seajoe-1 Reviews

The Americanization of Emily (1964)

One of the very best anti-war movies, esp. for Americans

[8/10 · 29 October 2002]

This film is being released on cable again here in the fall of 2002. I guess I hope some liberal Hollywood mogul is doing it on purpose, to give us, especially those of us in the US, another good dose of anti-war. The movie seems especially apt for me, for my countrymen, because it is both funny and serious, and, set in England, it gives a pretty good sense of what a people who know war think and feel about it.

I'm afraid I doubt that it's going to have much effect against the probably coming Iraq action, but I'd like to think it might have a bit.

Both James Garner and Julie Andrews do well in the film, and Melvyn Douglas is real good as an American ranking Naval officer who's sane about the "glories of war". The Brit who plays Julie Andrews mother, whose name I unhappily cannot remember, deserves strong mention, too, especially with her scene about the absurdity and stupidity of memorializing the first Allied death in the invasion at Normandy in WW II.

Challenger (1990 TV Movie)

Better than billed

[6/10 · 25 September 2002]

Just a note to say that I happened on Challenger, the TV movie from c. 1990 tonight on cable and came here to IMDB to see what I could find - because I thought it was kind of interesting. Found I was even more interested in the few comments I found here (no reviews).

It was also interesting to me that the "rating" votes from those 60 something people who made a choice were all over the map, but the two (statistically significant?), most often chosen numbers, were 6 and 7. That's about right. (I'm giving it a six.)

But, to get to the main point <s>, all but one of the comments written in for the movie were trashing and what I would call trashy: all of them seemed to be hugely swayed by the subject of the show. Too "meaningful", too "important for our nation"??? The fact, I'm pretty sure, is that Challenger is a somewhat better than average docudrama. And Karen Allen is a distinguished actor. And almost all of the rest of the cast were at least OK. I thought the tone set was quite good, trying pretty successfully for "this is the way it was". No melodrama, no Hollywood "effects", just straight ahead "documentary" acting and other movie skills. Not overwritten.

It's hard for me to figure where the low average of the comments came from. Something I guess about the subject being too Big and Serious (in the pseudo sense, non gravitas) for anyone, particularly the automatically suspect TV movie crowd, to make a respectable film about. I guess. ??? Interesting.

Moscow on the Hudson (1984)

Underrated; good plus; I'm curious why it was rated "low"

[7/10 · 5 August 2002]

OK, this is not the greatest movie. Doesn't probably belong in the top 250 movies ever, etc., but it's really quite good.

Paul Mazursky (sp?) is after all a very gifted and experienced moviemaker. The film's technicals are generally very good, therefore.

The biggest problem with the film is that it has too much sentimentality, that is, too much feeling that seems artificial or even fake (mawkish is a good though not often used word - it comes from the same root it seems as maggot! and denotes something that makes one nauseous!). I don't want to exaggerate negatively here. I said first that the movie is quite good and I mean it. But it does have problems with one of its main tendencies: its (main?) thrust, to show that the "freedom life" is good (and specifically in the USA). (BTW, I don't think it can be accused of excessive AmericaFirstNess on that score).

The acting is generally good to excellent, but Robin Williams who is usually good has some of his usual problems showing emotion. (He contributes a lot to the sentimentality problems.) Don't know why some people knocked Maria Conchita Alonso who I thought was real good (she's notably good at showing genuineness, in contrast to RW!) And many of the smaller parts are excellently done! Much of the movie's Soviet Russia sections are very good in *all* moviemaking respects. I note that several Russians have pointed this out.

I guess the thing gets down to the question of whether it's possible to make a great Something that's mostly about how good Freedom in the USA is. I'm not knocking the United States (although I'm pretty sure quite a few people in these post 9/11 times will, defensively, think I'm am, BUT I believe it is very difficult to make anything in art that's real positive about the US (or to argue strongly in favor of the USA) when most all of what you're showing or talking about is freedom: the US is a very green (ie, young) country that is still often juvenile, especially in "feeling its oats" too much. We didn't invent freedom or liberty and we aren't worlds better than anyone else at "doing" it, though we have been so insular through most of our history that too many of us think we are. And I'm surprised that so much of this pretty unknowing attitude comes through in a Paul Mazursky movie.

