Gideon58's Reviews

Thunder Road(2018)
In 2016, an unknown filmmaker named Jim Cummings made a 13-minute live action short subject called Thunder Road which was about a police officer eulogizing his mother. Well, apparently someone was impressed because Cummings was given the green light to make a full length feature that springboards from the short subject, which was an award darling on the indie circuit.

This 2018 fiilm opens on the same character, Jim Arnaud, a separated, small town police officer with a daughter who is observed struggling to deliver a eulogy for his deceased mother. He wants to sing the Bruce Springsteen classic as a tribute to Mom because she loved Bruce but he can't get the tape player to work and the story continues to be a bold and unapologetic character study revolving around this Jim Arnaud, that actually makes the guy look a little bit crazy.

Cummings really strikes gold with this central character because I think we all know someone like Jim Arnaud...Jim is kind of gregarious and it's often hard to get in a word edgewise with him so instead of trying to have a real conversation with him, we just choose to stop listening whenever it becomes too much of a chore. I don't know how many times in this movie where we observe Jim talking to people and they just walk away from while he's still talking.

This film carefully dissects the mental shredding in Jim's brain as he loses his mom, followed by his job, and then he totally snaps when his wife wants a divorce, half his assets, and full custody of his daughter. The scenes where he is talking to the judge in the courtroom and in front of the police station are simultaneously amusing and heartbreaking. There are a lot of laughs provided here, but most of them are nervous ones and I'm not sure if they are all intentional.

Cummings' Jim Arnaud is a cinematic enigma who commands attention from the viewer that he doesn't really get from the people in his life. The whining Arnaud does in the funeral scene is effective there but its appeal wears out as the film progresses. As expected with an independent film, the production values are less than impressive...there is a minimal use of music here, but the story really doesn't need it. This is a film where lack of cinematic gloss just adds to the power of the piece. Cummings is definitely a filmmaker to watch.

****, it's not the Jim Cummings I'm thinking of.

Melvin and Howard
Atmospheric direction, an Oscar-winning screenplay, and sparkling performances make the quirky 1980 comedy Melvin and Howard worth your time.

This is the story of a down on his luck loser named Melvin Dummar, an impractical dreamer who can't hold onto a job and is up to his ears in debt. One night while driving along a deserted stretch of highway outside of Las Vegas, Melvin encounters a grizzled old man passed out on the side of the highway and offers to take the guy to the hospital. The man wants nothing to do with doctors or hospitals, he just wants a ride to Las Vegas. It's not long before the man reveals himself to Dummar as Howard Hughes. Dummar doesn't give his claim a second thought and just insists that the guy sing a Christmas song that Dummar wrote along with him. Hughes asks to be let out in a dark alley, asks Melvin if he has money, and gets out of the truck and throws away the money Melvin gave him. A few years later Hughes dies and a will of Hughes materializes and names Melvin an heir, leaving him $156,000,000.

Bo Goldman's screenplay, despite the misleading title, is not about Howard Hughes at all but about this ordinary guy Melvin Dummar and how this chance encounter with the reclusive billionaire has no initial effect on his almost pathetic life. We watch his wife, Lynda (Mary Steenburgen) leave him, not once, but twice, after she wins $10,000 on a TV talent show and he blows the money. We watch him get a job as a mailman and almost lose the job several times because of his fiery temper and finally finds happiness with a co-worker who becomes his second wife. As the story floats across the screen, we begin wondering what the whole encounter with Hughes had to do with the rest of the film and then a mysterious man (Charles Napier) stops at Melvin's gas station and delivers the will and disappears as mysteriously as he appeared. Goldman would take another selected view of Hughes with his screenplay for 2016's Rules Don't Apply.

And this is where the story begins to aggravates for me...we've really gotten to know and care about Melvin Dummar, thanks to Jonathan Demme's direction, which establishes a lovely slice of Americana in the life of Melvin Dummar and we're ready to welcome something terrific happening to this guy, but this whole will thing is beyond fishy...the will is handwritten, because it was eventually thrown out of court, it was probably not notarized, and the whole scenario presented here about how the will came to Dummar just doesn't make sense. If the will were legitimate, wouldn't there have been a reading of same to which Dummar would have been invited? But instead, we get eager hangers-on all over poor Melvin and the guy actually being accused of lying about how he got the will and even accused of writing it himself.

