Gideon58's Reviews

Clifford the Big Red Dog
Paramount brings a classic literary character to the screen with 2021's Clifford the Big Red Dog, a big budget rendering of the title character that starts out beautifully projecting some nice themes, but grows a little more tiresome during the second half of the film.

A lonely little girl named Emily and her unemployed, homeless Uncle Casey enter an animal rescue shelter run by a Mr. Bridwell. Emily falls in love with a tiny red puppy but Casey says no. Of course, Bridwell manages to sneak the puppy into her backpack and Emily is overjoyed when she finds the puppy when she gets home. Of course, she is shocked when she wakes up and the puppy is ten feet tall and is about the size of an elephant. Inside, he's still a puppy.

Clifford is the central character in a scholastic book series named after the character and became an animated series on PBS in the year 2000. This reviewer has not read any of these books or seen the series, so this was my first exposure to the character. I thought I was in for something very special when Emily asks Bridwell how big Clifford gets and he replies that it depends on how much Emily loves him. It should be mentioned that the Bridwell character is named after the author of the books.

I absolutely loved the way the film opened...we see Clifford's mom and siblings taken away to a pound and we also learn that Clifford's mom and siblings are a normal dog color. Not sure why, but for some reason I thought a big plot point here was going to be learning why Clifford was red, but we never got an answer to that question, which nagged at me throughout, but I guess it's just supposed to be a message about tolerance.

Every minute of the film before Clifford turns big is adorable...the sight of him scratching on that warehouse door trying to get out after being left there almost ignited the tear ducts. Also loved the fact that Clifford seemed to understand English perfectly...love the scene where Emily is trying to name the puppy. But after he gets big, everything that happens to him is so predictable, including the half-crazed villain (nicely played by Tony Hale) who wants to use Clifford for his own purposes.

Production values are spot on, especially the technical team who created Clifford...those beautiful soulful eyes are irresistible. Darby Kemp does bring an intelligence to Emily we don't see coming and Jack Whitehall definitely garners laughs as Uncle Casey. Other familiar faces pop up including David Alan Grier, Paul Rodriguez, Rosie Perez, Tovah Feldshuh, Kenan Thompson, Alex Moffat and John Cleese as Bridwell, but the film eventually drowns in syrupy sentimentality.

The Santa Clause
Disney poured big bucks into their lavish Christmas fantasy from 1994, The Santa Clause, an often overly sentimental Christmas confection that takes Miracle on 34th Street and crosses it with Evan Almighty in tackling a universal holiday discussion...when did you stop believing in Santa Claus?

During his hiatus from season 4 of Home Improvement, Tim Allen was pegged for his second feature film appearance to play Scott Calvin. Scott is a divorced toy manufacturer with a young son who is not happy when he learns his ex-wife and her psychiatrist husband decide that Scott's son, Charlie, is old enough to learn there is no such thing as Santa Claus. While spending Christmas Eve with Charlie, Scott hears something on the roof and discovers Santa falling off the roof and apparently dying. Scott finds a note on the body saying to put on the suit and the reindeer will handle the rest. After delivering the toys, Scott is obviously thrown when he learns he is going to be the new Santa.

The screenplay for this elaborate comedy is by Leo Benvenuti and Steve Rudnick, who would later collaborate on Space Jam: A New Legacy, but obviously found its roots in the classic Miracle on 34th Street as a little boy gets his faith in Santa renewed in one night but Dad's not sure. Charlie's arrival at the North Pole is beautifully mounted, despite his annoying greeting by head elf Bernard, who had all the answers to what was going on but Charlie had to drag the answers out of him.

The part of the movie that was the most amusing was the physical transformation of Scott into Santa and anyone who has seen Evan Almighty will recognize this part of the story. As funny as it was when Scott started gaining weight and obtained a beard he couldn't shave off, it was stretching credibility that the other characters in the movie were either accepting Scott's lame explanations or just pretending not to see what was going on right in front of their eyes.

Director John Pasquin, who was a director on Home Improvement, does get a terrific performance out of Allen and mounts the film with solid production values, with a shout out to visual effects. Judge Reinhold, in a refreshing change of pace, is the villain of the piece, Charlie's new stepfather and young Eric Lloyd is adorable as Charlie. Despite some logistical and credibility issues, Disney has delivered a pretty smooth holiday ride here. Followed by two sequels.

