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Directed by John Frankenheimer.
Arthur Hamilton (John Randolph) is a listless Manhattan businessman who lives with his wife in the New York suburbs. One day, he runs into an old friend (Murray Hamilton) whom he thought had died. The friend leads him to The Company, a secretive operation run by The Old Man (Will Geer). The Company is a high-tech service which, for a price, provides older men with plastic surgery, a beefed-up body, and a fresh start in life. To cover the "disappearance," a middle-aged male cadaver is "killed" in a hotel fire. Hamilton submits to the operation that will turn him into a "Second," and when the bandages are removed, he's shed twenty years, renamed Tony Wilson and is portrayed by Rock Hudson. The Company creates a new identity for Hamilton, relocating him in a hedonistic California beach community with an identity as a painter. Celebrating during a local wine festival, Hamilton has his revelry cut short when he learns that all his new young friends are Seconds like himself and suddenly feels trapped in these surroundings. Unfortunately, finding a way out isn't nearly as easy as it was to find a way in. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
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trulyblissedtrulyblissed Seconds is very memorable.
by trulyblissed in trulyblissed Blog
hasn't rated it.
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"I saw this movie as a kid many, many years ago on television and has always stuck in the back of my mind. I finally rewatched it by renting it from Netflix and see why I remembered it. Great black and white photography and a main character suffering from angst who is pushed a bit into making a major decision to look for happiness. But happiness really begins on the inside- yes, a cliche but true. Rock Hudson and John Randolph do a great job, A true killer ending. " [More]
PuhnnerPuhnner Re: Latest unknown fave
by Puhnner in Viewing with a purpose
loved it.
"Based upon the viewing of the members here, these don't seem to exactly qualify as 'unknown films', however I just finished the Criterion issuedFace of Another and Pitfall; I resaw The Woman in the Dunes last yearThe special features and the video essay on each disk are really worth looking at; there are also some short Films included too which I think are only on the Face of Another disk . Seconds seems like it would make a great companion piece to Face of Another. These must have been quite revolutionary when they first appeared.I will try to find the book, Face of Another by the Author/Screenwriter Kobo Abe. I have read The Woman in the Dunes, but it has been a while. " [More]
koneckonec Seconds
by konec in konec Blog
loved it.
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"It's probably too early to say, having finished watching this movie not more than five or ten minutes ago, but I think this was one of the best movies I've ever seen. Gave me the shakes. I recommend it, I really do. I would promise more on this later, but I don't think I'll be able to do it justice. " [More]
Review by All Movie Guide
All Movie Guide
liked it.
Given what we now know about Rock Hudson's personal life, it would be easy to read a great deal into his performance in Seconds; his work as a tortured man living a lie that he willingly allowed others to create for him may well be the best and most deeply felt acting of his career. But to view Seconds as a film about Rock Hudson is to underrate and misinterpret one of the most original thrillers of the 1960s. Just as America's obsession with youth culture was about to shift into overdrive, Seconds offered a potent warning about the desire to be young at all costs, and few movies have ever offered a more interesting (and more literal) spin on the notion that "You can't run away from yourself." Director John Frankenheimer brings a brooding and kinetic tension to the proceedings that seems ahead of its time for 1966 (and still feels potent today), while James Wong Howe's masterful camerawork is rich and crisply detailed when it needs to be, and superbly disorienting when the story is at its most bizarre. In the decade in which angst finally made its way to the surface of American popular culture, few other movies were as full of dread as Seconds, which looked into the dark and frightening heart of human identity and the American mindset and found it fascinating and bleakly funny. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
 



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