Tag Archives: Jack Warden

The Champ (1978)

Posted on May 22, 2023 | 2 comments

champ1

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 7 out of 10

4-Word Review: Idolized by his son.

Billy (Jon Voight) is a former boxer whose been out of the ring for 7 years. Now at age 37 he works as a horse trainer. His 8-year-old son T.J. (Ricky Schroder) idolizes him and refers to his as ‘The Champ’ instead of dad. Billy though suffers from many inner demons including his perpetual drinking and gambling as well as not making enough money to sufficiently support either himself, or his son. Nonetheless he continues to go out gambling whenever given the chance and he manages to win enough money to buy his son a horse, which they name She’s a Lady. They enter Lady into a race where T.J. meets Annie (Faye Dunaway). Unbeknownst to T.J. Annie is his mother whom she gave up at birth, but now that she’s married to a wealthy man (Arthur Hill) she wants to have custody. Billy refuses to allow it, but when he loses the horse because of a gambling debt and Annie gives him the money to pay it off he eventually relents and has T.J. go live with her while he’s in jail for assault. Once he’s released the father and son reunite, but Billy realizes he must make more money in order to keep him and thus decides to go back into the ring one last time despite warnings from Jackie (Jack Warden), his former manager, that to do so could be life threatening.

The film is remake of the 1931 classic with Wallace Beery playing the part of the father and Jackie Cooper as the son. Director Franco Zeffirelli remembered watching it as a child and it having a profound effect on him. Then years later while he was in his hotel room while on-location filming another feature he saw it come on television and the film again moved him in such a way that he decided he wanted to do a remake. This though wasn’t the first remake as it had already been done in 1953 as The Clown starring Red Skelton though the story had been revised without the boxing theme and the climactic event at the end doesn’t take place at a sporting event, but instead a dangerous stunt that the lead character must do during a live broadcast of a TV special.

While this one stays more faithful to the original concept it was still panned by many critics as being overly sentimental and soap opera-like. Many who were fans of the original felt this one fell far short and complained about the long running time, this one runs of full 2-hours while the older one was only 83 minutes, with the feeling that it stretched the plot out too much and at spots was too slow. Though I’ve never seen the 30’s version I found myself genuinely wrapped up in the drama and the characters.

Many at the time complained that Voight was going back to the same type of Joe Buck character that he played in Midnight Cowboy, but I disagreed. That character was genuinely stupid, but Billy isn’t he’s just down-on-his-luck and suffering from basic human frailties, which made his situation far more compelling.

Schroder is an absolute jewel. He got the part after beating out over 2,000 others and it’s easy to see why. His ability to cry on demand with real tears streaming down his face is amazing and not something other actors are able to do. He’s cute and engaging without it ever getting forced, or overdone. His presence gives the film its energy and virtually the sole reason for why it works as well as it does.

The main complaint that I did have was with Annie. She’s marvelously played by Dunaway, who’s always been one of my favorite actresses and it’s a good role for her acting style as she’s excellent at playing characters that have a bit of a cold and aloof manner while not easily able to show their soft side, but with that said I still couldn’t understand what made the character tick, or her motivations. For one thing she seemed to have nothing in common with Billy, so what brought them together in the first place was a mystery and then having her abandon the kid while she went off living her life seemed pretty extreme. In most cases it’s the father that shirks the responsibility of raising the child, but here it’s reverse, but with no clear explanation as to why. There’s a vague excuse later on that it was so she could ‘pursue her career’, but then this doesn’t explain why she now wants to get close to her son. If she was selfish back then what made her change to suddenly want to be loving and caring? She went 7 years without ever seeing the kid, and did pretty well without him, so why now must she have him? I felt there needed to be some extra context added like she had been addicted to drugs when she had TJ, which then made her deemed unfit to raise him, but now that she had kicked the habit she wanted him back, or maybe she had suffered a miscarriage with her second husband and this made her feel guilty about the child she had let get away and this motivated her to want to seek out TJ, but without any of this added information the character comes-off as transparent, unrealistic, and unrelatable.

I will agree with Leonard Maltin in his review where he states that it looks like Faye wants to go to bed with her own kid. This occurs during the scene where Ricky is on her yacht and looking off in the distance while Faye comes up behind him and begins sniffing his hair like she’s getting turned-on by him. To call this a cringey, awkward moment is an understatement and it’s unintentionally laughable. Why it was left in, or why Zeffirelli thought it would be a good idea to put in I don’t know. The movie manages to recover, but it’s a segment that is indeed ridiculous.

