[AS LONG AS YOU'RE HEALTHY
screens Friday June 21st at 9:00 pm and Saturday June 22nd at 5:15
pm at the Cleveland Cinematheque.]
Review
by Bob Ignizio
Although it plays more like a sketch
comedy TV special than a true feature film, there's still much to
enjoy in Pierre Etaix's comedy anthology AS LONG AS YOU'RE
HEALTHY. Acts II through IV
serve as commentaries on the frustrations of then-modern (1966) life,
but the connection with opening segment “Insomnia” is somewhat
more tenuous. Nonetheless, it's a fine piece in which Etaix stays up
late reading a vampire novel, the film showing us the story in his
mind's eye. Etaix combines elements from the silent era NOSFERATU,
Tod Browning's 1931 DRACULA,
and Terrence Fisher's 1959 HORROR OF DRACULA
with his usual brand of sight gags for some thoroughly enjoyable
ghoulish laughs, and shows that he might have had just as much flair
for the horror genre as comedy.
