After honking her horn, Alfie (Sir Michael Caine) takes his leave of his make out partner, Siddie (Millicent Martin), to speak directly to the camera about his latest conquest, who incidentally is married with low self-esteem. Ready for more action, Alfie winks at a stray dog on the street and hops back in the car. Upon dropping Siddie off where she will meet up with her husband, Alfie heads home to his “standby,” Gilda (Julia Foster). Lower middle class Gilda loves Alfie, though he doesn’t even like her. He’s bossy and rude to her while she adores him. And she’s pregnant. Yikes!

She wants to have the baby and give it up for adoption “to a rich lady,” but Alfie doesn’t want the headache. To takes his mind off things, he sleeps with the manageress of a Dry Cleaners, a woman from a foot comfort service, a mother, and a stranger in a park. In his spare time, Alfie announces that he believes in helping himself at the expense of others, as he steals a tank of gas.

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Our journey through space travel science fiction has our coordinates locked onto the 1950's The most Ultra of the Ultra-Swank decades. Receding in our aft view screen is the pulp pre-war period of the 1930's and 1940's - the times of cowboys in space. They rode rockets instead of horses and blasted bad guys with ray guns instead of six-shooters.

Our mid-century destination is where the science in science-fiction takes over the controls! We land squarely in the realm of motion pictures- mostly black and white and often projected on the mosquito obscured screens of drive-in theaters. The plots may still be thin, the dialog contrived and the budgets no bigger than a plutonium neutrino but it's all arc-welded together by the blazing brilliance of the the god in the white lab coat- The Scientist! This is the height of the Cold War and the near vertical climb of American consumerism. Any moment science will end all life on the planet- but in the meantime let's get that new Hydramatic Futurific Buick with the built-in color TV dishwasher!

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During the early 1950s, the well polished comic team of Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis broke box office records and created a worldwide following. After splitting up in 1956, both men found themselves in successful solo careers. In 1959, Paramount Studios contracted with Jerry Lewis to create 14 films in 7 years for $10 million plus a profit-sharing deal. Released in 1961, The Ladies Man was written, produced, and directed by Jerry Lewis. The period from 1960-1964 would come to represent the best of Lewis’ creative output.

The Ladies Man begins as Herbert H. Heebert (Lewis) graduates from Milltown Junior College with plans to marry his sweetheart. Those hopes are destroyed when he finds her romantically involved with a letterman. From here on, Herbert vows to remain a bachelor, “alone all his life.” Herbert quickly runs into his mother’s arms, in a surprise drag role also played by Lewis.

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Dental assistant cum super spy Fathom skydives her way into our hearts via a series of confusing double crosses and eye-pleasing costume changes – 16, in fact. While traveling through Spain with her skydiving team, Fathom Harvill is enlisted by Colonel Campbell, who operates out of a mobile home in Malaga in lieu of a super secret volcano hideaway, to locate the Fire Dragon. We’re told there are only two qualifications for the job – being a girl skydiver, she meets both.

With the popularity of James Bond as strong as ever in 1967, there was bound to be a lady agent on film. Then 27-year-old Raquel Welch, fresh off One Million Years BC and sporting seemingly impossible measurements of 37-22-36, solidified her buxom beauty status with this role. Co-starring the “always a bridesmaid, never a bride“ Tony Franciosa, sporting an odd peroxide blonde ‘do, this film provides little substance, but a lot of Raquel.

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Get Carter starring Sir Michael Caine was released in 1971 and is most likely the best and most well known British gangster movie ever made. Not only does it create an excellent gritty, eerie and gloomy 1970s gray industrial look – but also features a very tasty score by composer and jazz musician Roy Budd, a musical prodigy already having completed a vast musical repertoire at the young age of 8. The above videos document Mr. Budd playing the main theme for the movie accompanied with the opening scene and under it the original uncut trailer for the movie. If you are a fan of Get Carter you should definitely also look into The Long Good Friday starring Bob Hoskins.

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