The boxing element is another problem as it gets introduced way too late. It gets briefly mentioned throughout the first 2 acts and there’s even a quick scene where Billy shows up at a gym, but overall it gets played-out as a side-story only to suddenly, 90-minutes in, becomes the main focus, which gives the film a very disjointed feel. Jack Warden’s character doesn’t appear at all until near the end almost like it’s a tacked-on bit that doesn’t really flow with everything else that came before. The boxing scenes are impressive and helps to effectively expose the brutality of the sport, but I felt Billy’s training and decision to enter the ring should’ve been made sooner and the boxing scenes mixed-in throughout, but either way it’s still an competent tearjerker that shouldn’t leave a dry eye in the house.

champ2

My Rating: 7 out of 10

Release: March 20, 1979

Runtime: 2 Hours 3 Minutes

Rated PG

Director: Franco Zeffirelli

Studio: MGM

Available: DVD, Amazon Video, YouTube

2 Comments

Posted in 70's Movies, Drama, Movies that take place in Florida, Remakes, Sports Movies

Tagged , , , , , , ,

September (1987)

Posted on March 21, 2023 | Leave a comment

september1

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 7 out of 10

4-Word Review: Drama at summer home.

Layne (Mia Farrow) has decided to spend the summer at the country home of her mother’s (Elaine Stritch) in order to recuperate after a suicide attempt. With her during her stay is her best friend Stephanie (Dianne Wiest). Layne is also madly in-love with her neighbor Peter (Sam Waterston) who is a struggling author who wants to write a book about Layne’s mother’s life, who was at one time a well-known actress, but who also shot her late husband in self-defense though it was reportedly Layne who pulled the trigger. Howard (Denholm Elliott) is Layne’s other neighbor who is smitten with her though she has no feelings for him as all of her emotions are tucked away towards Peter, who is more into Stephanie, a married woman with children. During the course of one night while an electrical storm occurs and the power goes out everyone makes their true feelings for the other known, but not everyone responds to the revelations the way they’d like.

This movie is unusual, or at least the behind-the-scenes production, in that two to three versions of every scene was shot and then writer/director Woody Allen took all the footage and edited it together only to be dissatisfied with the final result and decided to shoot it again, but with different actors. In the original production Charles Durning played Layne’s stepfather, but in the second version he is replaced by Jack Warden, and Maureen O’Sullivan played Layne’s mother. Since Maureen was Mia’s real-life mother it’s ashame she wasn’t kept on for the second version. Granted Elaine is excellent, but seeing a mother and daughter acting together would’ve given an interested added nuance that unfortunately gets lost with the redo.

The scenario has its share of intriguing elements, but Allen’s concept of trying to create a filmed stageplay was a mistake as the whole thing has a very static feel right from the start. The internal conflicts are not apparent right away and the first act comes-off like nothing more than lingering conversations with no idea what connects them until the second act kicks, but by that time some viewers may have already gotten bored with it. In Interiors, which was Allen’s first drama, the story clicked quickly because there was a main nemesis, which helped create the tension that’s lacking here. Having a few more characters including a couple that was invited over, but calls-in when their house gets flooded, could’ve helped enliven things.

The acting is uniformly excellent especially Farrow, who’s always had a gift for playing vulnerable characters though with this one she’s more assertive. Wiest is fabulous too though with her super short brunette haircut she looks too similar to Farrow in Rosemary’s Baby and for that reason she should’ve been given a different hairstyle. The short cut also makes Wiest’s squinty look where she constantly appears like someone who’s just walked into bright sunlight, more apparent. The male cast is overall wasted. Warden gets one poignant moment where he describes the cold, lonely universe, but otherwise doesn’t have much else to say, or do and overall gets dominated and upstaged by the caustic and brassy Stritch as his wife. Elliot has one good line early on, but then disappears for a good chunk of it only to get a walk-on towards the end, but by that point I had quite literally forgotten all about him.

The film would’ve worked better had it had stronger character arcs, but overall not much really happens. There’s brief moments of confrontations, particularly Layne’s arguments with her mother, where things appear to be getting juicy only to have them pull back and become civil again. Same thing happens when Layne catches Stephanie with Peter, a slight blow-up and then back to mundane. The characters don’t really grow, or change and everything gets treated like a minor, little tiff that quickly blows-over making the viewer feel at the end that there wasn’t much point in watching it.

On a side note I was also disappointed to learn that the whole thing was shot on an indoor sound stage. With the title of September and the location being Vermont I was fully expecting sights of beautiful fall foliage as the northeast can be one of the best areas for that during the autumn. Since Allen’s dramas can get quite talky I thought the scenic locale could help at least visually fill-in the slow spots, but we ultimately get none of that. The intention was to shoot it at Farrow’s Connecticut country house, the house had inspired Allen to write the screenplay in the first place, but by the time he was finished with the script it was already winter and thus the autumn look and feel would’ve been lost. Credit though should go to the lighting and set design as you still get a feel of Vermont during the night time scenes where you hear realistic sounds of crickets and night bugs outside. The light coming through the windows certainly looks like actual sunlight, but why would people keep their blinds closed when most anyone would have them open to take in the majestic countryside. Why bother even having a home in the country if the idea is to close the windows off from it? It’s also not logical for the sunlight to be shining through all the windows from any direction in the house as the sun can only be in one place in the sky, so some of the windows should not have had sunlight coming through though here all of them do.

