorized, complete season/series sets. They just started putting out The F.B.I. on DVD, so, obviously, they're not opposed to releasing some of their live-action TV back catalog.

I know I would collect them, if affordably priced. Anyone else out there want to see Warner Archives pull these great shows out of the vault?