The Brass Bottle | |
---|---|
Directed by | Harry Keller |
Screenplay by | Oscar Brodney |
Based on | The Brass Bottle by Thomas Anstey Guthrie |
Produced by | Robert Arthur |
Starring | Tony Randall Burl Ives Barbara Eden |
Cinematography | Clifford Stine |
Edited by | Ted J. Kent |
Music by | Bernard Green |
Distributed by | Universal Pictures |
Release date |
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Running time | 87 minutes |
Country | United States |
Language | English |
The Brass Bottle is a 1964 American fantasy-comedy film about a modern man who accidentally gains the friendship of a long-out-of-circulation genie. It stars Tony Randall, Burl Ives and Barbara Eden.
The film is based on the 1900 novel of the same title by Thomas Anstey Guthrie. The novel had been adapted for the screen twice before, in the silent film era, in 1914 and 1923. It inspired the American fantasy sitcom I Dream of Jeannie , starring Eden.
Architect Harold Ventimore buys a large antique container that turns out to imprison a genie named Fakrash Alamash, whom Harold inadvertently sets free. Fakrash is effusively grateful for his release, and persistently tries to do favors for Harold to show his gratitude. However he has been in the brass bottle for a long time, and Fakrash's unfamiliarity with the modern world causes all sorts of problems when he tries to please his rescuer. Harold ends up in a great deal of trouble, including with his girlfriend, Sylvia Kenton.
The Brass Bottle was made on a modest budget and shot primarily on the back lot of Universal Studios, with a few exterior sequences made with rear screen projection, "giving the feature film the look of a standard sitcom from the era." [1]
The New York Times critic A. H. Weiler found the film "about as funny as your own funeral", and dismissed it as "one of the duller fantasies dreamed up by Hollywood's necromancers." [2]
Tony Mastroianni says The Brass Bottle is 'not a bad little movie" for what it is: "well-made but rather unpretentious." [3] Craig Butler calls The Brass Bottle a "silly and fairly predictable comedy, the kind that Hollywood was making in the early 1960s before it figured out that people were more and more getting this kind of fluff on television, where it was more at home." While not a great comedy, it is "pleasant, amiable and diverting". [4]
The Brass Bottle was released on DVD for Region 1 (U.S. and Canada only) as part of the Universal Vault Series in January 2010. [5]
Eden's role was instrumental in getting her cast as the star of the TV series I Dream of Jeannie , even though she did not play a genie in this film. [6]
This film was remade in Tamil by Javar Sitaraman as Pattanathil Bhootham (or Ghost in the City) in 1967.
Burl Icle Ivanhoe Ives was an American musician, singer and actor with a career that spanned more than six decades.
Richard Mulligan was an American character actor known for his roles in the sitcoms Soap (1977–1981) and Empty Nest (1988–1995). Mulligan was the winner of two Emmy Awards and one Golden Globe Award (1989). Mulligan was the younger brother of film director Robert Mulligan.
Larry Martin Hagman was an American film and television actor, director, and producer, best known for playing ruthless oil baron J. R. Ewing in the 1978–1991 primetime television soap opera Dallas, and the befuddled astronaut Major Anthony Nelson in the 1965–1970 sitcom I Dream of Jeannie. Hagman had supporting roles in numerous films, including Fail-Safe, Harry and Tonto, S.O.B., Nixon, and Primary Colors. His television appearances also included guest roles on dozens of shows spanning from the late 1950s until his death, and a reprise of his signature role on the 2012 revival of Dallas. Hagman also worked as a television producer and director. He was the son of actress Mary Martin. Hagman underwent a life-saving liver transplant in 1995. He died on November 23, 2012, from complications of acute myeloid leukemia.
I Dream of Jeannie is an American fantasy sitcom television series, created by Sidney Sheldon that starred Barbara Eden as a sultry, 2,000-year-old genie and Larry Hagman as an astronaut with whom she falls in love and eventually marries. Produced by Screen Gems, the show originally aired for 139 episodes over five seasons, from September 18, 1965, to May 26, 1970, on NBC.
Richard Stanford Cox, known professionally as Dick Sargent, was an American actor. He is best known for being the second actor to portray Darrin Stephens on ABC's fantasy situation comedy Bewitched. He took the name Dick Sargent from a Saturday Evening Post illustrator/artist of the same name.
Barbara Eden is an American actress who starred as Jeannie in the sitcom I Dream of Jeannie (1965–1970). Her other roles included Roslyn Pierce opposite Elvis Presley in Flaming Star (1960), Lieutenant jg Cathy Connors in Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea (1961), and a single widowed mother, Stella Johnson, in the film Harper Valley PTA (1978). Due to the success of the film, Eden reprised her role as Stella Johnson in a two-season television series, Harper Valley PTA.
William Edward Daily was an American actor and comedian known for his sitcom work as Major Roger Healey on I Dream of Jeannie, and Howard Borden on The Bob Newhart Show.
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Michael George Ansara was an American actor. He portrayed Cochise in the television series Broken Arrow 1956-1958, Kane in the 1979–1981 series Buck Rogers in the 25th Century, Commander Kang in Star Trek: The Original Series and Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Deputy U.S. Marshal Sam Buckhart in the NBC series Law of the Plainsman, and provided the voice for Mr. Freeze in the DC Animated Universe. Ansara received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame for his work in the television industry, located at 6666 Hollywood Boulevard.
Emmaline Henry was an American actress best known for playing Amanda Bellows, the wife of Dr. Alfred Bellows, on the hit 1960s situation comedy I Dream of Jeannie.
William Henry Rorke, known professionally as Hayden Rorke, was an American actor best known for playing Colonel Alfred E. Bellows on the 1960s American sitcom I Dream of Jeannie.
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I Dream of Jeannie... Fifteen Years Later is a 1985 American made-for-television fantasy-comedy film produced by Columbia Pictures Television which premiered on NBC on October 20, 1985. It is the first of two reunion films based on the 1965–1970 sitcom I Dream of Jeannie.
I Still Dream of Jeannie is a 1991 American made-for-television fantasy-comedy film produced by Columbia Pictures Television which premiered on NBC on October 20, 1991. It is the second and final reunion film based on the 1965–1970 sitcom I Dream of Jeannie.
"The Lady in the Bottle" is the pilot for I Dream of Jeannie that was picked by NBC for its Fall 1965 schedule. The episode first aired on September 18, 1965. It would not air again until Fall 1970 when the series went into syndication.
Genies or djinns are supernatural creatures from pre-Islamic and Islamic mythology. They are associated with shapeshifting, possession and madness. In later Western popular representation, they became associated with wish-granting and often live in magic lamps or bottles. They appear in One Thousand and One Nights and its adaptations, among other stories. The wish-granting djinns from One Thousand and One Nights, however, are the divs of Persian origin, not the Arabian djinns.
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The Brass Bottle is a 1923 American silent fantasy comedy film produced and directed by Maurice Tourneur and distributed by First National Pictures. The original 1900 novel The Brass Bottle by Thomas Anstey Guthrie was produced as a Broadway play in 1910. A 1914 silent followed. Both silent versions are lost. A 1964 adaptation starred Tony Randall and Barbara Eden.