Red Notice
The screenplay is very talky, making the film seem five hours long, but 2021's Red Notice is still a high octane action adventure worth a look thanks to engaging performances from the leads and solid production values.

Apparently, there are three very valuable pieces of art called the Eggs of Cleopatra and some rich sultan somewhere wants to make a gift of them to his daughter. Dwayne Johnson plays an FBI agent named Hartley, who is certain that a top art thief named Booth (Ryan Reynolds) is about to steal one of the eggs. Booth does so, but during the process, Hartley is framed for the theft of the second egg by a thief named The Bishop (Gal Gadot). Hartley and Booth must team up to get the third egg before The Bishop does.

This overblown action epic was written and directed by Rawson Marshall Thurber, whose previous credits include Skyscraper and Easy A, who has seemingly found a way to combine elements from both of these films, but only with middling results. Thurber does possess knowledge of how to mount an action sequence, which he already proved in Skyscraper, though a lot of times here he doesn't provide the payoff that he sets up. There's a part of the story that finds Johnson and Reynolds escaping from a maximum security prison in Russia, built practically in the sky above massive, snow-covered mountains. As the leads execute their escape, we watch with bated breath for one bad guy to fall off this mountain precipice, but it never happened. Why set up this deadly setting and not have a single death occur?

As for Easy A, a movie filled with rich and funny dialogue, Thurber has chosen to really slow down the pacing of this already overlong film by having Johnson and Reynolds share boring monologues about their fathers meant to establish a connection between the characters, but all it really does is slow the film to a point where I found myself stifling the occasional yawn. Not to mention the fact that we're told that Reynolds' character knows where the third egg is but won't tell anybody where it is until the final third of the film.

Every penny of the budget is on the screen, with special shout-outs to cinematography, editing, and art direction, but this film eventually drowns in pretension and intensions it never really lives up to. Even the double twist ending doesn't help. Oh, and there's a sequel coming, which Thurber takes almost ten minutes to set up.

The Wedding Date
From the Pretty Woman school of filmmaking comes 2005's The Wedding Date a handsomely mounted romantic comedy that doesn't offer a lot in terms of imagination, but is worth a look thanks to the smooth chemistry between the leads.

Debra Messing plays Kat Ellis, a workaholic upwardly mobile who has to fly to London for her sister's wedding where her ex-fiancee is going to be the best man. In order to make him jealous, Kat hires a sexy professional escort named Nick (Dermot Mulroney) to go the wedding with her playing her boyfriend, for the bargain price of $6000. Upon arrival in London, Nick plays his role perfectly, but there's a whole lot going on with this wedding that neither he nor Kat know about.

Dana Fox's screenplay, based on a book called Asking for Trouble by Elizabeth Young, is overly cutesy at times, but crafts a story with rich characters who have equally rich backstories without actually having to have them play out in front of us, keeping the running time economic.

One of my favorite things about the story is that Nick is the smartest character in the movie. It's clear that he has been doing what he does for a long time and knows how to play his role with just enough tweaks to fit the situation. I love his opening dialogue where he is trying to calm Kat's fears about this thing and his handling of Kat's family is perfection, especially her father. Nick is the only central character who never makes a wrong move, unlike Vivian in Pretty Woman. He does his job so well that he confesses to the groom at one point that he is a prostitute and the guy just laughs in disbelief.

The London scenery is lovely and so is Messing in the role of Kat. Mulroney is slick and understated as Nick and Amy Adams, as always, brings a substance to her role as Kat's sister that's not in the screenplay. There are also scene-stealing turns from Holland Taylor as Kat and Amy's mother and Sarah Parrish as Kat's trampy gal pal, TJ. If I had one technical quibble, there was an issue with the audio that made it hard to hear what was being said during some crucial scenes, but other than that, a pleasant picture postcard romance.

The Hating Game
There's an air of predictability to it, but 2021's The Hating Game is a stylishly written and directed romantic comedy with a strong contemporary slant that provides just enough twists and turns to keep it from drowning in it's initial predictability.

Lucy Hutton and Joshua Templeman work as assistants to the co-CEOS of a Manhattan publishing firm in a large office across the room from each other. On the surface, Josh and Lucy can't stand each other but the sexual tension beneath the surface is viable and obvious. The gloves appear to come off when Josh and Lucy decide to compete for a newly created management position within the firm, but we get the opposite as a lot of tension between Josh and Lucy begins to be addressed through multiple storytelling techniques.

