A Talent for Loving * (1969, Richard Widmark, Cesar Romero, Chaim Topol, Geneviève Page) – Classic Movie Review 11,725

Richard Widmark in 1973.

Director Richard Quine’s 1969 British-American comedy Western film A Talent for Loving stars Richard Widmark, Cesar Romero, Chaim Topol, and Geneviève Page. It is based on the 1961 satirical Western novel A Talent for Loving, or The Great Cowboy Race by Richard Condon, with the screenplay by Jack Rose.

Richard Condon’s (Prizzi’s Honor) novel hits the screen as a messy, disjointed and unsatisfactory film about a Western family of high-powered, over-sexed executives having problems with their women.

Widmark stars as a gambler named Patten, wedded into a Mexican dynasty afflicted with the Aztec nymphomaniacal curse of A Talent for Loving of the title. Patten wins the deed to a Mexican ranch, but finds it is cursed. Cesar Romero plays Don Jose, who must marry off his lovely daughter to free her of the nymphomaniac curse.

Despite the good cast, this weird knockabout Western, made in Spain, was finally sold straight to TV and finally shown on ABC in 1974 on its US original airing.

It is produced by Walter Shenson, who weirdly offered it to manager Brian Epstein as a vehicle for The Beatles in December 1965 though it was sensibly rejected unanimously.

It runs 110 minutes but the Simitar Entertainment home video version of the film is edited to 95 minutes and re-titled Gun Crazy.

The cast are Richard Widmark as Major Patten, Chaim Topol as Molina, Cesar Romero as Don Jose, Geneviève Page as Delphine, Fran Jeffries as Maria, Derek Nimmo as Moodie, Max Showalter as Franklin, Joe Melia as Tortillaw, John Bluthal as Martinelli, Libby Morris as Jacaranda, Judd Hamilton as Jim, and Caroline Munro as Evalina Patten.

It is made by Saltair Productions [Walter Shenson Productions] and released by Paramount Pictures.

 © Derek Winnert 2021 Classic Movie Review 11,725

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