short takes (2)

Meanwhile, the Walt Disney people are still plying their campaign to broaden their audience, churning out several live-action films for each new animation, and moving to the PG realm of occasional (though always reasonably restrained) violence. Their latest is condorman, a very silly adventure yarn about a comicstrip artist who gets mixed up in a CIA scheme to help a Russian woman defect. There's nothing wrong with it, exactly. But there's nothing to recommend it, either, except its generally good nature, which gets rathers strained during an overlong climax full of speeding cars and exploding motorboats. Charles Jarrott was the director. In some theaters it's on a double bill with "Song of the South," which was made in 1946 but still lookks good -- as it should, with Brer Rabbit for the star and Gregg ("Citizen Kane") Toland for the cinematographer.