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4 internautes sur 4 ont trouvé ce commentaire utile :
Honey honey, Oct. 16 2008
Every time a semi-intelligent, capable heroine appears on a hit TV show, we're told that now all those old cliched women's roles are passe, compared to Heroine X.
But Honey West was truly one of the groundbreaking TV heroines, way back in the mid 1960s when women were still classified either as housewives or girlfriends, and a sexy woman was usually an evil one. "Honey West: The Complete Series" ended up being a pretty solid, unique detective show, with a heroine who definitely broke the mold -- both back in the sixties, and in the current day.
Honey West (Anne Francis) inherited a detective agency from her father, and instead of living off other people's work she dove into it, along with her long-suffering (and very hot) partner Sam Bolt (John Ericson).
As the series opens, Honey attempts to nab a criminal for a client -- the baddies get lonely, wealthy widows and wives into sexual situations, photograph them, and then blackmail them for ridiculous amounts of money. To make herself a target, Honey stays at a luxurious resort and pretends to be the neglected wife of a senator... while Sam pretends to join the blackmailing gang. Of course, it doesn't take long for the bad guys to start catching onto them.
And as the series goes on, Honey and Sam have some interesting problems to deal with, both for themselves and for law and justice and all that -- firebugs, kidnapped pop singers, stolen designer dresses, a horrendously spoiled little girl, a jade owl, jewel thieves, gypsies, a mobster's ex, an amnesiac with way too much money, loads of counterfeiting, psychics, embezzlement, and lots and lots of assorted thieves. There's even one thief who impersonates the one and only Honey West. Now that's personal.
In many ways, Honey West was a heroine ahead of her time -- she was a smart, self-sufficient heroine who was perfectly okay with being feminine, rather than having to be one of the boys. She did martial arts (we even see her practicing at home), wore glamorous gowns, took professional calls from the tub, had a pet ocelot, and had a vaguely James-Bondian array of magical technology (like a garter that turns into a gas mask, or a watch that served as a microphone). Oh, and her partner happened to be not only a technical wiz, but also quite tough and handsome.
It's a testament to Anne Francis that she can make this character seem semi-realistic and likable (although Honey's rotten money sense helps) rather than utterly nauseating. Francis -- best known as the daughter from "Forbidden Planet" -- brings a jaunty, sharp-edged energy to Honey, and handles her groundbreaking character without any visible strain. Though Ericson is technically the sidekick, he's more of an equal partner -- handsome, capable, and with a sharp tongue whenever Honey enmeshes them in another weird problem.
The mysteries themselves are pretty solid, classic material -- blackmail, theft, kidnapping and drug-running are the major culprits, although occasionally they become a little too wacky to be believed. They're handled with a deft mingling of the gritty (car chases, truckstop brawls) and the refined (Honey's luxurious apartment), and the mysteries take us to lots of mansions, ransacked offices, museums, boats, woodland cabins and occasionally a catwalk. And of course, lots of disguises and fun gadgets too.
And it's peppered with lots of intriguing twists in the detective work, clashes with the Californian cops, mild comic relief ("Finders keepers?" Honey muses after rescuing stolen designer dresses), and plenty of table-busting action. Ericson does most of the punching and wrestling, but Honey gets her fair share also (not always convincingly), and she adds some clever twists during the action scenes. For example, one episode has two attack dogs homing in on Honey's distinctive perfume -- until she splashes the bottle all over their master. Guess what happens.
"Honey West: The Complete Series" has aged quite well since the 1960s -- it may be in black and white, but the solid mysteries and excellent heroine keep it fresh. Nice vintage crime series.
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