Calamity Jane (1984 TV Movie)

Yet another of the good TV movies, that surprise

[7/10 · 3 August 2002]

Jane Alexander is most of this movie, but all the moviemaking techniques are respectable or better here and Frederick Forrest in a small role is pretty much fine, too. There's also a fat friend (of Jane's) who keeps appearing (Walter Olkewicz?): he also does quite a good job in a not very demanding role.

The script is not always - he says nicely - good, but it often is. And Jane Alexander is more than able to make the best of anything around.

Among other examples of her top of the list acting, it's quite amazing to me how well she showed (physically) a tough, quite masculine (sometimes) character. She got a walk together for the film that has little or no trace of the standard feminine (wherein, as a famous feminist once said, women imitate being feminine!). (Marilyn Monroe being the biggest example?)

And she plays old and washed up beautifully at the end of the film.

A movie that's well worth watching, and maybe even buying?, if you can find a good used version.

Bruno (2000)

Unusual film, lots of good things in it

[12 February 2002]

Well, this looks like a film many people (most?) didn't get. Should have got a lot more credits than it seems to have gotten. Not sure why at all it flunked the critical course. It's quite good and seems to have been Shirley MacLaine's first directing job. So, go see it or rent it. BTW, there is nothing in it of floating in clouds of spirituality over Peru, for those who have worried about that sort of thing over the course of Ms. MacLaine's almost always very distinguished career.

The movie is kind of like a home movie done by an extremely talented director and a lot of other talented movie pros: it's not that it's amateurish at all; its rather that it doesn't try for finished Hollywood effects much. Just lets things out, sometimes to play, sometimes not. It's very, very well directed but not in a usual or common or regular sense. Shirley MacLaine may do her best at what you might call encouraging and allowing her actors (including herself) to do "fresh" things onscreen. Sort of like, "OK, go!" Really nice spirit about almost all of the show.

And, like most good or better creations, the film doesn't at all go out of its way to explain the story it's showing you. Good. That means it's real hard to put it in a category. Also Good. It's some kind of comedy AND drama, I suppose, but please don't call it a comedy-drama, I think.

The young hero, played by Alex Linz, is a quite wonderful "open" part. Again the movie does not try to explain, put words on what "exactly", "precisely" <groan> his motivations are (to win the National Catholic Spelling Bee <really>) while most of the time wearing girl-woman dress, often flamboyant. Kathy Bates as the head of the Catholic grade school he attends is wonderful, too, a quite masculine and tough (and funny) nun who just won't tolerate the boy, for awhile. And there are quite a few nice drop-ins from actors like Jennifer Tilly. Gary Sinese, who I usually think of as a great villain or great sickone, or both, is wonderful as a trying-to-be tough cop who was labelled sissy when he was his hero son's age, not least by his mother, Shirley MacLaine.

I liked David Cuminello's script a lot. Got the impression he may not have written all of it???

In all, a quite different film that is well worth watching, wherever. Far from run of the mill, as they say.

I'm a little afraid to give it the 6 rating I've put on it, but I think I should stop worrying because I am a hard grader. Somewhere between 6 and 7 is I think where it belongs, and where I hope it's getting to on IMDB.

Breaker Morant (1980)

One of the very best

[8/10 · 5 July 2001]

Just saw Breaker Morant again tonight (July 6 '01), on cable TV in the US.

The movie was made in '79 and released in '80 I believe and it is one more example of how well the very best films hold up over the years. The meaning of classic perhaps?

Remarkable movie. *Very* high marks for direction, script, acting, editing (wonderful), photography, and probably everything else.

It's a damn shame that Breaker doesn't have enough votes to make it into IMDB's top film list. It's got quite a high rating, 7.8, I think, but it should be higher. After watching it again tonight, I'm thinking about trying to start a campaign to at least get the film enough votes, if not to raise its "score". I'm sure it's an 8-something on the rating scale.

*A truly fine film*

The Entertainer (1960)

One of Olivier's *very* best roles

[8/10 · 5 July 2001]

It seems to me that someone should come out with a good video or a good DVD of this film.

Olivier is fine and often he is amazingly good in this role and the rest of the cast list includes many of Britain's finest, too.

Depressing and cynical, yes, but, but.....

If you haven't seen this show, try to. Olivier on stage doing his hackneyed semi-vaudeville act is something every movie lover should get to see.