The funny thing is, Melvin's story was entertaining enough without his encounter with Hughes and when the will shows up, it throws a real bucket of cold water on what we've been privy to up until then. The small town atmosphere Demme creates is engaging and I absolutely loved the charismatic performance he got from Paul Le Mat, so memorable seven years earlier in American Graffiti, as the hapless Dumar. Steenburgen won the Best Supporting Actress Oscar for her delicious performance as Linda Dummar, which includes a memorable tap dance on the talent show and the late Jason Robards received a Supporting Actor nomination for his curmudgeonly Howard Hughes. A slightly loopy but ultimately entertaining look at a true story that found Dummar still battling courtrooms as recently as 2006.

Whitney (2015)
True fans of the iconic Whitney Houston should avoid a 2015 TV movie called Whitney, that suffers from overripe performances and a questionable screenplay that tries to paint Whitney as the bad guy in her relationship with Bobby Brown.

The film opens at some awards show where Whitney and her entourage are seated behind Bobby and his. The film depicts Whitney getting hot and bothered while watching Bobby onstage bearing his washboard abs. They meet backstage and exchange some sugary pleasantries regarding each other's looks and talent and the rest is alleged history.

Shem Bitterman's screenplay attempts to be a balanced account of the relationship that developed but as the film progresses, we can't help but wonder if Bitterman is a friend of Brown's because this film actually tries to paint Bobby Brown as this innocent babe in the woods who was corrupted by the evil Whitney. Despite the fact that he was still in the middle of another relationship and had a child with another woman, the film depicts Whitney as a homewrecker and a drug addict even before she met Brown. I was shocked that in a movie about Whitney Houston and Bobby Brown, we witness Whitney doing cocaine first and Brown actually acting offended and telling her that drugs are bad for her.

Actress Angela Bassett made her debut behind the camera as director here and showed a real flare for the melodramatic. It would have been nice if she had exercised a little more control over the scenes of Whitney crying about what a scumbag Bobby was because Whitney's constant whining and screaming became akin to fingernails on a blackboard. Bassett and Bitterman allows us to believe that Houston had no control over her personal life and I just don't believe that.

YaYa DeCosta's overly mannered performance in the title role gets tiresome about 30 minutes in (her singing was dubbed by Deborah Cox) and Arlen Escarpeta is just embarrassingly bad as Brown. Suzanne Douglass was fine as Whitney's mother as was Mark Rolston as Clive Davis, but if you're looking for a look at the real Whitney Houston, this isn't the place to find it.

Did you spot Gloria? Boy, did she have a small role or what?

I agree that the slice of American life was the highlight of the film and the Howard Hughes connection the least interesting. I didn't like the first few minutes with Jason Robards as Howard Hughes. But I did like backstory of this guy who supposedly met Howard Hughes.

Yeah, I can't believe she even agreed to do that tiny part, but yes, I recognized her immediately.

If you like slice of American movies like Melvin and Howard you should check out, Chilly Scenes of Winter (1979) Gloria is in it, with a bigger supporting role. It's a drama-comedy and about obsessive one side relationships. I thought it was refreshing and funny without trying to be too funny.

The Meyorwitz Stories (New and Selected)
The director of The Squid and the Whale and Margot at the Wedding gives us a mixed bag with a 2017 oddity called The Meyorwitz Stories (New and Selected), a slightly pretentious but often humorous look at family dysfunction where the parts are better than the whole, but some serious star power almost makes up for it.

The film centers on an eccentric family who have been distant for years but are brought together when Harold Meyorwitz (Dustin Hoffman), a former sculptor, is about to be honored at the school where he taught with a retrospective of his work. Harold has been married four times, most recently to Maureen (Emma Thompson), an aging, alcoholic hippie who likes to refer to Harold as "the Dad." Harold is the father of Danny (Adam Sandler), an unemployed musician who has a daughter who is becoming an erotic filmmaker and ignores a serious limp he's had for years; Jean (Elizabeth Marvel) is the sister who has always felt like the invisible member of the family, and Matthew (Ben Stiller), a successful attorney whose success has cost him his marriage and resents his father for treating him better than he treated Danny and Jean.

at Noah Baumbach is an acquired taste and sometimes his stories require a little patience from the viewer and this one is no exception. The film actually begins with a lovely scene between Sandler's Danny and his daughter trying to find a place to park, but the film then begins to drag with a lot of pretentious dialogue and artsy camera work and even has story cards introducing each of the Meyorwitz stories and just as the viewer becomes relaxed with Baumbach's storytelling format, the film takes a totally unexpected tragic turn that we don't see coming that disturbs the pacing Baumbach has already established.

