Elia Kazan may have bared his tortured soul in this autobiographical novel, but someone else was needed to bring it to the screen. Then again I'm not sure anyone could have made an entertaining film out of so dislikeable a subject.<br /><br />The Arrangement is ostensibly Elia Kazan telling his story of his relationship with a tyrannical father which is the root cause of the middle aged angst he now faces. Our protagonist is not a celebrated film director, but Kirk Douglas a rich and successful advertising executive who one fine day decides to go out in the way that Princess Diana did.<br /><br />It was not as fatal as poor Diana's crash. But all through this film you kind of wish he'd been put out of his misery. This man is selfish beyond all comprehension, narcissistic to the last exponent. Kirk Douglas has played some pretty rotten people on the screen, but even the cold blooded bank-robber/killer he played in his next film, There Was A Crooked Man, had far more going for him than this one.<br /><br />He's married to Deborah Kerr who was coming up short with decent film roles in the latter part of the Sixties. She's the long suffering wife in this one and initially you feel sorry for her. But after a while I got the impression she was just glorying in her martyrdom as the long suffering wife. Douglas even knocks up his mistress Faye Dunaway and even after she gives birth and the child is thrown in her face, she won't leave him.<br /><br />What she'd rather do is scheme with family lawyer Hume Cronyn and family doctor Harold Gould to get Douglas sent to the booby hatch. Not that he isn't giving them all plenty of good reason.<br /><br />Richard Boone is Douglas's father and he blusters and shouts his way through the part the Anthony Quinn does in his more bravura roles. Kazan didn't have a tight rein on the cast. Or perhaps they knew this film was a travesty and each was determined to overact and be noticed the most.<br /><br />Not the finest hour for all the talented people involved.