Christina Mengert's screenplay, based on a novel by Sally Thorne, is smart and sexy and establishes almost immediately the sexual tension between the leads providing surprisingly little backstory. The setting is backstory enough...two people who have worked across the room from each other for years, sparks are bound to fly at some point, but the wall between Josh and Lucy melts slowly, it's not just knocked down in one climactic sex scene where they are trapped together, like the scene near the beginning where Josh strands them in an elevator and then stops things before they start.

It's established immediately that Josh is an uptight obsessive compulsive who dresses for work in schedules and keeps his desk immaculate. Normally, in stories like this, it is the girl who is established this way and I found this so refreshing. Loved the methodical melting of the Josh character where several of the aforementioned surprises come up and provide understanding of the character,

Peter Hutchings' direction includes some clever camerawork and the great work from his cast. Lucy Hale and Austin Stowell heat up the screen as Lucy and Josh. Also loved Corbin Bernsen as Josh's sexist boss, Damon Duanno as Lucy's co-worker, and Sean Cullen as Josh's insensitive dad. It's no When Harry Met Sally, but a lot better than I thought it was going to be.

A Cry in the Dark
A chilling, Oscar-nominated performance from Meryl Streep is the centerpiece of 1988's A Cry in the Dark, a hellish and squirm-worthy docudrama that tells a true story of how the media and mob sensibility can affect true justice and destroy a family

Streep plays Lindy Chamberlain, the wife of a minister (Sam Neill) and mother of three children. Her family is camping in the Australian outback when, during an attack of wild dingos, Lindy's baby daughter, Azaria, appears to have been carried away by one of the dogs. An investigation turns up the baby's bloody clothes, but forensics reveal that there is no evidence of a dog handling the clothes and it's not long before Lindy is suspected of murdering her baby.

Director Fred Schepisi (Six Degrees of Separation, Roxanne) does a masterful job of establishing a very close-knit community on the other side of the globe who come together instantly when word spreads of the Chamberlain's tragedy spreads, but are torn apart with equal aplomb as forensics, the media, and vicious gossip that turns to an almost mob sensibility that demands Lindy's head on a platter.

What's even more frightening is Lindy's reaction to what is happening and how she reacts to it. Michael has clearly been destroyed by this, but Lindy embraces the spotlight in an uncomfortable manner that actually has us wondering what is exactly going on here. We see her do television interviews with relish, always sunglasses to shield her real emotions and found it disturbing that not long after the death of Azaria, she gets pregnant and has another daughter. Lindy's actions through this horror do not spell grief and have the viewer wondering exactly what's wrong with this woman.

Streep's stunning performance earned the film its only Oscar nomination, but I think Neill and Schepisi do Oscar-worthy work here too, A harrowing motion picture experience made all the more harrowing because it really happened.

The Humans
It's a little squirm-worthy and requires complete attention that pays off somewhat, but 2021's The Humans is a voyeuristic look at a family celebrating Thanksgiving that is unlike any holiday movie this reviewer has seen and but was riveted for most of the proceedings.

It's Thanksgiving Day and the setting is one of those large pre-war duplexes in Manhattan. Brigid and her boyfriend, Rich, have just moved into this duplex, devoid of furniture, except for the two bridge tables they plan to serve Thanksgiving dinner on. The other guests are Brigid's parents, Erik and Deirdre, Brigid's older sister, Aimee, and Erik's mother, confined to a wheelchair and suffering from dementia.

This film is based on a play by Stephen Karam that opened on Broadway in February of 2016 and ran about a year. When it came time to bring it to the screen, Karam was not only allowed to adopt his play into a screenplay but to direct as well. This is obvious because Karam was clearly given free reign here and definitely gets a little full of himself.

I love that the screenplay takes a lot of time providing backstory for these family members. We are well into the final third of the film before we learn one character is a lesbian, one used to suffer from severe depression, one is a musician, one is an adulterer, two have been fired from their jobs, and one is going to inherit a huge amount of money in five years.

This is plenty material for a family dysfunction drama but Karam spends way too much time setting the film to look like a horror film and then showing us, in agonizing detail, this decaying building, not to mention interruptions from an upstairs neighbor which never come to any real fruition. Karam should have spent more time at this deliciously dysfunctional family's Thanksgiving bridge table, drinking out of Dixie cups. It's Thanksgiving with Woody Allen and Edward Albee.