But there are selected scenes and moments here that are extremely effective: Matthew's attempt to take his father out to lunch; Matthew and Danny becoming obsessed with Pam, their father's nurse; the three siblings writing down everything their father's doctor is telling them; The siblings and Danny's daughter gathering around the piano singing songs Danny wrote as a kid; Matthew and Danny destroying the car of a friend of Harold's who once traumatized Jean as a child; and Harold's inability to deal with the success of a rival artist and old friend (Judd Hirsch); unfortunately, for some reason, the whole thing just doesn't gel as the whole cinematic experience Baumbach intended.

The film is beautifully photographed and I loved Randy Newman's stylishly subtle music score and Baumbach pulls solid performances from his hand-picked cast. After almost half a century in the business, Dustin Hoffman is still one of the most commanding screen presences bringing a prickly unpredictability to the sad and fascinating Harold. Ben Stiller is strong as Matthew and Adam Sandler displays flashes of brilliance as the slightly pathetic Danny, a performance that rivals his work in Punch Drunk Love. Mention should be made of a pair of classy cameo by Candice Bergen as Matthew's mother and Adam Driver as a client of Matthew's. Fans of films like Hannah and her Sisters and The Royal Tannembaums will have a head start here.

The Big Heat
The story is slightly predictable and can't stand a lot of scrutiny but taut direction and a solid cast help 1953's The Big Heat remain a credible crime melodrama after all these years.

The film stars Glenn Ford as a police detective named Dave Bannion who is assigned the case when a fellow police officer commits suicide. Evidence comes to Bannion suggesting that the officer's death might not be a suicide, which results in two murders that find Bannion's life spiraling into an all-out war against the mob where Bannion finds he is unable to trust anyone, except the not-as-dumb-as-she looks mistress of the mob boss' number two guy.

It's the directorial eye of the legendary Fritz Lang (M) that provides this film with the extra sizzle that overcomes the predictability of the story and some minor plotholes. The idea of cops on the take was pretty daring stuff in 1953 and it is pretty easy to conclude that the guy who kills himself at the beginning of the film was dirty, documented by his wife's icy reaction to what he has done and her immediate stashing of the evidence her husband had that apparently could bring down the whole syndicate. With all this incriminating evidence this cop had, I wasn't sure why he felt suicide was his only option, but I knew things weren't as they appeared when Bannion makes his first call on the "grieving" widow and it is made clear, through Lang's direction, that the woman is hardly grieving.

Lang and screenwriter Sydney Boehm make some bold storytelling choices here. I must admit being surprised after watching the story establish Bannion as a loving husband and devoted dad that the story would sacrifice his wife. In more contemporary mob oriented films, wives and children are usually off limits and I really didn't see this coming, a gutsy story element that pushed the story into first gear.

Ford is a square-jawed hero and Gloria Grahame once again lights up the screen as the mob mistress who, in a horrifying scene, actually gets a boiling hot pot of coffee thrown in her face. Lee Marvin is properly menacing as Grahame's coffee-throwing boyfriend and there's a rich supporting turn from Jeanette Nolan as the cop's widow that definitely merits attention. This one holds up pretty well with special appeal for fans of Grahame and Marvin.

Yeah that surprised the hell out of me when the film brutally kills off the wife and kids. Like you said it revved up the movie. A gusty scene for 1953. The whole film is pretty brutal by early 50s standards. I'm not a big fan of Glen Ford but he's will cast here. Of course I love Gloria Grahame's performance and Lee Marvin owns the screen. He's a favorite actor of mine. Nice review!

Beach Party
AIP Studios and the creative force behind the ABC sitcom Bewitched came up with a winning formula when they created a 1963 piece of fluff called Beach Party, which was such a surprise hit that it inspired six more films, including the first sequel which came out later the same year, not to mention creating the most charismatic screen team since Doris Day and Rock Hudson.

Robert Cummings stars as Professor Robert Sutwell, an anthropologist, who with help of his attractive research assistant (Dorothy Malone), has decided to write a book about the sexual habits of teenagers. Sutwell has set up residence in a beach house with a lot of fancy equipment which allows him to not only watch everything these teenagers do but also provides an audio feed that makes it possible for him to listen to the kids' private conversations.