My Rating: 7 out of 10

Released: December 18, 1987

Runtime: 1 Hour 22 Minutes

Rated PG

Director: Woody Allen

Studio: Orion Pictures

Available: DVD-R, Blu-ray (Region B/2), Tubi, YouTube

Leave a comment

Posted in 80's Movies, Drama, Movies with a rural setting

Tagged , , , , , , , ,

The White Buffalo (1977)

Posted on June 26, 2022 | 1 comment

white

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 5 out of 10

4-Word Review: Buffalo haunts his dreams.

Based on the novel by Richard Sale, who also wrote the screenplay, the story, which takes place in 1874, centers around Wild Bill Hickok (Charles Bronson) who’s suffering from reoccurring dreams involving a giant white buffalo. He travels to the west in order to find the beast and confront it. It’s there that he meets Crazy Horse (Will Sampson). The two initially don’t get along. Bill is not a fan of Indians and once said “the only good Indian is a dead one”, but the two share a common bond as they’re both after the elusive buffalo in Crazy Horse’s case it’s to avenge the death of his infant daughter who was killed when the beast violently attacked their campsite. Having formed an uneasy alliance the two, along with old-timer Charlie Zane (Jack Warden) go out into the cold, wintry terrain in search for it while debating over whose land this country really belongs to: the white man or the Native Americans.  

Story-wise the film lacks any explanation for why Hickok is having these dreams, or what exactly the image of the white buffalo is meant to represent if anything. The plot goes off on a lot of tangents including a segment where Hickok visits an old-flame (Kim Novak) that doesn’t have much to do with the central story, nor propel the plot along, and could’ve easily been cut. There’s also a few proverbial gun fights though they’re generic in nature, don’t add much excitement, and quickly forgotten. 

Bronson gives his typical wooden performance though seeing him with dark circular glasses and sporting long hair does make him, in certain shots, resemble Ringo Starr. The rest of the cast if filled with familiar B-stars in minor roles including Stuart Whitman and Cara Williams, who have an amusing bit as a vulgar couple whom Hickok shares a stagecoach ride with. Jack Warden, who’s almost unrecognizable, has a fun moment when he takes out the glass eye that he’s wearing much to the shock of Crazy Horse.

The only diverting element is the opening dream sequence that’s done over the credits where the viewer looks right into the eye of the beast close-up. Normally I’m not a fan of outdoor shots done on a sound stage, which always comes-off looking artificial, but in this instance it helps accentuate the surreal elements. The climactic sequence though in which both Hickok and Crazy Horse come face-to-face with the buffalo doesn’t work as it becomes painfully clear that the beast is special effects generated especially when Crazy Horse gets on top of it and repeatedly stabs it, which looks like someone stabbing into a sofa cushion with tacky fur stuck to it. We also never get to see a full-shot of the buffalo, just its head, so it’s difficult to gauge how big it really was. The truly disappointing part is that the illustration of the buffalo on the film’s promotional poster seen above is far more impressive looking than anything you’ll actually see in the movie.

Probably the only interesting aspect about the production is not what occurred in front the camera, but behind-the-scenes. Will Sampson, who’s by far the better actor and the story could’ve been centered around his character alone and it would’ve made it a more interesting movie, refused to read his lines for over 24 hours when he became aware that white actors had been hired to play the roles of the Native Americans and only went back to performing his role once the producers agreed to casting actual Indians for the parts. This then directly lead to the American Indian Registry of the Performing Arts, which he founded. 

My Rating: 5 out of 10

Released: May 6, 1977

Runtime: 1 Hour 37 Minutes

Rated PG

Director: J. Lee Thompson

Studio: United Artists

Available: DVD, Blu-ray, YouTube (with ads)

 

 

1 Comment

Posted in 70's Movies, Cold Climate/Wintertime Movies, Movies Based on Novels, Revisionist Western

Tagged , , , , , , ,

Carbon Copy (1981)

Posted on June 9, 2022 | Leave a comment

carbon

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 1 out of 10

4-Word Review: His son is black.

