A light romantic farce that must be viewed while keeping in mind that this sort of film was on the cusp (1963) of the sexual revolution when hiding mistresses under beds and discovering old boyfriends in closets preceded explicit sexuality. The cast is great to look at especially Fonda who made this movie while still in the midst of her Roger-Vadim- sex-kitten phase (BARBARELLA, TALL STORY, BAREFOOT IN THE PARK) long before KLUTE and well before she climbed on top of a North Vietnamese tank and romanced the Communists.
Fonda is in town to visit her brother Adam (Cliff Robertson) and connects, instead, with Rod Taylor (THE BIRDS, HOTEL, THE TIME MACHINE). You can almost feel the heat between Fonda and Taylor as they dawdle and foreplay around, under, and through Robertson's apartment in a game of adolescent sexual cat and mouse. In one scene, Taylor sleeps on the couch and Fonda is upstairs in bed as they both toss and turn anxiously in separate rooms reminiscent of a Doris Day-Rock Hudson-PILLOW TALK-silly-rama. Robert Culp looks uncomfortable bouncing in uninvited as an airline pilot; but, then, Robert Culp usually looked uncomfortable in most of his films, didn't he? Cliff Robertson is way too clownish in this one, never develops a mature character, and Jim Backus acts as if he can't wait to dog paddle back to GILLIGAN'S ISLAND.
The musical score for Sunday was by pianist Peter Nero (NEW PIANO IN TOWN, FOR THE NERO MINDED, THE COLORFUL PETER NERO, etc.) whose unique blend of jazz and classical styles sold millions of albums. In fact, Nero has a cameo appearance in a nightclub in Sunday (in 1963 he was at the peak of his career when he began turning out albums off an endless assembly line, and appearing on THE TONIGHT SHOW and in nightclubs). The title song, Sunday IN NEW YORK, is a bouncy, upbeat tune that made the charts back then, and MORE IN LOVE is perhaps Nero's most beautiful composition. The film's music is very much worth listening to just on its own merit.
Sunday IN NEW YORK is one of the last of its kind--an innocent, somewhat urbane romantic comedy where the sparks fly from innuendo and double entendre. It does have a few genuinely funny moments--if you can overlook the pre sexual revolution cupidity. Moreover, Sunday is worth seeing just to catch a glimpse of Fonda years before her Tom-Haydin-anti-war days when she was still a Roger-Vadim-produced cupie doll and the centerpiece of many a man's fantasies.
Dennis Caracciolo
Fonda is in town to visit her brother Adam (Cliff Robertson) and connects, instead, with Rod Taylor (THE BIRDS, HOTEL, THE TIME MACHINE). You can almost feel the heat between Fonda and Taylor as they dawdle and foreplay around, under, and through Robertson's apartment in a game of adolescent sexual cat and mouse. In one scene, Taylor sleeps on the couch and Fonda is upstairs in bed as they both toss and turn anxiously in separate rooms reminiscent of a Doris Day-Rock Hudson-PILLOW TALK-silly-rama. Robert Culp looks uncomfortable bouncing in uninvited as an airline pilot; but, then, Robert Culp usually looked uncomfortable in most of his films, didn't he? Cliff Robertson is way too clownish in this one, never develops a mature character, and Jim Backus acts as if he can't wait to dog paddle back to GILLIGAN'S ISLAND.
The musical score for Sunday was by pianist Peter Nero (NEW PIANO IN TOWN, FOR THE NERO MINDED, THE COLORFUL PETER NERO, etc.) whose unique blend of jazz and classical styles sold millions of albums. In fact, Nero has a cameo appearance in a nightclub in Sunday (in 1963 he was at the peak of his career when he began turning out albums off an endless assembly line, and appearing on THE TONIGHT SHOW and in nightclubs). The title song, Sunday IN NEW YORK, is a bouncy, upbeat tune that made the charts back then, and MORE IN LOVE is perhaps Nero's most beautiful composition. The film's music is very much worth listening to just on its own merit.
Sunday IN NEW YORK is one of the last of its kind--an innocent, somewhat urbane romantic comedy where the sparks fly from innuendo and double entendre. It does have a few genuinely funny moments--if you can overlook the pre sexual revolution cupidity. Moreover, Sunday is worth seeing just to catch a glimpse of Fonda years before her Tom-Haydin-anti-war days when she was still a Roger-Vadim-produced cupie doll and the centerpiece of many a man's fantasies.
Dennis Caracciolo