Sutwell's work severely affects the relationship between a kid named Frankie (Frankie Avalon) and his girlfriend Dolores (Annette Funicello) who through a series of silly misunderstandings, assume that they are cheating on each other and spend the rest of the running time trying to make each other jealous. Frankie pretends to be mad about a Hungarian waitress in a coffeehouse (Eva Six), while Dolores pretends to be fascinated with Sutwell.

On the surface, this film is beyond silly creating a teenage world that had to look pretty appealing to the 18-34 demographic buying movie tickets in 1963. Frankie and Dolores and the rest of their gang seem to have a pretty cushy life that was probably hard for teen moviegoers to resist. These kids did nothing but surf all day and sit in front of beach campfires all night, wiggling their asses to that crazy rock and roll music. These kids don't go to school, they don't seem to have parents, part-time jobs, and the words "study", "semester", and "flunk" are utilized in the first five minutes of the film and never uttered again.

What made this film such a monster hit was the hard-to-ignore onscreen chemistry between singer Frankie Avalon and former Mousketeer Funicello that pretty much burns a hole through the movie screen and director William Asher capitalizes on it beautifully by keeping the pair apart for the majority of the running time, only making the chemistry even stronger. He also throws in some terrific comic relief in the form of a nutty motorcycle gang, led by the equally nutty Eric Von Zipper (Harvey Lembeck) and it is through these characters where Asher gets to display a lot of his skill at producing laughs, whether on the big screen or small. Watch Von Zipper's opening scene where his motorcycle gets away from him and the camera stays glued on the gang and their reactions to what's happening to the bike...great comic moment that only works because of a solid directorial eye for what's funny. Yeah, there's a lot of seriously dated stuff here, but as part of cinematic history, definitely worth a look.

Skyscraper (2018)
Take a big dish of Die Hard, throw in a generous helping of The Towering Inferno, and then throw in a dash of The Lady From Shanghai and you've got a 2018 action thriller called Skyscraper, another entry from the "Put your brain in check and enjoy" school of filmmaking because trying to figure out everything that's going on here will give you a headache, but I swear my heart stopped about eight times during this non-stop roller coaster ride.

The film stars Dwayne Johnson as Will Sawyer, a security/safety expert who lost a foot in a hostage incident years ago, who is sent to Hong Kong to supervise the security and safety systems for the newest entry in the tallest building in the world competition, a building which we're told is 3 times the height of the Empire State Building. The upper part of the building is supposed to be residential and as part of a test of Sawyer's work, they have moved his wife (Neve Campbell) and two children into the residential area. A long standing blood feud explodes between the Asian billionaire who designed the building and an international criminal mastermind out for revenge, setting the building on fire with Sawyer's family still trapped inside.

Admittedly, I can't be absolutely certain about the accuracy of the story described above because the exposition provided for this story was pretty confusing. This is another one of those movies where it's really hard to tell who the good guys are and who the bad guys are...oh, except one.

There's no doubt that Dwayne Johnson's Will Sawyer is a good guy. Yes, the character reminded me a lot of John McClane, minus the cockiness. Even though we know Johnson is the star of the film, there is nothing in what this character goes through that is a slam dunk. If you're looking for a film steeped in realism, this is not the film, but if you're looking for an often logic defying circus of an action film that will have you on the edge of your chair and holding your breath, this is the film. I don't think I have let an action film grip me so emotionally since Face/Off. Thanks primarily to the backstory which opens the movie, we are instantly on Sawyer's side and want to see him and his family safe and our desire for the character definitely requires some patience and a strong heart.

Director/writer Rawson Marshall Thurber, whose previous credits include Dodgeball: A Underdog Story and Easy A totally belies his inexperience with the action genre here, though his writing could have made some minor plot holes a little more comprehensible. He has employed first rate production values here, with special nods to film editing, sound, art direction, and Steve Jblonsky's heart pumping music. Needless to say, Dwayne Johnson once gain raises the bar on the material and makes it really easy to forgive the film's minor problems. Action fans, belly up.

Oh Men! Oh Women!
Oh Men! Oh Women! is a sophisticated and engaging battle of the sexes from 1957 that works thanks to an intriguing premise and a stellar ensemble cast working at the top of their game.

David Niven stars as Dr. Alan Coles, a psychiatrist who has recently become engaged to a self-absorbed diva named Myra Hagerman (Barbara Rush) who learns through the husband (Dan Dailey) of a current patient (Ginger Rogers) and a brand new patient, a bundle of neuroses named Grant Cobbler (Tony Randall) that his new fiancee may not be the woman he thought she was.

