Return to Peyton Place (1961)

If the only reason (or the no.1 reason) you give a wonderful film sequel a bad review, is because none of the original cast returned - aren't you totally missing the point? This is a great film with with a great cast and a good message against bigotry, racism, censorship, hypocrisy and small town insular small mindedness. I enjoyed it immensely and recommend you watch it!

This review contains spoilers from the original movie Peyton Place.As a stand alone movie, RETURN TO PEYTON PLACE was okay. What really ticks me off about this movie is how so few of the characters in the original are in this movie. The whole point of a sequel is to find out what happens to the original characters. I want to know what happened with Allison's boyfriend Norman Page after he came home from the war. What happened to Betty Anderson after she and her father-in-law found out that Rodney Harrington had died in the war? But my biggest pet peeve is the way they handled the Selena and Ted affair. In this movie they acted as if they had never been anything more than friends. Well that's a big load of crap! And I don't remember Ted being rich in the first movie. Where did all this fabulous wealth suddenly appear from? The best part of the whole movie was Mary Astor as Mrs. Carter. You just wanted to smack her, she is such a bitch!

Lacking the better cast and production of the original, RETURN TO PEYTON PLACE is only a mediocre movie. In this sequel, Allison MacKenzie (CAROL LYNLEY) has written a novel about the citizens of her hometown, many of whom are less than thrilled. While Allison is in New York finalizing the publication of her work she falls for married publisher Lewis Jackman (JEFF CHANDLER). Back home,Allison's stepfather school principal Mike Rossi (ROBERT STERLING) is being threatened with removal from his post by schoolboard trustee Roberta Carter (MARY ASTOR) if he dares to stock Allison's book in the high school library. Roberta is also busy trying to destroy her son Ted's (BRETT HALSEY) marriage to his new bride Raffaella (A pre THUNDERBALL LUCIANNA PALUZZI). An additional concern for Roberta is keeping the town incest rape victim Selena (TUESDAY WELD), who is also the centerpiece of Allison's novel, away from son Ted. The characters of Allison and her mother Constance (ELEANOR PARKER) were the mainstays in the original. Here they become almost secondary when you watch MARY ASTOR wipe the floor with everyone in this film. Nobody can stare you down like ASTOR ! Nor can anyone in this movie match her subtle gestures or command. Telling his mother that his bride is a nice girl after she has insinuated differently, ASTOR adds, "Maybe it's the way she dresses." LYNLEY is over dramatic after her first 20 minutes. CHANDLER comes across as a dullard. WELD holds her own fairly well, except for an over the top semi flashback scene with new ski instructor boyfriend Nils (GUNNAR HELSTROM), where she proceeds to get hysterical and belt him with a fireplace poker. Veteran PARKER doesn't have much to work with here, but does admirably. PALUZZI is beautiful, but no match for sparring partner ASTOR. Sometimes you're better off not seeing what became of your favorite characters.

1. You get to see Robert Crane of Hogan's Heroes in an "Ed McMahon" type role to somebody else doing a "Johnny Carson". Actually he's acting more like Jack Paar.2. The first 45 minutes of the movie take place on what seems to be two days before thanksgiving. Then on thanksgiving morning, they show a scene of New York at dawn - and the streets are totally deserted!!!!3. You get to see this 1960 era turkey as a prop and boy, were turkeys skinny back before corporate farming took over.4. Everything was so wholesome back then. Except when a woman (the Italian actress) has an unwanted pregnancy. Then she tries to lose it by having a skiing accident because abortions were illegal back then, silly.5. I've been to Camden, Maine, several times, and the locals told me that they shot none of this movie up there (they filmed the original peyton place there in 1956).6. Peyton Place was set in 1941-43; this movie never sets a year but if you figure by the fact that the young lawyer just got through law school and that takes 7 years from the start of college, and he was in the war until 1945, that would make this about 1952 I guess. Or maybe its supposed to be current with the release date and be 1961; they never explain this.7. There is nothing said about several of the characters of the earlier movie that had prominent roles (such as the town doctor and Allison's boyfriend). Why are two such good looking girls still unmarried during that era anyway? Obvious plot loopholes.8. This movie has an old fashioned look and feel to it even for 1960-61 standards. Within 3-4 years clothing, hairstyles, speech, and mannerisms were significantly different. It's like a time capsule movie of a small town America just before all the crappy changes that took place in the 1960s.9. It has a really good ending. I found myself actually siding with the old biddy who is singlehandedly trying to enforce the old Puritan moral code of her era against the will of apparently the entire rest of the town, who want to change with the times and let everybody do their own thing. She walks out of the town hall meeting in silence and totally defeated; terrific symbolism, and almost supernaturally prophetic in what actually happened across the country over the rest of the decade. 10. Last but not least, the man who plays the character "Dexter" (he has about 1 line; he is a school board member who is a weak character and the old biddy uses him as a supporter)...this guy was on a lot of the old three stooges shorts. He always played a bad guy, and I've never seen him on any other serious movie.