Roger Ebert Gave A Perfect Score To This Cult ’60s Sci-Fi Comedy That Needs More Fans – SlashFilm

There are plenty of movies that Roger Ebert loved that everyone should see at least once. But he also handed out some perplexing perfect scores in his time. The critic seemed to love Samuel L. Jackson’s mediocre thriller “Lakeview Terrace,” for example, even while all of his peers dismissed it. Ebert also gave a perfect score to an extremely weird fantasy-horror flick and even loved the controversial ’70s Acid Western “El Topo.” But when it came to his four-star review of “The President’s Analyst,” he and his fellow critics were aligned. The public, however, didn’t seem to care all that much.

In his review, Roger Ebert praised Ted Flicker’s 1967 satire as “one of the funniest movies of the year,” ranking it alongside “The Graduate” and “Bedazzled,” but this since-overlooked sci-fi satire is perhaps the most absurd of that bunch. It stars James Coburn as psychiatrist Dr. Sidney Schaefer, who’s assigned to the United States president. After listening to the Commander-in-Chief’s personal struggles, Shaefer finds himself stressed and overburdened. He soon escapes and embarks on an odyssey that sees him pursued by everyone from international spy agencies to the telephone company.

For Ebert and his fellow critics, it made for a lively satire that sent up the increasing paranoia at the heart of a post-John F. Kennedy assassination U.S. society and the conspiracy thriller itself, which would become a much more popular genre the following decade. In fact, “The President’s Analyst” is not easily categorized, comprising about 10 different genres in one. It’s a farce, a political thriller, a buddy comedy, a dark satire, and everything in between. Rather than coming off as muddled, however, according to Ebert, it made for one of the best films of the year.

In “The President’s Analyst,” Dr. Sidney Schaefer’s bizarre journey through mid-’60s America alongside spy Don Masters (Godfrey Cambridge) sees him immersed in the counterculture of the time. All the while, he’s being pursued by the film’s equivalent of the FBI (The FBR) as well as several international agencies seeking to discover what he learned during his time with the U.S. President. It makes for a disorienting but always amusing odyssey that also makes “The President’s Analyst” a movie very much like “One Battle After Another.”

When the movie debuted in December 1967, however, it failed to make much of an impression at the box office. The critics, on the other hand, liked it very much, especially Roger Ebert, who called the satire “modern and biting” and commended writer/director Ted Flicker on the “many fine, subtle touches” in the film. Flicker had been working in TV before penning “The President’s Analyst,” contributing to shows such as “The Dick Van Dyke Show” and “The Man from U.N.C.L.E.” But he impressed with his first feature, which, aside from demonstrating his talents as a filmmaker, gave James Coburn a chance to shine following some questionable projects.

Ebert was certainly glad to see the actor back on top. As the critic saw it, Coburn had “been in lousy movies lately,” such as “In Like Flint” and “Waterhole No. 3.” But with “The President’s Analyst,” the actor had, in Ebert’s estimation, “regain[ed] his form as a comedian.” All of which resulted in an early perfect score from the critic, who had only started writing for the Chicago Sun-Times that same year.