WHAT'S UP, TIGER LILY? (1966) C widescreen 80m dir: Woody Allen

w/Tatsuya Mihashi, Mie Hama, Akiko Wakabayashi, Tadao Nakamaru, Susumu Kurobe, Woody Allen, Frank Buxton, Len Maxwell, Louise Lasser, Mickey Rose

From The Movie Guide: "Woody Allen took a low-grade Japanese spy film called KAGI NO KAGI (Key of Keys) and dubbed in new dialogue (improvised with Buxton, Maxwell, Lasser, Rose, [Bryna] Wilson, and [Julie] Bennett) to create this wonderfully cockeyed movie. The story describes the adventures of Phil Moscowitz, a Japanese James Bond who is searching for the world's greatest egg salad recipe. The balance of world power hangs on whether or not Moscowitz can keep this recipe --- 'so delicious you could plotz' --- from falling into the wrong hands. After many plucky escapades, Moscowitz confronts Shepherd Wong, the evil mastermind trying to get the recipe for his own nefarious doings. ...

"WHAT'S UP, TIGER LILY? is cleverly devised, hinging on a well-developed sense of the absurd. Allen and his cohorts make good use of the source movie's situations, turning its obvious chiches into some wonderful parodic gems. The one-liners spew out like popcorn, an effect that wears a little thin towards the end. Footage of the pop group the Lovin' Spoonful edited into the story also detracts from the pell-mell pacing. Though Allen had limited control over the visual content, many of the themes and ideas he would later develop in such films as LOVE AND DEATH and HANNAH AND HER SISTERS are evident in the dialogue --- themes of sexual frustration, psychiatry and neurosis, Judaism, and the influence of movies. Executive producer Saperstein paid only $66,000 for the rights to KEY OF KEYS and certainly got more than his money's worth when he turned it over to the rising comedian. Heard on the soundtrack are Lasser, Allen's second wife, and Rose, co-writer with Allen of TAKE THE MONEY AND RUN and BANANAS."