Screenwriter Nunnally Johnson (How to Marry a Millionaire, The Three Faces of Eve} scores in adapting Edward Chodorov's play for the screen which takes a severe skewering at the science of psychoanalysis and its validity from both sides of the couch: On one side, we see how psychiatrists are often revered and considered to have superhuman qualities and the ability to solve all problems regarding human behavior and on the other side, we see a psychiatrist who has been believing the hype his entire career, trying to live up to it and finding it a very difficult to be what people, especially his new fiancee, expect him to be.

Director Nunnally Johnson also does an admirable job of opening up this story for the screen as the story moves smoothly from Coles' office, to the home of Dailey and Rogers' characters to a very funny finale on the Queen Elizabeth II that help to keep this film from never appearing like a photographed play.

Johnson's cast is first rate for the most part...David Niven's deliciously understated performance anchors the proceedings quite nicely. Ginger Rogers had me in stitches as alcoholic drama queen Mildred Turner who feels like Nora in A Doll's House, though Dan Dailey's Arthur Turner tended to grate on the nerves. Tony Randall, in his film debut, had me on the floor as the tightly would Cobbler. Randall proves to be a master of physical comedy here, evidenced immediately in his opening scene where Cobbler is, shall we say, hesitant, about laying on Dr. Coles' couch, but the real surprise for me was the enchanting performance by Rush as Myra. her slightly over-the-top approach to the character works beautifully and, though I have not seen a lot of her work, I have never enjoyed Rush onscreen more. Also have to give a shout out to Cyril J. Mockridge's bouncy music. A witty adult comedy that holds up quite nicely.

You Don't Mess with the Zohan
Sometimes an unlimited budget in the hands of certain actors can be a dangerous thing, evidenced by 2008's You Don't Mess with the Zohan, an elaborately overblown comic adventure that blends spectacular scenery, cheesy special effects, a questionably PC story, and over-the-top performances to provide, in terms of pure entertainment, a mixed bag to be sure.

Adam Sandler plays the title character who is an Israeli Special Forces soldier with nature-defying physical abilities who decides to take the opportunity provided by assassinating a terrorist known as the Phantom (John Turturro) to fake his death so he can give up being a soldier and move to New York city and fulfill his lifelong dream of becoming a hairdresser.

The Adam Sandler rep company have never been big on bringing realism to the screen but they've taken it to a whole new level here, manifested through a complex screenplay by Sandler and Robert Smigel, a longtime SNL writer who appears onscreen as a stereo store employee that presents an offensive and outrageous story that like some of Mel Brooks' finest work, offers something to offend everyone and I promise you that before the closing credits, most viewers will find something in this film offensive.

Don't get me wrong...there are laughs provided here, but the laughs really don't have a lot to do with the confusing story being mounted here. The sporadic laughs the film provides are self-contained and don't have a lot to do with the story. The majority of the laughs come through the cheesy special effects making Zohan appear to do things beyond human ability and the occasional breaking of the 4th wall, not to mention cashing in on the rich entertainment history behind its cast which allows the viewer to roll with a lot of stupid stuff that goes on here.

Longtime Sandler director Dennis Dugan does manage to provide a semblance of structure to the story but it's just too complex and way too long. Sandler works hard as Zohan, even if we don't believe for a minute that he's Israeli and Turturro is very funny as the Phantom. Rob Schneider, looking a lot more Middle Eastern than Sandler, offers one of his funniest performances as a New York cabbie who has a past with Zohan and leading lady Emmanuelle Chriqui is absolutely breathtaking. There are also cameos from Kevin Nealon, Steve Buscemi, and Mariah Carey. Parts are better than the whole, but Sandler fans won't be disappointed.

Captain Fantastic
A powerhouse Oscar-nominated performance from Viggo Mortensen anchors a raw and disturbing drama from 2016 called Captain Fantastic that takes a jaundiced look at the art of parenting that should be required viewing of anyone raising young children and wondering if they're doing it right.

Mortensen plays Ben, the father of six children who, along with wife, Leslie, apparently decided years ago to forego traditional American society and made the decision to raise their children as survivalists in the wilderness of the Pacific Northwest. The children are subjected to brutal physical training on a daily business that rivals the military and are only allowed to eat what they kill. Leslie has been hospitalized for three months as the story opens and then Ben learns that Leslie has taken her own life. After a nasty phone conversation with his father-in-law, who says he is forbidden to attend the funeral, Ben packs the kids into their converted school bus/traveling home christened Steve and begin the road trip of a lifetime.

