Duke plans to rob the posh apartments of Ingrid's neighbors. To do so, he solicits funds from Mafia leader Angelo (Alan King) and Angelo's senile father. Duke also rounds up ex-con acquaintances, including safecracker Christopher Walken, black panther members Paul Benjamin and Dick Anthony Williams, and elderly Pops (Stan Gottlieb). He is forced to add brutal gangster Parelli (Val Avery). Gay antiques dealer Tommy (Martin Balsam) is brought in to case the apartments.
Robbed tenants include future "Maud" and "Diff'rent Strokes" straight man Conrad Bain, uncooperative Max Showalter and Norman Rose, and paraplegic brat Jerry (Scott Jacoby), whose duplicity and resourcefulness gets Duke and company in a great deal of trouble. Original "Saturday Night Live" cast member Garrett Morris plays a SWAT team leader.
In the source novel, all dialogue is derived from illicit surveillance. The theme is also present throughout the film, emphasized by Quincy Jones eclectic pseudo-electronic jazz score.
How others will see it. The Anderson Tapes is known today primarily for its firsts. It was the first feature film for eventual A-list star Christopher Walken, and was also the first movie in which Sean Connery is sans toupée. It was the last feature film in the career of Margaret Hamilton, the Wicked Witch from The Wizard of Oz, who plays an aged and shrewish tenant.
Despite Connery's status as a James Bond icon, The Anderson Tapes was not a box office hit, and failed to receive any festival award nominations. At imdb.com, it has a respectable 4300 user votes but the user rating of 6.4 is middling, albeit consistent. Film fans tend to dislike Quincy Jones' buzzing and bleeping score, are put off by its comic treatment of homosexuality, and by the lack of relevance of the illegal taping to the central plot of armed robbery. The film also lacks a major character audiences can support, although hard-pressed Garrett Morris and crimestopper Scott Jacoby are heroic in small roles.
How I felt about it. The Anderson Tapes is prophetic in that tape recordings of conspiracy drove President Nixon out of office three years later. The movie is forward in granting blacks three good supporting roles, but backwards in its depiction of gays as sissies and fops. Balsam's performance is nonetheless amusing, and at least he knows better than to get into the moving van.
Ingrid is a disappointing character. She all too eager to become Duke's sex toy, even though he is broke, unemployed, and straight out of prison. She shows little reaction when he spills his plans to rob every apartment in her building, likely to land her in prison as an accessory. Her actions are inconsistent with her status as mistress to Werner, whom she must dislike. In short, her character is cinematic instead of credible.
I understand that the concept of Big Brother surveillance is 1984-style social commentary. Still, given that so many agencies and spies are listening in, it is difficult to believe that nobody makes an anonymous pay phone call to the police or FBI to report the impending armed robbery.
What I do like about the movie is Frank Pierson's sometimes witty screenplay. Pierson was better with comedy than drama, but had great successes with Cat Ballou, Cool Hand Luke, and Dog Day Afternoon. Not so much with A Star is Born (1976).