Arnold

Plot synopsis:
A fake psychic, Blanche Tyler (Barbara Harris), and her boyfriend, George Lumley (Bruce Dern), attempt to locate the nephew of a wealthy and guilt-ridden elderly woman, Julia Rainbird (Cathleen Nesbitt). Julia's recently deceased sister gave the baby boy up for adoption, but Julia now wants to make him her heir, and will pay Blanche $10,000 if the man, Edward Shoebridge, can be found. During his investigation, George Lumley discovers that Shoebridge is thought to be dead, but he tracks down another criminal, Joseph Maloney (Ed Lauter), who paid for the tombstone over an empty grave.
Meanwhile, it is revealed to the viewers that Shoebridge murdered his adoptive parents, faked his own death and is now a successful jeweler in San Francisco known as Arthur Adamson (William Devane). He and his live-in girlfriend, Fran (Karen Black), kidnap millionaires and dignitaries, returning them in exchange for ransoms in the form of valuable gemstones. The duo conceal an enormous diamond in plain sight in a crystal chandelier.
When Adamson learns that George is investigating him, he enlists Maloney (the two had murdered Adamson's adoptive parents long ago), to kill Blanche and George. Maloney initially refuses to help, but then contacts Blanche and George, telling them to meet him at a café on a mountain road. He cuts the brake line of Blanche's car while the couple are in the café, but they manage to survive their dangerous high-speed descent. Maloney tries to run them over, but dies in a fiery explosion when he swerves to avoid an oncoming car and tumbles down the cliff.
At Maloney's funeral, his wife (Katherine Helmond) tearfully confesses to George that Shoebridge's name is now Arthur Adamson. George has to go to work driving his taxi for an evening shift, so Blanche tracks down various A. Adamsons in San Francisco, eventually reaching the jewelry store as it closes for the day. Arthur's assistant Mrs. Clay (Edith Atwater) offers to let Blanche leave a note. Blanche lies that she is a friend of Arthur and convinces Mrs. Clay to give her his address, instead.
Arthur and Fran are bundling a kidnapped Bishop Wood (William Prince) into their car when Blanche rings their doorbell. They attempt to drive out of their garage, but Blanche's car is blocking their way. She tells Arthur that his aunt wants to make him her heir. Blanche sees the unconscious bishop, and swears she will not tell, but Arthur drugs her, leaving her in the cellar while they drop the bishop off for ransom.
Searching for Blanche, George finds her car outside Arthur and Fran's house, but no-one answers the door. He breaks in and searches for her. Arthur and Fran return home; George hides upstairs. He overhears Arthur's decision to kill Blanche and frame her death as a suicide. George manages to talk to Blanche, who is faking unconsciousness in the open cellar. Arthur and Fran enter to carry Blanche out to the car, but she darts out and George locks the kidnappers in.
Blanche then goes into a "trance", climbs the stairs into the house and halfway up the next stairs, where she points at the huge diamond hidden in the chandelier. Blanche then "wakes" and asks George what she is doing there. He excitedly tells her that she is indeed a real psychic. He calls the police to collect the reward for capturing the kidnappers and finding the jewels. A smiling Blanche looks at the camera and winks.

Tags: cult, murder

Review:
For an association with one of America's foremost crooners, the company turned out a pretty grisly roster of flicks, (apropos, I guess, in light of the Crosby family history that surfaced later.) Film buffs may recall WILLARD, its inescapable sequel BEN, TERROR IN THE WAX MUSEUM, "W," and of course ARNOLD, among BCP's more visible offerings.Of the bunch, ARNOLD was definitely the most ghoulish fun.
A who's who of well-preserved Hollyweird relics and die-hard character actors, it predated the slasher film onslaught that would overrun theaters later with its premise of not so much "whodunnit," but who would get it next and how.Stella Stevens played a blushing, buxom bride about to make a most unusual deal with her much older hubby to be; an arrangement that is literally a lift from TALES OF THE CRYPT.
To complete the bizarro scene, Arnold even guides the proceedings through tape recordings, played in a machine installed in his coffin!The whole thing takes on the air of a ninety minute game of "Clue" played in reverse, as greedy, grasping relatives and hangers-on are dispatched in the most gory and inventive ways possible for a dead guy to come up with.
