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I'll be the first to admit that the last column kind of drifted off towards the end. I certainly don't wish this to become a habit, for I always start my writings off with the highest hopes of whipping all of my thoughts into some kind of grand form and leaving few to no loose ends dangling out there in the breeze. More often than not, however, I end up reconciling myself to the reality that actually achieving my aim would result in a veering towards an even more rambling and ramshackle style than is my norm. I pride - or perhaps kid - myself on achieving at least some sort of structure (a tendency left over, no doubt, from a good many years of formal schooling). That said, I do have a few odds and ends from last time that I wish to account for, before I can properly segue into this week's musings on Batman Returns.

In doing research on A Shot in the Dark, I came across several Web sites (perhaps all parroting the same false data) that suggested The Pink Panther was actually filmed second and A Shot in the Dark was able to be released so quickly on its heels due to the fact that it had been sitting on the distributor's shelf for several years. Added to this were conflicting stories of whether Blake Edwards had selected A Shot in the Dark as his next project and then turned it into an Inspector Clouseau saga or if he responded to a cry from help by Peter Sellers to save him from a troubled adaptation of a hit play. Finally, there is the mystery over who contributes the vocals to the opening musical piece, "Shadows of Paris." No one is given credit on screen, there is no accompanying official soundtrack, and apparently, the version that appears on some Henry Mancini retrospectives is not the one featured in the film. I am sure there are definitive answers to these three problems, and if anyone knows or feels they can shed light on these dark patches, it would be deeply appreciated. My opinion in regards to the first problem is if A Shot in the Dark truly did come first, then Clouseau would be more exaggerated of a buffoon in The Pink Panther since the subsequent sequels (in the 1970s) pushed the character farther and farther into the realm of comic grotesquerie.

As different as The Pink Panther and James Bond series are, they share a few key notable similarities. For four decades, both series survived (if not necessarily thrived) by making sequels that continued to push the franchise forward while remaining at least tenuously tied to the formula that came before. Even when the actor playing James Bond changed or Peter Sellers died, the idea was simply to keep pushing onward. It worked better with Timothy Dalton and Pierce Brosnan than Ted Wass and Roberto Beningni but that seems like quibbling. Brosnan simply donned the mantle or Beningni was pitched as a new heir to Sellers, and there was never any talk of a new installment being a relaunching.

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