Matt Ross, an actor who had supporting roles in such films as Goodnight and Good Luck, The Aviator, and American Psycho might have found his real niche in Hollywood behind the camera as director and writer of this striking and uncompromising drama that asks a lot of ugly questions and provides few answers. The story evokes mixed emotions as we see that Ben's intentions for his children are understandable to a point, even if his methods are often questionable and dangerous. We observe one training session of mountain scaling where one of the children almost falls off the edge of the mountain and , instead of offering help, Ben instructs him on how to figure out how to get down the mountain with an injury. And trust and believe that Ben has not neglected the children's home-schooling either. His 8-year old daughter can recite the entire Bill of Rights.

Ross' screenplay is fuzzy on a couple of points...we are given conflicting stories regarding whether or not Leslie was on board with her children being raised as survivalists and the validity of Leslie's will is never made clear to my satisfaction, but there were a couple of things in the story that really rang true for this reviewer. I loved the fact that Ben's younger son, Rellian, is not happy with the way he's living and that he blames his father for what happened to his mother and every time he's on the cusp of confronting his dad, he backs off. The reveal that his older son, Bodevan, has been planning to go to college behind his father's back also made for some compelling drama. The visit with Ben's sister and brother-in-law bristles with tension as they try to convince Ben that his children need to live a normal life.

What comes through so beautifully in Ross' story is Ben's unconditional love for his children even if his ways of showing it aren't always appropriate. I found it disturbing that he gifted his 8-year old daughter with a hunting knife for her birthday but even more disturbing was her unabashed joy at receiving the gift. I also was fascinated by the somewhat savage behavior of the children, especially at the beginning of the story. They are observed reacting to certain situations more like animals than human beings.

The film is handsomely mounted, with some stunning cinematography, film editing and sound. Viggo Mortensen once again proves he's one of the most underrated actors in the business with a gritty and heartbreaking performance that earned him his second Oscar nomination. Also loved Kathryn Hahn and Steve Zahn as Ben's sister and brother-in-law and the classy turn by Frank Langella as Ben's father-in-law. Also deserving mention are the performances of George McKay and Nicholas Hamilton as Ben's sons, Bodevan and Rellian. It's not exactly The Waltons, but it is a bold and gutsy film experience that pulls few punches and never apologizes for it and establishes Matt Ross as a filmmaker to watch .

Norman Lear: Just Another Version of You
There aren't a lot of documentaries done revolving around the creative forces behind the cameras in Hollywood but a loving and detailed tribute to television giant Norman Lear called Norman Lear: Just Another Version of You hits all the right notes and does what a good documentary should do: offer surprises, things I didn't know about the subject, and this one offered surprises in every reel.

For those who haven't watched any television in the last 50 years, Norman Lear was the creative force behind some of the best sitcoms to ever grace the television screen...Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman, One Day at a Time, Good Times, The Jeffersons, Maude, and the sitcom that changed the face of prime time television forever, the groundbreaking All in the Family. This documentary carefully dissects the genesis of these shows, not to mention showing what came before and after with this television legend, a man who if shown a picture of him, the average Joe wouldn't be able to tell you who he is.

News to me, the documentary reveals that one of Lear's first real jobs as a writer was on the Colgate Comedy Hour starring Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis. We are even treated to a rarely seen clip of Lear performing onscreen with Lewis, but being onscreen was not Lear's passion, his passion lied in creating the comedy. He calls comedy a "very serious business."

He wrote a couple of very strong film comedies (Divorce American Style, Cold Turkey) before eventually finding success on the small screen with All in the Family. This was also where I learned that the character of Archie Bunker was based on Lear's father who went to jail when Lear was nine years old.

The film features commentary from both of Lear's wives, Rob Reiner, Russell Simmons, John Amos, Beatrice Arthur, John Amos, and Esther Rolle. I loved Simmons' analogy of the difference between Good Times and The Jeffersons and how they were created two very different audiences, even if it was by accident.

Directors Heidi Ewing and Rachel Grady attempted to be a little artsy here, creating an alter ego for Lear, a little boy dressed like Lear including his signature white golf hat, but it just sort of slows things down and is eventually abandoned. I loved the clips of Lear, Reiner and Simmons just sitting and watching scenes from the shows, as well as Lear's observation that almost all of his lead actors had issues with his scripts, especially Carroll O'Connor. I also loved the subtle reminder that O'Connor was NOTHING like Archie. There is also a lovely meeting between Lear and two other comedy legends Mel Brooks and Carl Reiner, that is worth the price of admission alone. A loving tribute to someone who rarely stepped in front of the camera but had a lot to say.