Amongst the suspects/victims are THE Elsa Lanchester, Roddy McDowall, Patric Knowles, Farley Granger, the witchy Ms. Wallis, who gets to sample some of the hottest "cold cream" on the market, Jamie Farr (yeah, Klinger from M*A*S*H himself,) and Victor Buono, in a hysterical cameo as the 'lucky' minister who gets to officiate at the nuptials.Serving as the hysterically inept and definitely non-PC Greek chorus is Bernard Fox of HOGAN'S HEROES fame, (most recently seen in the Brendan Fraser MUMMY remake), as the bumbling inspector in charge of investigating the murders, while giving a running commentary on the action.Most moviegoers found this a little too dark and gruesome to be a farcical romp, (little did they know that SCREAM was on the way about thirty years down the road), but it looks like a good time was had by all, and though it's somewhat dated, this '70's sendup is still worth a look, especially since all its stars are allowed to do what they did best.
ARNOLD proves to be the liveliest dead guy who ever threw a family "bash," and one thing's for sure...you won't soon forget him!.
This is a pretty black little film, and I actually really like it.
Roddy McDowell and Stella Stevens were fresh off of "Poseidon Adventure." Was this a good career move?
They were both actors who were willing to work, even if it meant doing dumb movies.Stella Stevens plays a woman carrying out the wishes of her lover, that she marry him after he is dead.
What follows is a combination of campy 70's sitcom humor, a "And Then There Were None"-style "whodunnit" mystery and some grisly, inventive death scenes.The pace is brisk as it moves to a surprise ending that is both satisfying and pretty disturbing for a "comedy." I respect a film that is willing to pretend to be all light and funny, then end so hatefully!
The theme of this film is that everyone is money-grubbing, selfish and weak.
Nasty, black-hearted, TRULY WEIRD (the opening song just kills me) and I love it!
One of the first films to feature "creative deaths", it was soon followed by a sequel and imitations (Theater of Blood, also with Vincent Price).Arnold follows the pattern of someone who may or may not be dead getting revenge on those who have wronged him.
Here we have a corpse (is it really millionaire Arnold Dewellyn?) who lays in his coffin for the entire movie while tapes of his voice are played at various intervals.
Arnold knows his greedy relatives are after his money, but he has a surprise for each of them.
Who will survive???This movie is basically a comedy, with some semi-gruesome murders (tame by today's standards) thrown in.
If you like black-comedies (Murder By Death for example) you should enjoy this PG rated Bing Crosby Production (BCP).
The cast is great: Stella Stevens, Roddy McDowell, Elsa Lanchester, Victor Buono, Charles Fox. The movie did hardly any business in 1973.
BCP sold the movie to be tacked on to double bills.
Arnold may be the most active corpse in the history of movies (we're not talking about zombies here).
There he is, lying in his casket throughout the movie, and yet his presence dominates the world of the living, and his sardonic smile makes him look pretty darn alive.
This highly original horror comedy has a morbid sense of humor and will keep you guessing all the way, but ultimately has one twist too many, becoming excessively illogical by the end.
It's still recommended, perhaps as a double feature with "Terror In The Wax Museum", another 1973 film by the same director, with many of the same stars, with even the same "they never set foot outside the studio" feeling.
I've noticed there aren't a lot of comments on this film, and for good reason.
It's been burried in the annals of time, from that dark age where films where made before Direct to Video that were obviously prime candidates.I managed to see the piece with my fiance last weekend on television as part of a run of 'bad movies'.
We intended to go out to a show that night, but ended up caught up in the funny weirdness of the story, the sets, the acting, the whole mess, and couldn't leave.
It's a pretty lousy movie.
Arrrrnold, Arrrnold!") is played over the background of a funeral in an obviously small soundstage with styrafoam tombstones and the obligatory raven and fog, which is of course hillarious.But it's a fun watch.
It's got enough aspects of a whodunit to be vaugly interesting.Best points are probably the police constable commenting 'Now, is this place a cemetary because it's always foggy here, or is it always foggy here because it's a cemetary?' and the tapedeck in the coffin.
Black Comedy Nothing, this funny movie has everything.
But I can say this that Roddy MacDowell shines throughout this movie as does Stella Stevens.
Norman Stewart as Arnold was really great, how'd he keep his eyes open all the time like that ?
Let's say he lost his head over the serving part (ha, ha).Elsa Lancaster was excellent as Arnold's sister, who get's all the solitude she needs at the climatic end.
I give it a 10 on the scale of rating because as a child I remember how scared I was when I left, seeing a nervous eye looking out of Arnold's picture every-so-often.
I really like this movie for a number of reasons.First it delivers the shocks and the laughs almost at the same time.It does not pretend to be high art.This movie is fun in a lot of ways.
If you have not seen it, you know right at the start that the greedy bunch of relatives and hangers on are going to be dispatched one by one.
