When watching this film, the question is — why did it end Dean Martin’s film career? There were a number of reasons, really, that had nothing to do with the film itself. Just a little over a year before this film was released, Martin divorced his popular wife, Jeanne. And I personally know people who had been fans who “dropped” Dean, as a result. They saw the situation as Peck’s bad boy really being bad, not just playing being bad. And, In 1974 his television show ended after a long (9 year) run. Since his smash hit (and financial bonanza) “Airport” in 1970, Dean had made only 2 movies before “Mr. Ricco”. Clearly, Martin’s career was winding down…and why not…he was approaching age 60.
And that’s where this film comes into the story. Dean Martin was getting old. I was in college when this film came out, and as a Dean Martin fan, I rushed to the theater to see it. There was a fair-sized audience in the theater that day, and 3 minutes into the film there was a scene that set the theater abuzz with chatter. I had only seen such a thing happen once before — at a theater presentation of “Gone With The Wind” — the scene looking down the staircase where we first see the dashing figure of Clark Gable. But unlike the GWTW experience, when the chatter was about how handsome the actor was, now it was about how old the actor looked. I heard people say things such as, “Oh my god! Look how old he is!” Now today, when you watch this film on television — even a high def widescreen television — he doesn’t look THAT old. But in the theater, on a wide screen, with particularly crisp cinematography, the wrinkles were startlingly clear…and my guess was that Dean was wearing very little makeup. And, in this picture it mattered, because later there are fight scenes, and one can’t help but think that it’s illogical that a man that old could fight like that. In my opinion, that brutal photography of Dean’s character playing cards 3 minutes into the film was the end of Dean’s film career (not counting the much later Cannonball knock-offs).
That’s not to say that this is a bad film. It’s not. Nor is it a great or almost-great film. It’s a pretty average crime drama from the mid-1970s. As a TV-movie, this might have been a pretty decent release…much as was Frank Sinatra’s “Contract On Cherry Street” as a TV-movie 2 years later. “Mr. Ricco” is a pretty gritty film, perhaps a little too gritty for a Dean Martin audience. Dean’s acting is okay, in fact a little more subtle here, and he comes across believable as an attorney. And, this really is Dean’s movie. While other roles are pivotal, and all the actors do their jobs, none have significant screen time.
If there’s a specific criticism I have it’s that the stunt double for Dean is so not Dean in many of those scenes.
It’s interesting to watch the two flops at either end of Dean’s solo film career — this film and “Ten Thousand Bedrooms”. Both are primarily for fans of Dean Martin.