The small ensemble cast works beautifully together. Jayne Houdyshell, who I recognized as a judge on Law and Order: SVU, is allowed to repeat her Tony Award winning role as Deirdre and Richard Jenkins is wonderful, as always, as her slightly pathetic husband, Erik. Beanie Feldstein, who stole every scene she had in Lady Bird is terrific as Brigid, as is Best Actor nominee from last year Stephen Yeun (Minari) as Rich. And for the first time, Amy Schumer was not completely annoying onscreen as Aimee. This could have been incredible if the director/screenwriter hadn't gotten a little full of himself.

Diamond Horseshoe
20th Century Fox produced one of their best musicals with 1945's Diamond Horseshoe, a splashy and surprisingly entertaining backstage musical that provides solid entertainment for most of its running time, thanks to first rate production values, a very hummable score, and one of their biggest stars center stage.

Joe Davis, Jr. (Dick Haymes) has dropped out of medical school to pursue a career in show business. He arrives backstage at the title establishment where his dad (William Gaxton) is one of the stars. Dad tries to discourage Joe but does get him a job as the assistant stage manager at the Horseshoe. Joe falls hard for the female star, Bonnie Collins (Betty Grable), initially resisting because she doesn't get along with Joe's dad at all. Dad's girlfriend, Claire (Beatrice Kay) is not happy with the time that Joe Sr is spending with his son and offers Bonnie her mink coat if she will get Joe to fall in love with her.

Director and co-screenwriter George Seaton has crafted a classic backstage story that features everything you expect from a backstage musical, including a funny running gag where the show's stage manager (Phil Silvers) finds himself trying to get to the truth behind the old saying "The show must go on." What we have here in terms of story could have trimmed a little bit due to its lack of originality, but we find ourselves engaged in the travails of Joe and Bonnie and want them together.

The musical numbers are an effective combination of elaborate production numbers like "Welcome to the Diamond Horseshow", where the chorus girls are all dressed as food and condiments and Dick Haymes' dreamy rendition of the film's most famous song "The More I See You". A production featuring Grable, Gaxton, and Kaye called "The Old and the New" and a torchy version of "I Wish I Knew" by Grable are also well worth your time. A guest appearance by pianist Carmen Cavallaro is strangely placed near the end of the film and kind of slows things up when they should be wrapping up.

Grable and her million dollar legs light up the screen as always. One character says to her "If you ever put on a long dress your career will be over." Haymes is no actor, but I could listen to him sing all day and Beatrice Kay steals every scene she's in Claire. 20th Century Fox was not really known for musicals, but this one was definitely one of their best.

I've not even heard of Diamond Horseshoe before, must be a more lesser known of Betty Grable's musicals.

Rita Moreno: Just a Girl Who Decided To Go For It
With the general release of Spielberg's remake of West Side Story, less than a week away, I felt it was important to view a joyous, intimate, and unabashedly candid look at a Hollywood legend, who a few days ago celebrated her 90th birthday. The first Latina EGOT winner, the incredible Rita Moreno, is profiled in a PBS documentary called Rita Moreno: Just a Girl Who Decided to Go For It.

The 2021 documentary follows the accustomed path of most documentaries, but the star's past is revealed to us through contemporary settings. The star's dirt poor childhood is effectively juxtaposed with scenes of her as Anita in West Side Story, which, like the character Anita, lead to Moreno leaving Puerto Rico for America. Loved the story the star shares of her first meeting with Louis B Mayer at the Waldorf, which led to her first contract at MGM, because Mayer thought she looked like Liz Taylor.

There is a look at Rita's extensive cinematic resume, where often it was hard to tell one role from another and Moreno definitely feels the same way. Her years of playing exotic island girls who barely spoke English frustrated her to no end. I was fascinated to learn that as much as she loved appearing in Singin in the Rain, she found her role as Tuptim in The King & I to be boring. Rita doesn't hold back regarding her history with sexual harassment either.

There is a nice amount of screen time devoted to Moreno's long and turbulent relationship with the legendary Marlon Brando, where a few things about the relationship turned out to be news to me. She refers to him as "the Daddy I couldn't please". It's implied that the demons and toxicity of the relationship were worked out onscreen years later in the movie The Night of the Following Day. We also learned how the day of the 1962 Oscars, she and George Chakiris spent hours making up "loser" acceptance speeches because they felt they had no chance at winning. Moreno is known for delivering the shortest Oscar acceptance speech ever.

