Together Again For the First Time

Not long ago, people went up to the attic to stow clutter away. Today they bring it down. Nostalgia and its bastard cousin, camp, have transformed debris into antiques, and trivia into gold. In the Hollywood attic, two losers have been moldering for over a year, waiting for a miracle that would render them profitable. The leftovers are Fearless Frank and Madigan's Millions, and the miracle is Midnight Cowboy, which reinforced the reputation of Dustin Hoffman and elevated Jon Voight from a cipher into a star with a six-figure salary. This month American International Pictures, with the calculation of a jeweler digging out his stock of Mickey Mouse watches, is distributing a double bill that brings the boys together again for the first time.

Fearless Frank is a comic strip brought to life in all two dimensions. In the title role, Voight plays a Supermanic hero and his Frankensteinian twin. Occasionally, he perks up enough to look lobotomized; the rest of the time he second-fiddles amid a frantically improvising cast--which includes Novelist Nelson Algren. The only player who truly understands this kind of cartoon is not the blond, bland star but Severn Darden, a refugee from Chicago's improvisational Second City troupe. Darden portrays a mad doctor who would seem far more at home speaking balloons than lines.

As for Hoffman, he was airlifted from off-Broadway to Rome for Madigan's Millions and given a fast $5,000 for his first film role as a fumbling, bumbling G-man. Today he could light his cigars with bills of that size--and may be tempted to put his screen debut to the same use. At first glance, he can hardly be blamed. The movie's garish color and lighting would give an aspirin a headache, and its flubbed, dubbed screenplay is sheer, towering Babel. Yet here and there are some amusing hints of the ludicrous student who became the Graduate.

Beyond the simple history and mild comedy that its twin bill offers Hoffman-Voight fans, American International Pictures deserves an additional salute from the industry. Eyes fixed on the rear-view mirror and hands planted in the cash register, AIP has devised a unique way to greet the '70s, ringing in the now by wringing out the old.

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