Walter (George Segal) is living the American Dream as a rich company executive residing in the gated community of a posh suburb while also driving a Rolls Royce. However, he’s not happy with his wife Vivian (Susan Saint James) who’s frigid, nor his daughter-in-law Mary Ann (Vicky Dawson) who’s mouthy and spoiled. Yet he remains in the marriage because Vivian’s father Nelson (Jack Warden) is also Walter’s boss and climbing the career ladder is important to him. Then one day Roger (Denzel Washington) drops by and introduces himself as Walter’s son from a relationship Walter had with a black woman many years ago. Walter enjoyed his time with her, but broke it off due to pressure from Nelson who said it would stymie his career. Now Walter feels guilty from what he’s done and wants to make it up by allowing Roger to move in with him, but once his wife finds out she gets him fired. All of his money is tied up in company stocks that is either under his wife’s or father-in-law’s control, so without any income he’s forced to move into a hotel with Roger and then eventually to a rundown apartment in a dangerous area.

The script was written by Stanley Shapiro who received accolades in the early part of his career for scripting many Doris Day movies during the 50’s and 60’s, but he clearly got in over-his-head with this one. The concept and overall reactions from the characters is dated even for 1981. I was around in ’81 living in a small Midwestern town and I didn’t see half the overt racism that the characters here display despite the fact that it all takes place in California known as the liberal capital of the world. I’m not saying there isn’t some racism everywhere, but it gets exaggerated.

The Saint James character is particularly problematic. She plays the part in a funny way, but it’s a caricature. It would’ve been more revealing had she not been this stereotyped rich white person who feels comfortable displaying her bigotry, which would’ve been socially taboo in L.A. and she’d know it, but instead pretending to be okay with it, or even being an outward liberal who tries to be hip with race relations, but then, in more subtle ways, becomes increasingly less comfortable as it goes along.

Segal’s character comes-off as a massive conformist who will do whatever is takes to a part of ‘acceptable’ society. He even changes his last name to hide the fact the he’s Jewish, so where is this rebel side who moved-in with this black lady back in the 60’s when that would’ve created outrage and scandal? Some may argue that people change, sure that can sometimes happen, but there needs to be some factor that created it and the movie does not make that clear. The fact that he morphs into somebody that was so different from what he used to be makes him seem like two different people with no connecting thread at all. A more plausible storyline would’ve had him getting drunk one night and picking-up a black women at a bar for a one-night-stand, or secretly hiring a black prostitute just because he was curious about having sex with someone of a different race and then thought nothing more of it once it was over. 

Susan’s character has the same issue. She coldly kicks Walter out of the house and then for some unexplained reason turns-up at the doorstep of his ratty apartment with her father and begs for him to come back, but with no clear rationale for what created this radical change-of-heart. I don’t think a racist, snotty woman like that would ever dare come into a dangerous area for any reason. She would’ve only done it had she been accompanied by armed guards, or maybe carrying a gun herself and openly flashing it, which could’ve been funny, but of course this stupid movie doesn’t even think to go there.

The over-the-top situations become increasingly ridiculous without a hint of nuance and as satire it’s about as sophisticated as an episode of ‘Gilligan’s Island’. That’s not to say there can’t be some excellent films about race relations as I found The Landlord to be terrific, but this thing lacks any serious insight. Many consider Soul Man to be the worst 80’s film about a white man trying to understand the black experience and get in-touch with their own inner bias and the bias of those around them, but this I consider to be just as bad. Denzel Washington, who makes his film debut here, is the only good thing about it, it’s just a shame they couldn’t have given him better material.

My Rating: 1 out of 10

Released: September 25, 1981

Runtime: 1 Hour 32 Minutes

Rated PG

Director: Michael Schultz

Studio: AVCO Embassy Pictures

Available: DVD/Blu-ray

Leave a comment

Posted in 80's Movies, Satire

Tagged , , , , , , ,

Dreamer (1979)

Posted on January 3, 2020 | Leave a comment

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 2 out of 10

4-Word Review: Bowling for a living.

Harold Nuttingham (Tim Matheson) who is nicknamed ‘Dreamer’ because of his lofty ambitions of becoming a big league bowler struggles with the demands of the sport and the amount of sacrifice and practice that it takes to be good along with the balancing act of having a relationship with Karen (Susan Blakely) and holding down a job. Eventually with the help of Harry (Jack Warden), who acts as his coach, he’s able to get accepted into a major tournament where he’ll take on the veteran champion Johnny Watkin (played by real-life champion bowler Dick Weber) and prove to a national audience that he truly deserves to be considered one of the best.

It’s truly hard-to-believe how a film like this could’ve been funded by a major studio, or how anyone would think a movie about bowling, a sport with no real cinematic quality to it at all, would be something that people would want to watch, or even take seriously. Sure, it replicates the same Rocky formula, which at the time was quite popular, but what’s next? A small town kid desiring to be the next great badminton champ? Ping Pong? Tiddlywinks?