Commentary is provided along the way by Chakiris, Whoopi Goldberg, Justina Machado, Lin-Manuel Miranda, Gloria Estefan, Chita Rivera, Mitzi Gaynor, Karen Olivo, who played Anita in the last Broadway revival of West Side Story, and Morgan Freeman, who-costarred with Moreno on The Electric Company, the PBS childrens' show that won Moreno a Grammy. We even get glimpse of Moreno on the set of the new West Side Story with Steven Spielberg. A fascinating documentary on a fascinating subject whose only real fault is that it wasn't long enough.

Interrupted Melody
A dazzling performance by Eleanor Parker is the centerpiece of a lavish MGM musical biopic called Interrupted Melody that sacrifices biopic for melodrama but Parker's performance makes the melodrama work.

This 1955 film is an alleged biography of an Australian opera singer named Marjorie Lawrence, following her studying voice in Paris to a spectacular career, which gets sidelined due to a romance with a handsome pediatrician named Tom King (Glenn Ford) and a bout with polio which puts the diva in a wheelchair.

The Oscar-winning screenplay by Lawrence, William Ludwig, and Sonya Levien might be on the melodramatic side, but I love the fact that it doesn't present Lawrence in the most flattering light. Lawrence is portrayed here as an arrogant and self-absorbed prima donna who never doubts any move she makes. Her head is so swelled by the halfway point of the film that she expects Tom to put his medical practice on hold so that he can go on tour with her and Mr. Marjorie Lawrence.

Though Lawrence is credited as a screenwriter, I still have to question the accuracy of the facts here. In this film, we learn in the opening scene that Lawrence has two brothers and a sister. An online search of Lawrence reveals that Lawrence was, in reality, one of six kids. And just like the Esther Williams film Dangerous When Wet, Marjorie and her family are supposed to be Australian, but none of the actors attempt an accent.

Though the facts of Lawrence's life may have been glossed over in favor of melodrama, the melodrama works thanks to a true professional with the genre in the starring role. Parker absolutely commands the screen here in a performance that earned her a third Best Actress Oscar nomination. Grammy-winning soprano Eileen Farrell provides incredible vocals for Parker's competent lip synching. Farrell is allowed to shine with material from La Boheme, including a complete version of "Musetta's Waltz" and Salome, as well as songs like "Over the Rainbow" and "Waltzing Matilda".

Ford is a solid leading man, who lets his leading lady do what she needs to do but never gets blown off the screen. There's also an appearance from a very young Roger Moore as Marjorie's younger brother and manager. Curtis Bernhardt's direction is a little static, but I loved the set direction and the Oscar nominated costumes. But in the tradition of Davis, Crawford, and Hepburn, Parker owns this film, makes it appointment viewing, and makes anything wrong with it irrelevant.

tick, tick...BOOM!
The Tony-Award winning genius behind In the Heights and Hamilton knocks it out of the park with a spectacular debut as the director of a feature length film. tick, tick...BOOM! is an electric, intimate, and joyous musical rendering of the life of composer Jonathan Larson, the composer of the Pulitzer Prize winning Broadway musical Rent, who died right before the show's opening at the tender age of 35. A spectacular musical fantasy that has earned a 2021 Golden Globe Nomination for Best Picture, Comedy or Musical.

This 2021 film opens as we watch a 27-year old Jonathan (Andrew Garfield) on the brink of sanity as he is preparing for the workshop of a new musical set in outer space that he has spent eight years working on. Jonathan feels if he doesn't have a show on Broadway by the time he's 30, his career is over. His current headaches include not having money to hire the musicians he wants for the workshop and composing a song for the second act which is causing him a serious writer's block. As Jonathan slowly begins a meltdown, we watch him drive away the two closest people in his life: Susan, his girlfriend, is a former dancer who has been offered a job outside of Manhattan and wants Jonathan to leave New York with her and Michael, his gay BFF, a former actor who now works in advertising.

Lin-Manuel Miranda was the perfect choice to bring this piece to the screen. Providing audience access to a piece with clearly limited appeal (theater lovers) was going to require a director with imagination, something Miranda is stupid with. The presentation of this story reminded me a lot of the Elton John biopic Rocketman, so if you liked that film, you will have a definite head start here. Jonathan's story is populated by a rich score that doesn't take the accustomed musical comedy paths. Miranda and screenwriter Steven Levinson (Dear Evan Hansen, Fosse/Verdon) have decided to use the score to flash out characters, advance story, or as in the case of the number "Therapy", musically reinterpret a scene without music. The story is musically narrated by Jonathan's band, whose lead female vocalist is played by Vanessa Hudgens.

