I really want to write something good about this movie. I can't, though. I only saw it once, and once was more than enough. I was a teenager in Denver, Colorado, when "Pepe" previewed for the first time before an audience. A passel of studio bigwigs showed up at the Centre Theatre that evening, including, I believe, producer and director George Sidney. Cantinflas was a no-show; maybe he knew something.
Did you ever attend a movie where the audience greets it with...dead silence? Not the kind of silence for something cerebral, such as "2001: A Space Odyssey", but the kind of silence that lets you know you are watching a very slow, very long train wreck. And there were roughly 1,200 really silent people that night fifty years ago.
So why did I stick it out through the whole thing? Easy. The cameos. I would start looking for the exit when Edward G. Robinson would appear. Wow! This picture's got to get better now. Wrong. Ditto for Ernie Kovacs, and so on.
Since I viewed the preview print, I believe I saw the full 195 minute version. So what did the studio cut for general release? The only thing I clearly remember departing was a long, misbegotten animated sequence.
In retrospect I feel sorry for George Sidney, director of "The Harvey Girls", the 1948 "Three Musketeers", and "Kiss Me Kate". But the industry had changed a lot by 1960. He did his best to keep up, but "Pepe" has to be a nadir.
Some believe "Pepe" to be excellent family fare. If I compelled a child to watch the whole thing, even the cut general release version, I could probably be arrested for child abuse. You have been warned!