There’s been other films made about bowling like Kingpin and The Big Lebowski, but those all had a sense of humor to it and some interesting camera shots, but this thing takes it all too seriously and is flatly photographed. Part of the charm of Rocky was seeing him train to become a good boxer, but this film glosses over the training/technique aspect and starts out right away with him already winning a bowling contest and receiving a big trophy, so what’s the point of seeing him receive one trophy after another? Besides the bowling alleys that he plays in all look blah and filled with the same unexciting people making it look like Dreamer really isn’t moving up, but instead perpetually stuck in the same drab small Midwestern town, or one’s just like it, that he came from.

The story needed of some sort of side-plot that could’ve created actual tension that is otherwise completely lacking. It may sound like a sport’s movie cliche, but Dreamer needed a psychological hurdle to overcome, like maybe he had a history of choking under pressure in big games, or possibly injuring his hand right before the contest, or maybe even losing his trusted bowling ball (or having it stolen) that would cast some doubt, and elicit some genuine intrigue from the viewer about whether Dreamer could pull through, but nothing like this ever gets presented.

Instead the majority of the drama centers around Dreamer’s on-again/off-again relationship with his girlfriend over benign issues that aren’t interesting and with a woman that looks way too beautiful to be wasting her life away working in some dumpy bowling alley, or going out with a bland stiff that doesn’t treat her right. There’s also a thread dealing with Harry and his inability to come to terms with not achieving as much as he could’ve during his younger years when he was a bowler on the circuit, but Harry is just a minor character, so his character history/arch isn’t compelling. It’s Dreamer’s that’s important, but his arch isn’t even apparent.

The film also has a cheesy scene featuring Harry bowling intensely all by himself in the dark after the place has already closed, which begs a really important question: If he’s bowling after everything’s been shut down, then who, or what is resetting the pins while he proceeds to continuously knock them down?

A bad guy, or jerk with the potential of throwing a monkey wrench into the proceedings needed introducing, but nothing materializes and everybody is too chummy with no tantalizing element simmering beneath the surface. To some degree this is the film’s one successful quality as it accurately recreates just how slow, dull, and uneventful small town living can be while putting the poor viewer to sleep in the process.

My Rating: 2 out of 10

Released: April 27, 1979

Runtime: 1 Hour 30 Minutes

Rated PG

Director: Noel Nosseck

Studio: 20th Century Fox

Available: None at this time.

Leave a comment

Posted in 70's Movies, Drama, Obscure Movies, Sports Movies

Tagged , , , , , , ,

So Fine (1981)

Posted on May 5, 2019 | Leave a comment

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 2 out of 10

4-Word Review: Jeans that expose ass.

Bobby Fine (Ryan O’Neal) is an English professor at a college waiting to get tenure who inexplicably becomes the head of his father’s clothing company, which produces women’s apparel, when his father Jack Fine (Jack Warden) is unable to pay off a debt that he has with a local loan shark named Eddie (Richard Kiel). Bobby knows nothing about the clothing business, but inadvertently strikes on a hot idea, jeans that look like they’re revealing a woman’s butt cheeks, which becomes a huge fashion sensation. Unfortunately Bobby also starts having an affair with Eddie’s wife Lira (Mariangela Melato) which jeopardizes not only his newfound success, but his life as well.

The film was written and directed by Andrew Bergman who was just coming off great success as the screenwriter for The In-Laws and was fully expecting this film to do just as well, but instead it had less than a 2-week run in the theaters. Much of this can be blamed on the humor, which is lowbrow and farcical while failing to give any new insights into the clothing business, or anything else for that matter. The jeans themselves don’t look sexy either as plastic gets used in replacement of the real butt cheeks where exposing the actual ass would’ve been far more provocative.

O’Neal’s affair with Melato is both unfunny and dumb. Why would such a good-looking guy, who could easily get women to fall for him,  fall suddenly head-over-heals to a wife of a mobster who will kill him instantly if he found out? This guy teaches at a college, so why not get into a sexual relationship with one of the coeds, who are most likely younger and better looking than this middle-aged woman and does not have the baggage of a marriage?

The climactic sequence, which takes place at an opera is when this thing really jumps-the-shark as it features Melato coming out of the audience and agreeing to replace the leading lady on stage when she falls ill, but how would Melato have known all the words to the music without having been to any of the rehearsals? This segment also features Kiel getting on stage and becoming a part of the opera as well where he sings in fluent Italian even though it was never established earlier that he knew the language.

It was fun seeing Kiel, who built a career by playing a lot of mindless hulks most notably in the James Bond films, being given more speaking lines than usual, but I noticed the very apparent lump on his forehead, which in his other films I didn’t. Maybe this was because in the Bond movies he was given metal teeth, which is what got the viewer’s attention and took away from the lump, which here I found became a distraction.

