The “disastrous” movie Michael Caine wanted to delete from history: “One I’d rather forget”
We can all agree that Michael Caine is one of the greatest stars of his generation whose contributions to cinema are irreplaceable, but let’s not kid ourselves – he made a lot of outrageously terrible films. Perhaps this is part of his success. What’s that saying about how you can’t have roses without thorns? Caine made a lot of thorn-adjacent movies in his day, and he wasn’t above talking about it.
Rock bottom is subjective, of course, but anyone who’s seen the 1984 sex comedy Blame It on Rio would probably agree that it is the worst movie of Caine’s career. For that matter, it was also the worst movie of director Stanley Donen’s career (the guy made Singin’ in the Rain, after all) and Demi Moore’s career. I won’t dignify it with too much attention, but the gist of the plot is that two men in their fifties fall for each other’s teenage daughters as they watch them frolic in bikinis on a beach vacation. It is smutty and leering, even by the low standards of the 1980s.
Caine was pretty diplomatic about this one. In his memoir, he acknowledged that it hadn’t aged particularly well but highlighted how enjoyable it had been to make. Again, the man is a class act and it’s hard to get him to be negative about anything. It says a lot about the extreme variability of his filmography that this was not, at least in his estimation, his worst film. That distinction belongs to a little thriller called The Magus.
Released in 1968, it was part of Caine’s first brush with stardom. He had broken out as one of the most internationally recognised faces of the Swinging Sixties with movies like Alfie and The Ipcress File. He might not have looked like Paul Newman, but he was a sex symbol, and Hollywood was ready to capitalise. Twentieth Century Fox signed him to a two-picture contract, which probably seemed like a major breakthrough but turned out to be a nearly disastrous setback.
The Magus was the second film in that deal, following the lacklustre Deadfall from earlier that year. In it, the Alfie star played an English teacher who begins a job on a Greek island and goes head-to-head with the local wizard. In his memoir, The Elephant to Hollywood, Caine was uncharacteristically harsh. “The Magus, my next film, was the second of my disastrous Twentieth Century Fox contract and one I’d rather forget,” he wrote. “Because I simply didn’t have a clue what it was all about – and I still don’t.”
He happily retreated back home to London, scarred and ready for a break. Although that first stint with a major studio could have been the demise of his career, Caine was in it for the long haul. The following year, he accepted a role in a film helmed by an unknown director, and it turned out to be one of his best.
The Italian Job was not a huge hit in the US, but it had a strong showing at the UK box office and set Caine on the right track again. As he fervently hoped would happen, most people have no idea that The Magus even exists. Apologies to Sir Michael for digging it up again. It is just as bad as he remembered.
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