Just like Rent, Larson's glorious score is center stage here and keeps the viewer completely invested in the proceedings. Loved Jonathan and Michael's duet, "No More", the above mentioned "Therapy", Hudgens' ":Come To Your Senses", and the finale Louder than Words. But for this reviewer, the best musical number and best scene in the film, hands down, was "Sunday", a re-working of a song from Sondheim's Sunday in the Park with George, set at a diner where Jonathan works, that features Joel Grey, Chita Rivera, Brian Stokes Mitchell, Bernadette Peters, Andre DeShields, Bebe Nuewirth, original cast members from Rent and Hamilton, and the director.

Judith Light is a lot of fun as Jonathan's manager, as is Bradley Whitford in a frighteningly accurate cameo as the late Stephen Sondheim. Andrew Garfield, who impressed me a few months ago playing Jim Bakker in The Eyes of Tammy Faye, is equally dazzling here, and, yes, Garfield is doing his own singing. Also loved Robin DeJesus, who impressed at the beginning of this year in the remake of The Boys in the Band gives the performance of his career as Michael. Miranda's direction is exhausting in a good way, including some extremely smart camera work, providing the viewer with a musical journey that requires complete attention, rewarding the viewer in spades. Bouquets all around, especially to Lin-Manuel Miranda.

The Muppet Christmas Carol
There have been dozens of versions of the classic Dickens novel brought to the screen over the last century or so, but Disney and Jim Henson Productions triumph with 1992's The Muppet Christmas Carol because, despite the presence of the Muppets, this version does really find its heart where it should...in the original novel by Charles Dickens
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I've lost count as how many times this story has found its way to the big screen, but one thing most of them have tried to do is to give the story a more contemporary feel by updating dialogue and making it more accessible to contemporary moviegoers. Director Brian Henson and screenwriter Jerry Juhl know they automatically have given the story a modern flavor with the presence of the Muppets and they leave the rest of the story up to Charles Dickens himself.

The Great Gonzo narrates the film claiming to be Charles Dickens, utilizing much of the original Dickens novel, giving the story such a rich feeling of authenticity, despite the presence of Muppets playing a lot of the characters. Gonzo is given Rizzo the Rat to assist with the narration, though it really isn't necessary. The rest of the Muppets that we know and love are cast in the story appropriately. The Muppets serve the story here instead of the story serving the Muppets, making this so much different than other offerings from the Muppet cinematic library.

And the cherry on the cake here is an absolutely brilliant performance by two-time Oscar winner Michael Caine as Ebenezer Scrooge. Caine completely disappears inside this role, giving Scrooge a depth and heart that ranks up there with former movie Scrooges like Reginald Owen and George C. Scott. Even those he's working with puppets, Caine plays this role with a straight face and makes the transition that Scrooge goes through completely believable.

The story has been enhanced by a bouncy musical score by Grammy and Oscar winner Paul Williams that includes "Room in Your Heart", "Bless Us All", "When Love is Gone", "Marley and Marley", and "Christmas Scat". Caine even gets to sing with a song called "Thankful Heart".

The film features handsome production values, especially art direction and costumes.
Loved the costume for the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come. Raymond Courtland and Steven Mackintosh made the most of their roles as Young Scrooge and Scrooge; nephew, Fred. Statler and Waldorf were a lot of fun as Marley's Ghosts and has there ever been a better Bob and Emily Cratchet than Kermit and Miss Piggy? For those looking for a new holiday movie tradition, this might be worth a look.

King Richard
The screenplay could have used a little tightening, but 2021's King Richard is still a riveting and manipulative look at Richard Williams, the father of tennis superstars Venus and Serena Williams, that is unapologetic for its portrayal of the central character in a very unflattering light.

The film follows Richard's training of the girls on the public tennis courts of Compton through his manipulation of two professional tennis coaches into taking their training to a professional level, but never really getting out of these coaches' way so that they can do what Richard wants them to do.

