Some people have said that he is over the top, but I think that is so only if you consider all of his comedic performances and satires. How can I believe this fellow is the incompetent Clouseau and also wince every time his character in this film walks into a room, expecting him to explode with the violence that is obviously seething in him.
Sellers plays the owner of an auto repair shop that runs a ring of car thieves on the side. Then one day his gang of teen thieves steal the car of John Cummings (Richard Todd). Cummings is a mediocre salesman of cosmetics who has just bought the car but not bought full coverage insurance. He only has liability. So with the cosmetics company's son taking over the practical running of the business and implying that Cummings' job is in danger, and Cummings thinking that this car and being able to get to more places quickly is the secret to holding on to that job, he begins to investigate the crime himself, and soon he is getting very close to the truth.
Meanwhile, he finds out from his wife that she sees him as a perpetual dreamer and failure, and she is OK with that, but she is not OK with him getting mixed up with a bunch of hoods to get his car back, but unfortunately Cummings has focused in on reclaiming his car as a way of proving that he can finish what he starts, that he is not the failure his wife says that he is.
In the middle of this you have a dispassionate police inspector, and a couple of kids in love who have no real options in life. Unfortunately one is Meadows' mistress and the other is one of his gang of thieves.
This thing, on what was probably a shoe-string budget is an incredibly engaging movie. There's great dialogue, a tremendous use of music in ratcheting up the tension, and towards the end I felt like I was watching Marshall Dillon of Gunsmoke (Cummings) steeling himself to face down some bank robber (Meadows) on Main Street in Dodge City.
There is just not one wasted minute in this entire production. I highly recommend it.
Sellers plays the owner of an auto repair shop that runs a ring of car thieves on the side. Then one day his gang of teen thieves steal the car of John Cummings (Richard Todd). Cummings is a mediocre salesman of cosmetics who has just bought the car but not bought full coverage insurance. He only has liability. So with the cosmetics company's son taking over the practical running of the business and implying that Cummings' job is in danger, and Cummings thinking that this car and being able to get to more places quickly is the secret to holding on to that job, he begins to investigate the crime himself, and soon he is getting very close to the truth.
Meanwhile, he finds out from his wife that she sees him as a perpetual dreamer and failure, and she is OK with that, but she is not OK with him getting mixed up with a bunch of hoods to get his car back, but unfortunately Cummings has focused in on reclaiming his car as a way of proving that he can finish what he starts, that he is not the failure his wife says that he is.
In the middle of this you have a dispassionate police inspector, and a couple of kids in love who have no real options in life. Unfortunately one is Meadows' mistress and the other is one of his gang of thieves.
This thing, on what was probably a shoe-string budget is an incredibly engaging movie. There's great dialogue, a tremendous use of music in ratcheting up the tension, and towards the end I felt like I was watching Marshall Dillon of Gunsmoke (Cummings) steeling himself to face down some bank robber (Meadows) on Main Street in Dodge City.
There is just not one wasted minute in this entire production. I highly recommend it.