Isn’t It Shocking? **** (1973, Alan Alda, Louise Lasser, Edmond O’Brien, Lloyd Nolan, Ruth Gordon, Will Geer) – Classic Movie Review 11,497

Director John Badham’s 1973 thriller Isn’t It Shocking? is written by Lane Slate, and stars Alan Alda, Louise Lasser, Edmond O’Brien, Lloyd Nolan, Ruth Gordon and Will Geer. The made-for-television comedy-mystery film first aired on the ABC network in 1973 as an ABC Movie of the Week on 2 October 1973.

It is a smashing TV movie with Alda and Lasser and a great bunch of veteran actors in charismatic performances in an entertainingly offbeat murder mystery set in a tiny Oregon town with a population of just 1360, where it isn’t old age that’s killing off the elderly.

The Mount Angel police station, manned by inexperienced police chief Dan Barnes (Alda), just can’t keep up with the mounting body count.

Badham directs with the expert touch that set him off on a big film career and the fine script continually hits the target.

Also in the cast are Dorothy Tristan, Lloyd Nolan, Pat Quinn, Liam Dunn, Michael Warren Powell and Jacqueline Allan McClure.

The movie is a series pilot and sequel to writer Lane Slate’s 1972 film They Only Kill Their Masters. Later, Andy Griffith starred as a similar character named Sam McNeill in the 1974 TV movie Winter Kill. Griffith starred again as Sam Adams in 1975 in the short-lived TV series Adams of Eagle Lake, and again in 1976 and 1977 with Griffith as Abel Marsh in the TV movies The Girl in the Empty Grave and Deadly Game. All the TV movies and the short-lived series were filmed in Big Bear Lake, California.

The cast are Alan Alda as Dan Barnes, Louise Lasser as Blanche, Edmond O’Brien as Justin Oates, Lloyd Nolan as Jesse Chapin, Will Geer as Lemuel Lovell, Ruth Gordon as Marge Savage, Dorothy Tristan as Doc Lovell, Patricia Quinn as Ma Tate, Liam Dunn as Myron Flagg, Michael Warren Powell as Michael, and Jacqueline Allan McClure as Hattie.

Derek Winnert 2021 Classic Movie Review 11,497

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