Boom! (1968) review

"Dying monster" 'Sissy' Goforth (Elizabeth Taylor) - who spends her days dictating her memoirs to Miss Black (Joanna Shimkus), an assistant - gets a sudden visit at her mansion on Sardinia by a man named Chris Flanders (Richard Burton), who brings her a Calder-esque mobile; she eventually accepts him in, despite a warning from her friend The Witch of Capri (Sir Noël Coward) that he's the Angel of Death.  The screenplay by Tennessee Williams - based on his own play The Milk Train Doesn't Stop Here Anymore - is simply preposterous (Burton dresses like a samurai most of the time, Liz wears a Kabuki costume, Coward is served a sea creature for dinner) and its "philosophical musings" are so banal they would make a third year student reading the classics roll his or her eyes in disgust (when Richard hears a wave hit the rocks he says, "Boom ... the shock of each moment ... of still being alive").  "Filth elder" John Waters, who loves the movie (along with Williams, who bewilderingly thought it was the best screen adaptation of any of his plays), admits it's a failed art film, and certainly begs the question: how can so many talented people (even Karl Lagerfeld worked on the outfits) come up with something so bad?  One possible answer: they were all (allegedly) intoxicated.