Zach Baylin's screenplay is overly detailed, taking a little too much time with exposition, but what it does do is present Richard Williams as an extremely flawed person, even if he doesn't think so. Williams is initially presented as a doting father of five girls who has a strong sense of family values, which seems to go out the window whenever he is trying to manipulate deals for Venus and Serena. A lot of early screentime is devoted to Richard's obsession that his girls be humble, but once he starts seeking professional coaching and negotiating deals, the character shows nothing but unabashed arrogance, especially his constant conflict with first coach Paul Cohen and the deal he broached with second coach Paul Macci, which he pretty much ignored after the elaborate deal he got out of Macci.

As the film progressed, the Richard Williams character reminded me a lot of Rose in the musical Gypsy...strong and manipulative, running over everyone in his way like a steamroller, only hearing what he wanted to hear, as his role in Venus and Serena's lives makes him look more like a pimp than a parent. It was equally as sad to see Venus sit back and take it until she can't take it anymore. There's a terrific scene once the family starts working with Macci where Venus finally sees that her dad is standing in her way and decides t stand up for herself, but she does it unilaterally by approaching Paul, not her father. Sadly, it's the most direct step Venus takes, which is only a little more than her Venus' mother tries to do.

What makes this film appointment viewing is the performance by Will Smith in the starring role, which has earned him a Golden Globe nomination and could earn the actor a third Oscar nomination for Best Actor. There was a time when I was certain that Will Smith was incapable of playing anyone but Will Smith. He showed promise in The Pursuit of Happynessand Seven Pounds, but he knocks it out of the park here, disappearing inside the most unsympathetic character he has ever played, detailed de-glamming of his pretty boy good looks only amplified the performance.

There is also strong work by Aunjanue Ellis as Richard's wife and the girl's mother, which has earned her a Globe nominattion as well and by Jon Bernthal as Paul Macci. There is footage of the real people featured in the film, which verified the authenticity of the facts for me, but the facts became less relevant as I found my stomach being tied in knots by this beast Richard Williams.

Blume in Love
From the creative force behind Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice comes an edgy and entertaining comedy-drama from 1973 called Blume in Love, which got a bump up my watchlist thanks to the recent passing of its leading man, offering one of his best performances.

George Segal lights up the screen as Steven Blume, a divorce lawyer still feeling the pain from his divorce from the lovely Nina (Susan Anspach). Steven initially takes responsibility for why his marriage ended, but taking responsibility doesn't necessarily mean that he wants it to be over. He feigns remorse for the pain he put Nina through but that all changes when Nina becomes romantically involved with an unemployed musician and ex-con named Elmo (Kris Kristofferson).

Director nd screenwriter Paul Mazursky proved with his Oscar-nominated screenplay for Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice that he has never been shy about tackling stories centered around the ever changing sexual morality of the country and has the perfect canvas for this story. The 1970's were pre-HIV and a time when most sexual walls were being torn down and painted multiple shades of gray with a central character who was willing to embrace it all. Despite Steven's opening narration which declares Nina is the love of his life, he is observed in bed with his secretary and his ex-girlfriend about 25 minutes into the film. What we have here is a serial womanizer who doesn't know he's a serial womanizer. On the other hand, when given the opportunity to participate in sex romp with three other people, he runs for the hills.

The story confusingly provides glances into Steven and Nina's courtship, their Italian honeymoon, and another visit to Italy after their divorce with attempts to win Nina back, an inability to deal with Elmo, which actually finds him bonding with Elmo, creating a truly conventional movie triangle that never really resolves anything and from which Steven learns nothing.

What keeps the viewer invested in this bizarre love story is a wonderfully unhinged performance by George Segal in the starring role that keeps the character completely likable when he shouldn't be. He works well with Anspach's vulnerable Nina and Kristofferson's Elmo creating a triangle that often seems to be headed questionable places. There's also a wonderful supporting turn by Shelley Winters as a neurotic client of Blume's and by Mazursky as Steven's lawyer. The film is rich with extremely flawed characters who all make wrong moves, and though this Steven Blume is kind of a slimeball, I still found myself rooting for him.

West Side Story (2021)
Disbelief and outrage were this reviewer's initial reaction to the news that Stephen Spielberg planned to do this, but after finally viewing Spielberg's 2021 re-imagining of the Leonard Bernstein/Stephen Sondheim musical West Side Story, and in an actual movie theater, all I can say is Mr. Spielberg, we're not worthy.

