Watch Shack Out on 101 For Free

Don't listen to the Hype. It's awful

A film with more than the usual spoiler issues. Talking about it in any detail feels akin to handing you a gift-wrapped present and saying, "I hope you like it -- It's a thriller about a diabolical secret experiment."

A movie that not only functions as a solid scarefest but a razor-sharp satire.

Although I seem to have had higher expectations than I thought, the movie is super entertaining.

SHACK OUT ON 101, Edward Dein's 1955 minimalist masterpiece of Cold War weirdness remains, over 50 years later, one of Hollywood's strangest concoctions.A dilapidated seaside beanery just north of San Diego is the setting for this outré noir tale about a group of disparate folks who become either directly or peripherally involved with Commie spies and stolen microfilm. The unforgettable cast includes Keenan Wynn as the diner's proprietor, a man obsessed with his "pecs" and always at odds with Lee Marvin as Slob, the animalistic short-order cook who's obsessed with va-va-voom Terry Moore who drives all the guys wild as the put-upon waitress who seems to only have eyes for Frank Lovejoy, "the professor" (of what we're not exactly sure) and Whit Bissell as the annoyingly chatty salesman who wanders in and out of the picture whenever a couple of uninterrupted minutes of bizarre banter is required. This is not a normal film in any true sense of the word. It doesn't make a whole lot of sense and, apart from aligning itself with the then current trend of pseudo patriotic, anti- communist espionage films, it isn't easy to guess what was really on the minds of those who produced this delirious little oddity. At times hilarious (possibly intentional, possibly not) and grimly somber, SHACK OUT ON 101 defies rational description and should most definitely be experienced at least once, or in the case with some of us, as often as humanly possible.

The movie is like some guy who rushes out of a bar after four stiff margaritas and has forgotten where he parked his car so he lurches all over the lot. It was written and directed by Edward Dein, so it's his fault.It's hard to believe this one-set movie was ever made. Half-way through, it turns from what I guess was supposed to be a comedy into an espionage thriller. Hard to believe -- really. I suspect that when Dein and his wife put it together they went through a few dozen old rejected screenplays and extracted episodes they thought might be playable by someone. It didn't matter whether the episodes fit together or not. There is one scene involving a weight-lifting competition between Keenan Wynne and Lee Marvin that rolls on for ten minutes and is not in the least amusing and is utterly pointless.Here's a sample of the dialog. See -- Terry Moore is studying for her civil service exam and her boyfriend, Frank Lovejoy, is holding her and administering a pop quiz. What are the three branches of the government? "Judicial." (He gives her a peck on the cheek.) "Legislative." (Peck.) "And executive." (Peck.) "Oh, I wish there were more branches of the government." (Clinch.) Lovejoy is "the professor" who works on secret technology and plays ball with Lee Marvin in order to get to the big guy at the top, in this case named "Mister Gregory." The professor doesn't really sound much like a professor. He uses "obsolete" not as an adjective but a transitive verb. For that matter, nobody sounds more than usually erudite. Keenan Wynne: "All men are created equal. If Lincoln knew Slob, he would never have said that." I now tip-toe gingerly around the plot details and move to the acting. Actually it's a pretty good cast with Lee Marvin at the top of his rangy form, but the director torpedoes any talent they might have put on display. Everyone shouts -- all the way through, regardless of context. When they want to show intense emotion -- surprise or anger -- what can they do? They can't very well shout. They've been shouting all along! So they must slam their fist on the counter or pound their heads.Terry Moore was so tiny, cute, and firmly packed in movies like "Mighty Joe Young" and "Beneath the Twelve Mile Reef." She could make any normal man feel like a pedophile. Here, though, she's hardly recognizable as the same person. She can't really act -- or isn't given a chance to. And her voice is lispy and hoarse as if she'd been smoking three packs of Gauloise every day for years. Thirty years after this release, she looked far better as a nude Playmate in Playboy Magazine.It's just awful. Marvin, a cook, has been constantly referring to Moore as "the tomato" and when she discovers he's an enemy agent, she TELLS HIM. Naturally he pursues her into her room with a carving knife and for a few minutes, while he slings her about the room, I bit my lip, fearing that he was going to slice and dice the tomato. Not to miss any cinematic cliché, Wynne enters the room to find Marvin holding the others at gunpoint. "What are you doing, Slob? Are you crazy? Give me that gun. Come on, let me have it." All the while Wynne is advancing on Marvin -- who finally lets him have it.Some people have found this funny. I have an appointment with my shrink next week and I would like any one of those people to accompany me and explain this to my psychiatrist in my presence. You tell him why you think this movie is funny.

Now here's some trash like it oughta be. Keenan Wynn's greaseball diner becomes the crux of a commie spy ring featuring the much-maligned Slob (suddenly I LOVE Lee Marvin). It's up to babyfaced waitress Terry Moore to set things straight. The rapport between Marvin and Wynn when they're not on the let's-get-into-Terry's-pants bandwagon is something to behold - this movie is casual in a delirious way, feels like it was shot on break from a really fun beach party. In their effort to add variety to what is basically a one-set movie, there is SO much going on - there's a goofy workout scene, Wynn gets uncharacteristically introspective and soft-spoken and then suddenly he's running around in flippers and snorkel, and a pacifist veteran shoots a commie with a spear gun. The plot contrivances have to be seen to be believed, especially the triple-macguffin love interest subplot with the State Department lunkhead and Moore walking straight in and out of the spy conference without being noticed. Lots of political speeches, all somehow overwrought and vague at the same time.

Terry Moore for all her potential in that movie never achieved the critical acclaim in later life that Lee Marvin did. I loved the movie, but don't believe I've ever seen it on TV. Only saw it once in 1955 and it was second bill of a two movie program. I don't even know what the first movie was. In those days it was normal to have two movies (and a cartoon, MovieTone News and a few trailers of movies to come).Frank Lovejoy was great as the commie spy, but I think Slob (Marvin) stole it. Terry Moore as the 'babe' was ok, but Slob was fantastic.