Main Cast: Jean-Paul Belmondo, Ursula Andress, Jean Rochefort, Darry Cowl, Maria Pacome, Valerie Lagrange
Release Year: 1965
Country: IT/FR
Run Time: 94 minutes
Plot
Arthur Lempereur (Jean-Paul Belmondo of Breathless) is a globe-hopping millionaire, engaged to Alice (Valérie Lagrange), a beautiful young woman. As the film opens, Arthur has cut the break line on his fine automobile and proceeds to drive it off a cliff. This, we learn, is his ninth suicide attempt in the past week. Arthur is bored with his easy life. Even learning from his accountant, Biscotton (Darry Cowl), that he's ruined doesn't perk him up. On a cruise to Hong Kong, his friend Mr. Goh (Valéry Inkijinoff) comes up with a solution to Arthur's woes: "Adversity carries the chance for happiness," he explains to the despondent young man. Goh convinces Arthur to take out a two-million-dollar life insurance policy, with Goh and Alice as the beneficiaries. The policy will expire in one month. Goh then tells Arthur that his life is in danger. He may be killed at any moment. Arthur soon realizes that he's being followed. He's not so eager to be murdered. Arthur and his valet, Leon (Jean Rochefort of The Hairdresser's Husband), frantically search for Goh to ask him to call off the hit. At one point, Arthur ducks into a nightclub to dodge his pursuers, and instantly falls for Alexandrine (Ursula Andress), the stripper on-stage. Alexandrine is fascinated by the ways men try to manipulate women and assumes that Arthur's story about hired killers is a bizarre ruse. All the more determined to survive the month, the bumbling Arthur engages in a fierce battle for his life. Up to His Ears is both a loose adaptation of a Jules Verne story (Les Tribulations d'un Chinois en Chine) and a hyped-up return to the form of director Philippe de Broca's previous action comedy, That Man from Rio, which also starred Belmondo. ~ Josh Ralske, All Movie Guide
Review
Philippe de Broca's Up to His Ears is a charmingly slapdash action comedy. Despite the film's decidedly thrown-together feel, it's genuinely exciting and funny. De Broca starts his film with Arthur (the redoubtable Jean-Paul Belmondo) very symbolically cutting the brake line on his car. The director is doing the same thing, throwing caution to the wind and ramping the action up to a breakneck pace. Up to His Ears is engaging, though never convincing. Any semblance of sanity -- or even continuity -- is amusingly tossed aside as Arthur deals with duplicitous friends and would-be in-laws, his bumbling valet (Jean Rochefort as Leon), dangerously incompetent insurance men, and a volatile Ursula Andress running on the beach in a white bra and panties. There are a few thrilling comic set pieces as Arthur and Leon traverse the globe, including a sequence where our heroes dangle from a hot air balloon over the Himalayas, a spectacular Hong Kong car crash leading to a chase on a rolling bed, and another scene in which Belmondo and Andress appear to leap from one plane to another in mid-flight. There's an element of satire in the convenient way Belmondo stumbles and crashes his way out of impossible scrapes without ever (well, hardly ever) messing up his hair or clothes. The whole thing zips along with an infectiously insouciant air. ~ Josh Ralske, All Movie Guide
Francois de Lamothe - Art Director, Jacqueline Moreau - Costume Designer, Philippe de Broca - Director, Francoise Javet - Editor, Georges Delerue - Composer (Music Score), Edmond Sechan - Cinematographer, Georges Dancigers - Producer, Alexandre Mnouchkine - Producer, Gil Delamare - Special Effects, Gil Delamare - Stunts, Daniel Boulanger - Screenwriter, Philippe de Broca - Screenwriter, Jules Verne - Book Author