Though most grew up with the 1961 Best Picture Oscar winner, Spielberg has actually gone back to the original 1957 Broadway musical and returned certain scenes and songs to their original place in the libretto. Tony Kushner (Angels in America) has done a superb job of adapting Arthur Laurents' original screenplay, primarily by peppering a lot of the Sharks' dialogue with actual Spanish, even utilizing it in a couple of very crucial scenes where English seems to be required. Kushner also manages to flesh out minor supporting characters like Chino, Anybodys, and Sergeant Krupke, without making the movie four hours long.

Spielberg makes instant improvement upon the '61 film by not only casting actual Latino actors as the sharks, but by casting four actors in the leads who can actually sing, which brings an added richness to the score. For those unaware, the only actor in the 1961 film who did all his own singing was George Chakiris. Was particularly impressed by Rachel Zegler's bell-like lyric soprano, Ariana DeBose's ferocious belt as Anita, which reminded me of Broadway's original Anita, Chita Rivera, and especially Ansel Elgort's Tony, the first Tony whose songs didn't sound like an opera singer with a standout rendering of "Something's Coming". The attention to the music was unparalleled...was particularly delighted with the fact that I understood every lyric of "America" and the restored full version of one of Broadway's greatest duets "A Boy Like That/I Have a Love." They are also aided by absolutely gorgeous orchestrations.

Justin Peck, who was the subject of a 2014 documentary called Ballet 422, provided splendid choreography, something that fans expect from this show,. I would have liked to have seen a little more dancing in the opening, but the dance at the gym was spectacular, only outdone by "America" where Peck took the number off the rooftop in '61 and brought it on the street and made the number explode off the screen.

Spielberg never forgets the love story at the center of the spectacle, getting star-making performances from Rachel Zegler, who has been nominated for a Golden Globe for her impressive film debut, and Elgort doing exemplary work on the most difficult role in the movie. DeBose creates a genuine spitfire in Anita and David Alvarez and Jose Andres Rivera bring more to the roles of Bernardo and Chino than the screenplay provides.

And needless to say that Spielberg's inclusion of 1961 Anita, Rita Moreno, to the story, was lovely. Her interpretation of "Somewhere" could ignite a tear duct. The film will probably win the Golden Globe for Best Picture, Comedy or Musical and a Best Picture Oscar nomination is not out of the question. Really didn't think Spielberg could pull this off, but he nailed it.

Hero at Large
Despite an utterly charming performance from the late John Ritter in the starring role, 1980's Hero at Large is a dull and predictable comedy that suffers from a swiss cheese screenplay and lethargic direction. The Marvel comic book movies age we live in today makes this look pretty lame.

Ritter plays Steve Nichols, a struggling actor who is making a few bucks making live appearances at movie theaters promoting a movie about this fictional superhero. One night while stopping at a store to buy milk, still in costume, he foils a robbery, which gains some attention for Steve but not much. He decides to go out and look for a crime to foil and finds himself in a high speed chase that climaxes with him getting shot in the arm. This is enough to send him into hiding with a pretty neighbor (Anne Archer), but changes his mind when a slick publicist (the late Bert Convy) they stage crimes for him to break up, in exchange for the role of Brick in a revival of Cat on a Hot Tin Roof.

The screenplay by AJ Carothers (The Secret of My Success) attempts to cover a little too much territory as it not only tries to look into the business of show business, it also takes jabs at advertising, mob sensibility, and politics. Carothers seems to set up Nichols as a comic variation of Travis Bickle, as several references to the 1976 classic can be evidenced, including an appearance of the Mayor of New York, played by Leonard Harris, who played the Senator Bickle wanted to murder in the Scorsese classic and the cab stand that was the hangout for the cabbies in the film is also glanced here. Not sure of the connection that Carothers saw between the two movie, but it sure makes for an often squirm-worthy cinematic journey that moves at snail's pace to a finale that's too silly to be believed.

Martin Davidson's direction is unimaginative and makes the movie seem three hours long. Archer is a lovely leading lady but Convy and Kevin McCarthy's roles are thankless. And if you pay attention, there's a tiny cameo at the beginning of the film by Kevin Bacon that's equally pointless. Ritter's charisma helps to keep the viewer from dozing off.

I've been looking forward to seeing Spielberg's version of West Side Story since the first time I read about it, so I'm glad to hear how good it is. Unfortunately it will probably be a while before I get a chance to see it.

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OPEN FLOOR.

Make sure you see it in an actual theater...online can't do it justice.

I have no plans to go to the theater as long as there's still a pandemic going on, so it will probably be years before I go back to the theater.

I'll just have to take my chances watching it on the small screen eventually.