VidMate
Free YouTube video & music downloader
ACTOR
Carol LynleyJeff ChandlerEleanor ParkerMary Astor
DIRECTOR
José Ferrer
SYNOPSICS
Return to Peyton Place (1961) is a English movie. José Ferrer has directed this movie. Carol Lynley,Jeff Chandler,Eleanor Parker,Mary Astor are the starring of this movie. It was released in 1961. Return to Peyton Place (1961) is considered one of the best Drama movie in India and around the world.
More
Return to Peyton Place (1961) Reviews
No where near as good as the original
This review contains spoilers from the original movie Peyton Place. As a stand alone movie, RETURN TO PEYTON PLACE was okay. What really ticks me off about this movie is how so few of the characters in the original are in this movie. The whole point of a sequel is to find out what happens to the original characters. I want to know what happened with Allison's boyfriend Norman Page after he came home from the war. What happened to Betty Anderson after she and her father-in-law found out that Rodney Harrington had died in the war? But my biggest pet peeve is the way they handled the Selena and Ted affair. In this movie they acted as if they had never been anything more than friends. Well that's a big load of crap! And I don't remember Ted being rich in the first movie. Where did all this fabulous wealth suddenly appear from? The best part of the whole movie was Mary Astor as Mrs. Carter. You just wanted to smack her, she is such a bitch!
Worth watching for one reason - Mary Astor
Compared with the original and it's brilliant cast, this sequel is a bit of a mess. Too much of Miss Lynley goes to New York and falls for very bland Jeff Chandler. Who cares. Also, the lack of a kindly Dr. (Lloyd Nolan in the first) strips the town of it's heart. But, on the positive side, Mary Astor is terrific as the ultimate soaper opera version of the evil, possessive, rich, self appointed queen-of-the town. Some great verbal sparing with her new daughter-in-law. And even in defeat, her final, dignified speech is frighteningly prophetic 35 years later. I watch a lot of movies, and this performance took my breath away. Wow!!!!! She is to Soap Operas villains what Alan Rickman is to Action villains.
Not much of a homecoming!
On the big, wide CinemaScope screen of the Fox Village Theater in Westwood, in West Los Angeles, California, where I saw this one first-run, I settled in with some rather high expectations as the lovely theme song was beautifully sung by Rosemary Clooney, while stunning vistas of New England beauty followed one another over the opening credits. Alas, my hopes were quickly dashed and, as other IMDb comments attest, this followup to the very successful "Peyton Place" was a severe disappointment in most respects. The handsome cast was strangely set adrift amidst some rather drab production values and only Mary Astor was given enough to do and was allowed to do it well as the town's tyrannical matriarch. Her final scene is an example of an actress still in full command of her powers convincing an unwilling cinema audience (though not her fellow townspeople on screen) that being a prude and a social snob is a desirable way to live one's life! Jose Ferrer as a director was never much of a visual stylist so the VHS tape of this CinemaScope production, most probably not letterboxed, might satisfy the curious who want to see an example of studio product that was mired in a soon to be abandoned estimation of what audiences of that day really wanted to see.
Not as sensational
Not as sensational as the great Metalious' novel based upon a small New England town with all it's small talk, and nasty inuendos, but it holds it's own with fine performances of Mary Astor, who really steals the show as the embittered mean old lady who spoils things for others. Cast includes Carol Lynley as Allison Mackenzie who writes her book; Jaff Chandler, as the publicist; Eleanor Parker as Connie; and Tuesday Weld as Selena Cross. I give it 6/10
You Can't Go Home Again...
As has already been stated, all of the actors in the original "Peyton Place" were replaced by new performers. That was the first mistake. The next was the script. Allison MacKenzie (Carol Lynley) has just completed a semi-autobiographical novel about her home town. Off she goes to New York for a meeting with her publisher Lewis Jackman (Jeff Chandler) and what looks like (at least at first) an antagonistic relationship between the two. Meanwhile, back in Peyton Place, Ted Carter (Brett Halsey) has just returned with his new(pregnant)Italian Bride, Raffaela (Luciana Paluzzi) and is greeted by his wealthy, influential mother, Roberta (Mary Astor) who is displeased, to say the least,by her son's choice of a wife, and immediately begins a campaign to destroy Ted's marriage and drive Raffaela away. Roberta even goes so far as to involve town outcast (and Ted's onetime girlfriend) Selina Cross (Tuesday Weld) in an attempt to make his wife jealous. In New York, Allison has discovered she likes her publisher and considers becoming involved with him. When the newly published book reaches Peyton Place, all Hell supposedly breaks loose. Allison's mother Constance (Eleanor Parker) who has a skeleton in her own closet, is disgusted by the book. Her high school principal husband Mike Rossi (Robert Sterling) however, promptly puts it in the school library. Whereupon Roberta Carter (naturally, the head of the school board) demands his resignation. And so it goes... Most of the performances are problem number three. Lynley plays Allison so stiffly and unpleasantly that she quickly becomes a bore. Chandler is OK though he has little to work with. Parker overacts to a fault, which she often did in the past, and Sterling does about as well as Chandler. Weld is a bit shrill herself (especially when she begins an impromptu affair with new ski instructor Gunnar Hellstrom) but at least she's lively. The best scenes in the film are those between Astor (superb, as always), Halsey and Paluzzi (both of them are good and prove adequate sparring partners for Astor, though of course, they aren't in the same league) Had the film concentrated on the tension between these three, and a clearer exploration of it, then it would have been that much better. Instead, Director Jose Ferrer insists on switching back to the other ''Plot Threads'', none of them even as remotely interesting as this one. Especially Lynley's almost-affair with Chandler, which, like the rest of the film, goes nowhere. As for Ferrer, he appears to have left the performers to their own devices, and done little else. At least the obligatory town meeting, attended by all the principal characters, wraps up most of the loose ends neatly, which is certainly a novel ending for a soap opera., and the CinemaScope production is handsomely photographed. It really isn't necessary (or wise) to see the original "Peyton Place" before viewing this film, because "Return To Peyton Place" inevitably suffers in comparison. In all fairness, it must be mentioned that this film underwent extensive editing before it's release, excising scenes still glimpsed in the theatrical trailer. Astor's part suffered from the editing most (and her scenes are probably the only regrettable deletions), but the rest would only have made a mediocre melodrama that much longer.