Melato, who was a big star in Italy particularly with the films she did with director Lina Wertmuller, gets completely wasted in a thankless, one-dimensional role of an over-sexed vamp that is neither funny nor interesting. O’Neal, whose best bit may just be the perplexed expression he conveys in the film’s poster seen above, is adequate, but upstaged by Warden who is far funnier and the movie would’ve worked better had he been the star.

The jeans angle, which features a TV-ad that has Anita Morris as one of the dancers, is brief and more of a side-story while the emphasis is on O’Neal’s fling with Melato that isn’t very inspired and no surprise why this ultimately failed at the box office.

My Rating: 2 out of 10

Released: September 25, 1981

Runtime: 1 Hour 30 Minutes

Rated R

Director: Andrew Bergman

Studio: Warner Brothers

Available: DVD-R (Warner Archive), YouTube

Leave a comment

Posted in 80's Movies, College Life, Farce, Movies that take place in the Big Apple, Sex

Tagged , , , , , , ,

…and justice for all. (1979)

Posted on July 19, 2018 | 4 comments

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 7 out of 10

4-Word Review: Lawyer fights the system.

Arthur (Al Pacino) is a defense attorney who becomes increasingly more frustrated and disillusioned with the court system. He’s fighting to get one of his clients, Jeff (Thomas Waites), out of jail as he’s been sitting behind bars for over a year simply because he was mistaken for somebody else while also being forced to defend Judge Fleming (John Forsythe), a man that he vehemently hates, from a rape allegation.

The script by the husband and wife team of Barry Levinson and Valerie Curtain is chockfull of great insights into the American legal system and how messed up and prone to corruption it can sometimes be. Defense lawyers have in the past been glamourized in TV-shows like ‘Perry Mason’, but here the viewer gets a more stark assessment of their profession as they watch them being forced to defend those that they know are actually guilty. Yet it also balances this by showing how public defenders can also be the lone voice to those who are truly innocent and have no one else to speak up for them.

The film has a weird comedy/drama mix that doesn’t work and ends up getting in the way. When I first saw this many decades back I liked the humorous undertones as it gave production a surreal, satirical edge, but upon second viewing I didn’t find it to be as amusing. The script makes good hard-hitting points and adding in the humor only diminishes this message and takes away from the seriousness of the subject matter.

The side-story dealing with the suicidal judge, played by Jack Warden, should’ve been excised. I’ll admit the images of him eating lunch while sitting out on a ledge of a tall building, or trying to kill himself with a rifle are memorable, but pointless and by coupling this judge character with Forsythe’s crooked one seems to imply that all judges are either bad or crazy, which isn’t fair.

The storyline dealing with Arthur visiting his senile grandfather, played by Lee Strasberg, should’ve been cut out as well as it has nothing to do with the main plot. It also brings up many unanswered questions like why is Arthur close to his grandfather and not to his own parents and why did his parents apparently ‘abandon’ him? This backstory never gets sufficiently addressed and seems like material for a whole different movie altogether.

Spoiler Alert!

The storyline involving Judge Fleming is the most intriguing and should’ve been made the film’s primary focus, but I was disappointed with the way the judge glibly admits to his crime, which takes away the mystery angle and I would’ve preferred the truth coming out in a more dramatic manner. The film also has a very old-fashioned take to his situation by saying that just because the character is involved with BDSM activities that somehow makes him ‘deviant’ and more prone to committing rape, which has been proven untrue as there are plenty of people who can enjoy kinky activities with consenting partners and still remain ethical.

End of Spoiler Alert!

Overall the film is worth catching and has many interesting moments including Pacino’s final speech that he gives to a packed courtroom, which is a gem. This also marks the film debuts of Christine Lahti and Jeffery Tambor as Pacino’s lawyer friend who slowly goes crazy.

My Rating: 7 out of 10

Released: October 16, 1979

Runtime: 1Hour 59Minutes

Director: Norman Jewison

Rated R

Studio: Columbia Pictures

Available: DVD, Blu-ray, Amazon Video, YouTube

4 Comments

Posted in 70's Movies, Black Comedy, Cold Climate/Wintertime Movies, Court Drama

Tagged , , , , , , , ,

Shampoo (1975)

Posted on December 29, 2016 | 3 comments

shampoo-2

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 9 out of 10

4-Word Review: Hairdresser shags his clients.

George (Warren Beatty) is a successful hairstylist who makes a habit of sleeping with his lady clients. He wants to open up his own beauty salon, but lacks the funds and not enough collateral to qualify for a loan. He is currently sleeping with Felicia (Lee Grant) who tells him to ask her husband Lester (Jack Warden) for the money. Lester is having an affair with Jackie (Julie Christie) who used to be George’s girlfriend. George’s current girlfriend is Jill (Goldie Hawn) who is having the inklings to sleep with Johnny (Tony Bill) since she thinks George is not being faithful to her. Everything comes to head on the night of November 5, 1968 during the election returns when everyone finds out that everyone else has been cheating on them and things get hilariously awkward.