I'll Take Sweden
Bob Hope made a lot of silly and forgettable comedies during the 1960's and one of the silliest and most forgettable was 1965's I'll Take Sweden, an attempt to bridge a cinematic generation gap that doesn't really work and provides very selected laughs.

Hope plays Bob Holcombe, a widowed father who is not crazy about the fact that his daughter, JoJo (Tuesday Weld) is planning to marry her boyfriend, Kenny Klinger (Frankie Avalon), a college dropout who lives in a dingy trailer, so when Bob's company offers him a job in Sweden, he seizes the opportunity to get JoJo away from Kenny by whisking her away to Sweden with him, but finds even a worse potential son-in-law in his Swedish office manager, Erik (Jeremy Slate), who is instantly smitten with JoJo. Keeping JoJo and Erik apart is also complicating Bob's new romance with a pretty Swedish interior decorator (Dina Merrill).

This film appears to be an attempt by MGM and by Hope's handlers to keep Hope relevant in the industry by blending a typical saucy Hope sex comedy with the Beach Party craze that was cleaning up at the box office at the time. The idea of pairing Hope with Frankie Avalon, who was riding the crest of success with the recent release of his fourth Beach Party movie, probably seemed inspired at the time, but now it just comes off as forced, predictable, and lazy.

As a matter of fact, lazy would be a perfect adjective to describe everything involved in this production. Nat Perrin's screenplay is a tired combination of hip 1960's teenspeak and somewhat amusing Hope one-liners (if you listen closely, you can almost hear a rimshot after some of them). Except for selected exteriors, I don't think director Frederick De Cordova filmed a single scene outside a Hollywood soudstage or employed a single Swedish actor in the production where the screenplay reminds us every 10 seconds that we're in Sweden. Avalon is given two songs to sing, including the title tune, that bring the film to a dead halt.

Hope seems to be sleepwalking through this and Avalon and Slate are just annoying. Merrill is enchanting, as always, and Tuesday Weld actually show a glimpse of acting talent as JoJo, a role which feels like it was written for Ann-Margret. For hardcore Hope fans only.

Factory Girl
There was Judy and there was Marilyn and there was Edie...Edie Sedgwick was a Bohemian party girl of the 60's who wanted fame and fortune but drugs, alcohol, and burning the candle at both ends were too much for her and she died in 1971 at the tender age of 28. The last eight years of Edie's life is questionably documented in a 2006 drama called Factory Girl that features some stylish direction and some dazzling performances, but suffers due to a screenplay that doesn't fully commit and just general overindulgence.

The film opens in 1964 where we meet Edie, the spoiled and self-absorbed trust fund kid who drops out of Radcliffe to pursue a different kind of life in New York City. Edie's wild lifestyle eventually leads to an introduction to Andy Warhol, the avante garde artist and film maker whose Greenwich Village loft became a haven for the Bohemian set that came to be known as "The Factory", where Andy becomes entranced with Edie and puts her in front of the camera as the star of several of his movies, which Edie thinks are going to be her ticket to stardom, but the movies are pretty much unknown outside the factory. Edie does find some salvation through another relationship she cultivates with a very famous folk/rock musician (Hayden Christensen), who tries to get Edie to see through Andy but can't really commit to her either.

This film has a lot going for it, especially the look and atmosphere that it establishes...director George George Hickenlooper makes New York in the 1960's look like the only time that being alive mattered. The combination of color and black and white photography might give the story a look of importance that it might not really deserve, giving the story a real documentary feel but it's hard to get on board with this film in that sense either since screenwriter Captain Mauzner wasn't allowed to commit to the story fully.

The character of the musician is actually Bob Dylan, but he threatened legal action if the film used his name because he felt the film made it look like Dylan was responsible for Edie's death. For me, this would be akin to making a film about Natalie Wood's death and Robert Wagner saying he wanted his name removed from the story. I found it hard to believe anything else that goes on here if the filmmakers just caved on this major part of the story and it shows on the screen. The film makes a big deal out of how big a star this guy is and he's only billed as "The Musician"?