Stella Stevens has seldom looked better than she does in this movie.
The cast is comprised of mostly character actors who have had some connection with the bizarre and macabre cinema before.
Among the cast members are Victor Buono, Elsa Lanchester, Roddy McDowell, Jamie Farr, Farley Granger, John McGiver and Bernard Fox. Needless to say everybody in the cast gets what they so richly deserve.
Roddy McDowall is so cocky and nasty in the movie that you know his time is going to come, and when it does-- it's a real headache!After seeing this movie at such a young age, I was afraid to dress in any sort of Halloween mask-- fearing that I would end up like poor Robert (Roddy McDowall).
Kind of like TEN LITTLE INDIANS meets SAW.
Arnold is everything a black comedy should be!
Here's a movie that, though released in theatres when it was made in 1973, had 'made for TV' written all over it.
I just watched it on YouTube after not having seen it in decades, maybe not since in the theatre when it was released.The best parts of this movie are Bernard Fox as Constable Hooke, who's descriptions of the murders is an absolute hoot, Jamie Farr (almost unrecognizable as an Indian servant) who says nothing, but who's presence is always good, and Victor Buono who may be in it briefly, but as the officiate of the wedding, is outstanding.
He plays 'uncomfortable and awkward' extremely well, without going over the top.The rest of the cast holds their own nicely but those three take the movie from being an amusing 5 to a very amusing 8.
No, this isn't a laugh out loud comedic classic, but it's fun to watch in spite of the cheesiness.And the end is definitely a bit of a surprise.
The trailer for "Arnold" was far more successful than the actual movie; delineating sort of a "Ten Little Indians" scenario, it quickly highlighted a passel of imaginative deaths, such as two kissing lovers crushed to death in a shower stall.
The recipients of a deceased millionaire's will perish, one by one, in colorful ways, with Roddy McDowall's comeuppance--squeezed to death in a purple velvet suit--being the most ridiculous.
Produced on a TV-movie budget, stars Stella Stevens, Farley Granger, Jamie Farr, Victor Buono and McDowall each look properly embarrassed.
The only cast member who gets to shine a bit is Elsa Lanchester, hamming it up as dead Arnold's sister.
At least this one is fun (just imagine a "Love American Style" episode if made by Hammer Films).
Once again a mixture of has-been and never-were big and small-screen actors get bumped off in ways that will seem silly to veteran viewers of Brit-horror films such as TALES THAT WITNESS MADNESS and VAULT OF HORROR.
I remember seeing this movie when I was all of 10 years old with my older sister (who should have known better!) I couldn't sleep for days after.
This movie is really really scary in a campy, early '70s way.
Com'on, who wouldn't get scared with a dead body lying in its coffin, in the middle of the living room, while tape recordings arrive each morning detailing the gruesome events of the previous day -- and, in the corpse's own voice, no less!!???
The last one alive gets to keep all the money left behind....the location of which is to be revealed in one final tape!
You just gotta have a ghoulish sense of humor to enjoy the cheeky macabre aspects of this horror flick send up.
Plus, it really is funny the way these greedy, money hungry people die and, in the end, you kind of feel they all deserved it..
Arnold is a film about a recently deceased wealthy man that kills off his heirs and company from the grave.
Stella Stevens is ever beautiful, and buxom I might add, as Arnold's newly wed wife after his death.
Good turns also are contributed from Patric Knowles, Farley Granger, John McGiver, and Jamie Farr.
The best performance is given by British character actor Bernard Fox(known for his role of Dr. Bombay on Bewitched) as a dim-witted policeman that has little tact and sense.
His lines are the best and he certainly is the funniest aspect of the film.
The cast dies through many grisly deaths.
Shanni Wallis sings a rather very 70ish tune by the titular name that sets the mood of the film almost immediately as do some of the stylish sets and swirling fogs of the cemetery..
"Arnold" is a fun but minor example of the genre of "Mass Murderer impossibly out-psyches all of his victims" films.
For better examples, see either of Vincent Price's "Dr. Phibes" movies, or VP's "Theatre of Blood," probably the best crazed killer on the loose but with a theme movie ever made.But...
"Arnold" is sheer fun in the sense of watching a corpse kill off all his heirs solely because he knows them so well.
Sure, the methods of killing are ridiculous -- acidic cold cream, a killer suit, a squishing shower, a well placed guillotine -- but the supporting cast is marvellous, the suspense is there, and the "bad guy" wins.