This could quite easily be the best satire on the mores of Southern California culture ever made. The fact that it gets juxtaposed with the election where the same people who voted for an administration that vows to crackdown on the ‘permissive culture’ are the same ones doing the immoral behavior makes a very loud statement on the foibles and hypocrisies of the establishment.

Richard Sylbert was nominated for the Academy Award for his set decoration and he should’ve won as the vibrant and colorful interiors of the plush homes that the characters reside in become almost like a third character and makes you feel like you are right there inside the places with the characters and immersed completely in their world. The spectacular skyline views seen from the window of Lester’s office are equally impressive and I also enjoyed the party sequence, which reflected a true party atmosphere particularly the one attended by members of the counter-culture and the stylized set lighting by a slowly opening refrigerator door that gradually exposes the identities of a couple making love in the dark to the shocked onlookers standing around is outstanding.

The talented female cast is terrific, but a bit misused. Jackie’s meltdown during the election party seemed way overdone. This was a smart woman who would’ve seen through Lester’s thin veneer from the start and therefore wouldn’t have been that ‘traumatized’ when it finally came out in the open.

I was also disappointed that we didn’t see more of Lee Grant’s character. She won the Academy Award for her work here, but there needed to be more of a wrap-up with her as well as a scene showing an ultimate confrontation with her daughter (Carrie Fisher in her film debut) who has a secret fling with George behind her back. However, the shot showing Fisher giving her mother the most hateful and disdainful glare you can imagine that literally burns through the screen is almost a gem in itself.

Despite his many transgressions I found Lester to be strangely likable. His quirky ‘bonding’ with George near the end is cute, but I really wanted to see him jump into the hot tub and smoking some weed with the hippies after they offer him a joint and was disappointed it never came to pass even though it does come close.

Beatty, who co-wrote the screenplay, has his moments too, but they don’t come until the final half-hour, but it’s worth the wait. His ‘confession’ to Jill about what motivates him to sleep with all of his female clients and what he gets out of it is not only funny, but quite revealing to any male with the same traits. His final desperate plea to Jackie at the very end is equally interesting and even a bit surprising.

My only real complaint is the fact that it doesn’t seem like a legitimate ‘60s atmosphere even though that’s when it supposed to take place. The adult characters are too brazen in their actions. The college crowd was the first to embrace the free love philosophy while the middle-agers, who were raised in a more repressed, guilt-ridden era, took longer to catch-up to it. It just reeks too much of the mid ‘70s where by that time ‘everybody was doing it’ particularly in swinging L.A., which is where the time period should’ve stayed. There is also never any explanation for why the fire department comes in to evacuate the guests from the building as they are watching the returns.

Still the message of how people who use other people will eventually end up getting owned by the very same folks that they think they are manipulating is very on-target and amusingly played-out.

shampoo-1

My Rating: 9 out of 10

Released: February 11, 1975

Runtime: 1Hour 49Minutes

Director: Hal Ashby

Studio: Columbia Pictures

Available: DVD, Amazon Video, YouTube

3 Comments

Posted in 70's Movies, Academy Award Winners for Best Supporting Actress, Satire, Sex

Tagged , , , , , , , , ,

The Sporting Club (1971)

Posted on April 11, 2014 | 1 comment

the sporting club 2

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 4 out of 10

4-Word Review: Haves versus have-nots.

Jim (Nicholas Coster) finds out that his business is going under and he barely has any money left. To escape the stress he decides to take a trip to the wilderness of northern Michigan for a little R&R. Unfortunately once there he meets his friend Verner (Robert Fields) who has built a shooting range in his basement and wants to challenge everyone to a duel. The snotty sporting club that Jim belongs to wants to boot him out when they realize he is no longer making an income and rebel- rouser Earl Olive (Jack Warden) gets into a war with the elitist at the sporting club, which sends things spiraling out-of-control between the two sides with Jim right in the middle.

Based on the Thomas McGuane novel the film has the right concept, but not the fluid essence or wry humor of his writing. Some of his later work that was brought to the screen fared better. This film version is too uneven and takes too long to get anywhere. It becomes somewhat intriguing when we are given the idea of this set-up of a wild shoot-out between Olive’s biker gang and the elderly members of the club, but just as things seem to be getting interesting the film veers into a radically different direction and has all the sporting club members getting into a bizarre sex orgy. This may sound funny or even sexy, but it really isn’t as all the people were in their 60’s or 70’s and seeing their naked bodies cavorting around comes off as gross and sick.