On the other hand, there are some really wonderfully performances making this journey worth the investment. Sienna Miller does Oscar-worthy work with her flashy Edie, which effectively captures the sad and gamine quality of her character and Guy Pearce is nothing short of amazing as Andy Warhol, a performance of such delicacy and artistry it should be studied by acting students. The solid supporting cast includes Jimmy Fallon, Beth Grant, James Naughton, Shawn Hatosy, Mena Suvari, and Illeana Douglas, but the film fails to engage as it should because the screenplay doesn't commit as it should.

Lili
An enchanting performance by Leslie Caron that earned her an Oscar nomination is the centerpiece of a lovely MGM fantasy called Lili that completely captivated me with its exuberant innocence and lush simplicity.

Caron play Lili, a 16 year old French orphan who joins the troupe of a traveling carnival and becomes involved with two very different men who work for the carnival. Marcus (Jean Pierre Aumont) is a slick and charismatic magician with a clinging but understanding wife/assistant (Zsa Zsa Gabor) who has learned to accept her husband's wandering eye to a point. Paul (Mel Ferrer) is a former dancer whose dancing career was ended by an injury that turned him into a very angry puppeteer.

Initially, Lili only has eyes for Marcus, but when he rebuffs her, Paul decides to reach out to Lili the only way he can...by speaking through his puppets. The first meeting between Lili and Paul's puppets draws a crowd and they are made a permanent attraction at the carnival. Paul continues to explore his feelings for Lili through his puppets; however, Lili still only has eyes for Marcus the Magnificent.

Director Charles Walters has mounted a lilting romantic fantasy from Helen Deutsch's screenplay which is basically a romantic triangle where the apex of the triangle has no idea that she is in love with both men. This concept is legitimized through the youth of the central character as well as her being lured into the world of these four puppets and even though it's hard to believe that when Lili is talking to the puppets, that she sometimes forgets that they are creations of Paul, but the moment when Lili admits this, for some reason we believe and accept what she's saying and understand the conflict in her mind about these two guys.

Walters has smartly supervised the accustomed MGM gloss to this production despite certain limitations. It's obvious that the movie is not being shot on location and that's OK, but certain story elements here never allow us to forget that this is an MGM film, primarily the two fantasy ballets that appear near the beginning and the end of the film, that don't just fill time but help to advance story and clarify the conflict in Lily's mind. The second ballet is particularly lovely where the four puppets come to life and Caron's dancing is somewhat limited because Aumont and Ferrer aren't dancers but Walters' staging cleverly disguises that.

Caron is magical in the title role and I absolutely loved Mel Ferrer as the tortured Paul. After seeing this, I wonder why he never had more of a career than he did. The film features first rate production values, which of, course, is assumed...it's MGM. Five years later, they story was re-worked as a Broadway musical called Carnival starring Anna Maria Alberghetti as Lili.

Kevin Hart: What Now
If budget and size are an indicator of quality, then Kevin Hart seems to have hit the top with his 2016 concert, Kevin Hart: What Now?.

It's pretty easy to gauge how the career of a comedian is going is by the size of venues that they appear in. In I'm a Grown Little Man, Hart could practically reach out his hand and touch the back wall of the club he was performing in. This concert was filmed in front of over 50,000 people where the Philadelphia Eagles play all their home games.

The concert opens with an elaborate James Bond spoof featuring Oscar winner Halle Berry that is kind of funny, but as always with these things, goes on way too long and you just want to tell the guy to get to the good stuff. The good stuff includes variations on most of the themes explored in previous Hart shows. Hart always seems to have a great story regarding a confrontation with a wild animal and this show is no exception, offering a very funny tale of a raccoon peeping in his kitchen window.

Kevin also takes time to update us on his kids. His infant son in I'm a Grown Man, who suffered from bobble head syndrome is seven years old and driving his father crazy because he doesn't have any "edge." Kevin doesn't exactly paint his father or his posse in a flattering light either, but the lights are very funny.

This concert featured elaborate production values that brought mixed emotions from this reviewer. The editing by Peter S. Elliott and Guy Harding was top-notch, but something was going on with the sound that I was unable to reconcile...every now and then, the sound seemed to be concentrated on one female audience member whose laughter sounded like she was sitting on stage right next to Kevin, which was kind of unsettling. I also had mixed feelings about the large screens behind Hart that would often have images of whatever he was talking about at the moment. Sometimes it was very effective, like when he was talking about women texting, but other times it was distracting, but Kevin always brings the funny and this concert was no exception.