The Moon Spinners (1964). "Everyone lies when it serves their purpose...even the stars."
This week we get Hayley Mills' first on screen romance...the only problem is her partner wants absolutely nothing to do with her.
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Storyline :British musicologist Frances Ferris (Joan Greenwood) and her late teen niece Nikky Ferris (Hayley Mills) are travelling through Crete recording Greek folk songs for the BBC. In the usually quiet coastal town of Aghios Georgios, they manage to get a room at an inn called "The Moon-Spinners", despite the people at the inn being busy preparing for a wedding, and no one there, except Alexis (Michael Davis), the young teen son of the proprietress Sophia (Irene Papas), he who is fond of spouting current popular Americanisms in his slightly broken English, seeming to want them there. Frances and Nikky learn from Alexis that the unwelcoming feeling is all because of his maternal Uncle Stratos (Eli Wallach), who has become a man suspicious of anyone ever since his recent return from London after being away for fifteen years. Beyond those there for the wedding, the only other guest at the inn is a young Englishman named Mark Camford (Peter McEnery), who they befriend. Nikky is too preoccupied with her own suspicions and mistrust of Stratos truly to see that there is something more sinister in the feelings between Stratos and Mark. Although they don't say anything to each other directly on the matter, Stratos knows why Mark is in Aghios Georgios and is always skin diving in the nearby Bay of Dolphins, and Mark knows that Stratos, and by association his other nephew Lambis (Paul Stassino), will be after him if he gets too close to what they have hidden in the bay before their intended method of disposal. By getting close to Mark, Nikky may unwittingly get caught up in what is the very dangerous and potentially life threatening game of cat-and-mouse between Stratos and Mark.
Directors: James Neilson
Writers: Michael Dyne(screenplay) and Mary Stewart(book "The Moon-Spinners")
Stars: Hayley Mills, Eli Wallach, Pola Negri and Peter McEnery
Awards: 0 Wins & 0 Nominations
Film Budget: $5,000,000 (estimated)
Gross Worldwide: Unknown - but we do know it was a flop.
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Such a bizzare intro track but would it be a Disney live action movie from the 60s or 70s without one?
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HAYLEY and a ROMANTIC STRANGER bound together by an ancient secret... too dangerous to share! But we will share these facts.
Pola Negri (Madame Habib) had been retired for about twenty years when Producer Walt Disney convinced her to come out of retirement to make this movie. Studio Executive and co-Producer Bill Anderson telephoned Negri at home in Texas, and convinced the veteran actress to read the screenplay, after going to Hollywood to negotiate the project.
Despite good reviews, and Hayley Mills' popularity with young audiences at the time, this movie failed at the box-office. Rather than being re-issued in theaters, it was initially shown two years later, in three parts, on the Disney Sunday night television show.
At a cost of five million dollars, this movie, at the time, was one of Walt Disney Pictures most expensive live-action movie productions.
The big pet cat belonging to Madame Habib (Pola Negri) was originally supposed to be a domestic cat in the original script, but at Negri's suggestion, it was changed to a cheetah.
The name of the pet cheetah that belonged to Madame Habib (Pola Negri) was "Shalimar".
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We were incredibly surprised this movie no one knows about is available on Disney+
https://www.disneyplus.com/video/a79c712d-c7d0-46fa-949f-3eb46ccd9c55?distributionPartner=google
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