The satirical jabs at the snotty club members are funny to some extent. They represent society’s old order people still clinging to age-old traditions and values even though the rest of the world around them is changing. They boast about their exclusive club membership even though it no longer has any allure and their stubbornness only makes them more insignificant and absurd. The scene where they stare blankly like lost children at the blown-up remnants of their cottage is probably the best moment in the film. However, their caricatures end up going overboard they become too illogical and ridiculous like crazed stupid creatures instead of human beings.

Most anti-establishment films of the era, which in the end is what this is, usually cast young stars in the lead, but here we have Coster who was already middle-aged making it look too much like the old guard vs. the old guard, which did not connect with the young filmgoers and they stayed away. The middle-age audience of the time was the establishment themselves and they found the film’s crass humor and scenarios off-putting and thus the film alienated everybody and bombed terribly at the box office.

Robert Fields gives an excellent performance as a budding sociopath and his scenes have an added tension. Warden is also very good in an unusual role for him as a joint smoking trouble maker who loves to rock-the-boat. The gun duel he has with Fields is interesting and his presence helps give the film a few extra points. Margaret Blye has a beautiful face making her a pleasure to look at no matter what she is doing. Jo Ann Harris is also sexy and the scene where she strips down to her panties with the phrase ‘my grandmother loves me’ stenciled on the rear is fun.

The film is weird enough to be worth a look as a curio. Director Larry Peerce infuses some interesting camera work into the proceedings and Michael Small’s moody folk rock score deserves its own album. Despite the locale looking very much like Michigan it was actually filmed near Hot Springs, Arkansas.

My Rating: 4 out of 10

Released: February 28, 1971

Runtime: 1Hour 45Minutes

Rated R

Director: Larry Peerce

Studio: Avco Embassy Pictures

Available: None at this time.

1 Comment

Posted in 70's Movies, Movies Based on Novels, Movies with a rural setting, Movies with Nudity, Obscure Movies, Offbeat, Satire

Tagged , , , , , , ,

Used Cars (1980)

Posted on March 11, 2013 | Leave a comment

used cars 3

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 7 out of 10

4-Word Review: Don’t trust car salesmen.

Crazy, zany comedy written and directed by Robert Zemeckis dealing with twin brothers Roy and Luke Fuchs (Jack Warden) who run competing used car dealerships that sit right across the street from each other. The film examines the various shenanigans that each pulls on the other in order to give their business the edge.

Steven Spielberg was the executive producer and the result is taking a rather flimsy plot with an ordinary setting and propelling it to gargantuan proportions with lots of stunts, twists, and action. It teeters precariously to falling over-the-edge with too much of it getting silly and exaggerated, but somehow it manages to save itself by being consistently funny and clever.

Some of the segments really had me laughing even after repeat viewings. My favorite is when they jam the TV signals and then break into a live broadcast with one of their off-the-wall commercials. However, from a purely visual perspective the climax, which features over 250 used cars speeding across the desert in order to get to the dealership before an important deadline is impressive.

Although the humor does manage to hit-the-mark the rest of it is run-of-the-mill. The characters are too dishonest, lowbrow, and scheming, which makes it hard to warm up to any of them. This is especially true with the Rudy Russo (Kurt Russell) character as the film goes overboard in creating the obnoxious salesman stereotype. The suits he wears are loud even from a comedy perspective and only a complete moron would be seen in public wearing them. Russell is also too young and too otherwise hip to be caught up in with the down-on-his-luck salesman caricatures and the part would have been better suited for an actor who was middle-aged. Bringing in Barbara Jane (Deborah Harmon) as his love interest is too forced and their romantic interlude bogs down the momentum.

Warden shines as always and this could be considered his career pinnacle. He plays two very different types of characters and as usual pulls it off in effortless fashion. He shows great energy in a fight sequence as well as in the end while standing in the back of a pickup and dueling with Rudy.

Gerrit Graham comes off as the most likable of the bunch and the running joke involving his superstitious nature works. His dog has to rate as one of the better animal performers and does some really funny tricks.

The cars look like they are genuinely of the used variety and it is great seeing all the old model types that they no longer make. My only real quibble involves the climatic sequence which although fun seemed implausible especially when taken into consideration that the hundreds of cars seen careening across the desert were driven by student drivers and yet none of them broke down, or had an accident, which seemed highly unlikely.

My Rating: 7 out of 10

Released: July 11, 1980

Runtime: 1Hour 53Minutes

Rated R

Director: Robert Zemeckis

Studio: Columbia Pictures

Available: VHS, DVD, Amazon Instant Video

Leave a comment

Posted in 80's Movies, Farce, Fast Cars/Car Chase, Movies with Nudity

Tagged , , , , , , ,