Bonus points: Elsa Lancaster, and the dead guy looks a hell of a lot like Jack Cassidy, although he's not.I'd recommend this film as the second rental on a double feature; something to provide gory nasty thrills, but not quite as gross as whatever first choice nastiness you rented that evening..
The least you can say about "Arnold" is that it features an incredibly inventive and completely original plot!
"Upon his death, Arnold marries his long-time mistress Karen" What?
Wait a minute, the titular character Arnold is dead from the beginning of the film but he nevertheless gets married?
And I use the word "phenomenal" because the film opens with atmospheric images of a fog-enshrouded and morbidly ancient cemetery where a black cat challenges a vicious raven to a fight!
By then you will also have figured out that "Arnold" is, in fact, also a parody next to being an old- fashioned gruesome horror film.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't think there exist many other ways for a film to start more promising or peculiar!
It turns out that Arnold's shrew of a wife never agreed to a divorce while he was alive, so he arranged to wed his mistress after he died!
Arnold was a very wealthy but also eccentric man, and thus he astounds his ex-wife and greedy family members one last time by declaring in his will that his new wife Karen inherits his entire fortune and giant estate!
There's one little condition, though They have to remain married and Arnold needs to remain with her in his open coffin until death do them part (again).
Oh, by the way, did I mention that the deceased reads the testament to his family himself?
He actually as a tape deck build into his coffin (!) and while the recordings are playing he lays there with a giant evil grin on his dead face!
Obviously the testament causes further jealousy and hatred in the family, and even the brand new bride quickly turns out to be treacherous and in favor to put Arnold underneath the ground as fast as possible.
But new tapes continue to arrive and illustrate how Arnold is always several steps ahead of his evil family.
Although dead, he seemingly sees through their diabolical plans to get their hands on the fortune and prevents them by setting up freakish and painful death traps.
I really enjoyed "Arnold" a great deal in spite of some major defaults!
Many other reviewers already righteously compared the film with "The Abominable Dr. Phibes".
Even though that film benefited from much better direction and a smiling corpse could never replace the almighty Vincent Price, there are indeed a lot of similarities.
"Arnold" is basically a throwback/homage to the good old days of dark mansions full of booby-traps, secret peeping holes in paintings and despicable family members fighting over an inheritance.
There isn't a lot of tension, some parts are dull & slow-paced and the denouement is very predictable, but still the murders are gruesome and inventive (burning acid stirred into facial cream, shrinking suits, collapsing shower walls) and – as said already – the set pieces are magnificent.
Personally, I loved the Constable Hooke character (Bernard Fox) and how he persists on reporting the macabre deaths as terribly unfortunate accidents.
He also speaks a downright fantastic – in my humble opinion, at least – piece of monologue: "I wonder  Is it always foggy here because it's a cemetery, or did they build a cemetery here because it's always foggy?" Oh, and final note for the avid horror nerds, that's Elsa "Bride of Frankenstein" Lanchester in the role of naive, cat- caressing sister!.
This is a great movie.
I saw it when I was 5 years old (back in 85') and I still remember it.I even remember the theme song.
I found this movie on here, because I remembered the theme song.
The one thing that I think that they should have done was let him have faked his death.
However, I guess the twist was that in most movies like that the person usually fakes his death.
Upon his death "Lord Arnold Dewellyn" (Norman Stuart) makes arrangements to be married to a woman by the name of "Karen" (Stella Stevens) even though he leaves behind a widow named "Lady Jocelyn Dewellyn" (Shani Wallis).
As it turns out, the reason he does this is because he wishes to settle some old scores with everyone who supposedly loved him but were only interested in his money.
Now rather than reveal any more I will just say that I didn't particularly care for this movie that much due in large part to the absence of humor and the morbid circumstances surrounding everything.
To be sure, there is some mystery here and there and Stella Stevens was definitely quite attractive.
**some spoilers**My parents took me to see this movie when I was 6 and it seriously freaked me out for many years to come - especially the shower squishing scene.
At that age, I certainly didn't recall anything funny about the film.
After a 30 year hiatus, I watched it again last week and, though I did laugh out loud in a few spots, I would hardly call it a comedy.
Granted, the whole wedding sequence was hilarious - especially the performance by Victor Buono (the minister).
But the rest of the movie was just a game of which selfish, unlikable, poorly developed character would get killed off next and in what gruesome fashion they'd meet their end - basically just an exercise in sadism.
This pattern reminded me a lot of "Final Destination 2", though at least that film had something resembling a likable character here and there.
Either way, "Heathers" and "Dr. Strangelove" will always be the apex of dark comedies in my book to which all others are compared - and "Arnold" falls way short.