The
luscious Barbara Bouchet stars in the brain-dead lensed-in-the-Philippines
stinker. She plays the mistress of a
smuggler (Michael Rennie) who gets a line on a valuable cache of jewels. He sends Barbara to retrieve them, and
naturally a lot of people come crawling out of the woodwork to get their hands
on the loot.
The
promise of Bouchet naked will be the only thing to keep you watching this
boring heist picture. Even then, her
nude scenes are brief and not all that titillating. The presence of one of my all-time favorite
character actors, Vic Diaz couldn’t even brighten things up. That’s mostly because his role is minor, and
his character is underwritten. If only
the filmmakers allowed Diaz to go full-tilt boogie on Bouchet. What a treat that would’ve been.
Another
problem is that the movie never tries to make Bouchet a credible action
star. Sure, she looks great while
wearing a variety of vintage garments, but I bet she would’ve looked even
sexier brandishing a machine gun. Unfortunately,
we’re forced to settle for a dull, British, way-past-his-prime matinee idol
type to do that sort of stuff while Barbara cowers in a corner somewhere.
Most
of the blame must be placed on director Wray Davis. He never directed another movie and it’s easy
to see why. The film is painfully low on
action and what action we do get is badly shot, poorly lit, and incompetently
staged. (The strobe light effect during
the final double-cross is annoying as hell.)
Since most of the running time is devoted to long, boring scenes of
people sitting around plotting and scheming, enjoying Stoney is a rocky
proposition at best.
AKA: Surabaya Conspiracy. AKA:
The Gold Seekers.
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