Cheap The World of Henry Orient (DVD) (George Roy Hill) Price

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Customer Reviews of The World of Henry Orient

A fun movie about growing up
This is just simply a very sweet and fun movie! As others have noted, if you watch it in the belief that it's a Peter Sellers movie then you're going to be disappointed. While Sellers' character is crucial to the film, he's not the star. The stars of the film are two teenage actresses- Tippy Walker as "Valarie 'Val' Boyd and Merrie Spaeth as "Marian 'Gil' Gilbert." It's amazing that this movie was the debut for both- they just seem so natural. (It's also surprising that neither acted much afterwards.) <
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>Gil and Val are two girls who have reached an age in which they're too old for toys, but too young for boys. Further, they're young teens living during what John Waters has described as "that weird time that was after Elvis, but before The Beatles." As Gil and Val struggle to adjust to their growing sense of maturity, they find comfort in a self-created fantasy world with Manhattan as the background to their flights of whimsy. (I've lived in Manhattan for ten years, and I wish it looked as half as good as it is filmed here.) By chance the girls find an object that becomes the intense focus for all their innocent romantic fantasies- Henry Orient (Sellers), an avant garde concert pianist of dubious talent who seems a lot more intersted in attempting to make married women "hum" than improving his non-Van Cliburn skills. <
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>Sellers' Orient is a truly unique character. Born and raised in Brooklyn, he's adapted a pretentious non-descript Continental accent especially when wooing women, but when he gets flustered his native Brooklynese escapes his lips. And Val and Gil certainly fluster Mr. Orient as they follow him around town, completely oblivious to the havoc that they're wreaking on his love life. <
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>The movie also delves into the home life of these two girls. Gil, despite her parents being divorced, lives in a stable upper middle class home with her mom and her mom's friend. On the other hand, Val's very wealthy and very busy parents (played by Tom Bosely and Angela Lansbury) are still married, but far from happily. Eventually, Val's unhappy family life will interfere with her joyous fantasy world and bring it crashing down. <
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>Overall, this is just a very nice film about both the joy of being young and the difficulty of growing up. I enjoyed it because of the acting and its endearing story. I also enjoy it because it makes Manhattan in the early 60's look like such a great place to live- how nicely everyone is dressed and how clean the city looks! <
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A Sellers Sleeper
This movie is unique in the Peter Sellers repertoire in that Sellers does not dominate the film; he gives a relatively restrained yet dead-on comedic performance as a sleazy third-rate concert pianist who is equally maladroit as a womanizer. The two teenage girls who stalk him steal the show. Angela Lansbury and Tom Bosley are superb. Elmer Bernstein's score with its recurring theme provides an ideal backdrop for this very New York movie. It was endearing when I saw it 40+ years ago, and no less captivating now.

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Beyond Horrible
After seeing the number of glowing reviews I had to put in my thoughts - - this was beyond horrible. I was quite ready to turn this off at the 15 minute mark. Someone mentioned the weird scene with the girls jumping over things - - in slow motion - - I think they were just trying to shoot up their dresses. I especially hated the fact that the "girls" looked SO mature, but were playing 13/14 year olds. I just looked them up and I was correct - the actresses were 16 and 17 at theh time they played the "girls". They couldn't find some precocious pre-teens to play the part?? The funniest part of the movie was the scene with the checkers while the "symphony" was playing. 10 seconds - maybe. PAINFUL movie to watch. Also, as previously mentioned the sound was horrible.