AS "Every Bastard a King" opens, Pier Angeli, as the mistress of an American journalist in Israel, boards a plane to escort his body home. Blasting away in the background, as the titles unfold, is a terrible rock 'n' roll ballad, raucously sung, that defines what lies ahead. The picture is a dead duck. It opened yesterday at the Festival Theater.
Filmed in Israel by a color camera—and the color is poor—that flips around in self-conscious "cinéma vérité" style, this miserable little exercise pastes a slap-dash little drama signifying absolutely nothing against some authentic locales that mean a great deal.
Occasionally, as the journalist-hero roars around in a jeep after a "scoop," the picture slams, as though by accident, into some footage that looks documentary and real, such as cafe scenes suggesting the political turbulence of the country. There is also a shot of the massed street adulation of Abie Nathan, the young man who abruptly flew solo to Egypt to talk peace with Nasser.
Finally, there is some explosive footage of a tank battle apparently clipped from the reality of the six-day Israeli-Egyptian War. And we defy anybody to indicate which side is which.
Out of the confusing photography and an equally confusing babble of English-speaking voices, some of which sound dubbed, there emerges ever so obliquely a dull little story of a Heming-way-type writer covering the conflict. At least William Berger, squinting like a chow and sporting a thick mustache, looks like Hemingway as he pecks away, watched adoringly by Miss Angeli, who only remotely resembles the lovely little Italian of long ago.
"I'm the best," he yaps, a typical observation in his continual flow of stale, cynical wisecracks. He's not much of an actor, that's for certain.
Not much better is Oded Kotler, as his Israeli pal, who abruptly flies to Egypt and has a fliply comical encounter with a sub-official (hence the cut-in of that acclaim for the man who actually did fly over). The only remotely intriguing character in view is the hero's chauffeur, a burly ex-paratrooper played by Yehoram Gaon. The whole thing looks like a rush, topical job. The word for it is sloppy
This is a very poor quality rip, one that is usually not allowed here, however due to the film's rarity it was approved as an exception to the rules in the Rip Quality Standards Approvals
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http://www.filesonic.com/file/106809422/Kol_Mamzer_Melech.rar
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