evanston_dad

Back around the year 2000, the Modern Library of America released a list of the greatest 100 novels of the 20th century. I made it a project to read the entire list, which led me to "Ironweed" by William Kennedy, a novel I'd never heard of. It took my breath away and to this day remains one of the best books I've ever read.

The film version boasts two really great performances by Jack Nicholson and Meryl Streep, and some touching sequences, notably one in which Streep sings for a barroom full of people and we see fantasy collide with reality, and another when Nicholson's character returns to visit the family he walked out on twenty years ago. But overall the movie remains relentlessly bleak and rather pointless in a way the book didn't. I kept asking myself during the movie, "why am I being subjected to all of this misery?", which is a question I never asked myself while reading the book. And the movie never answers that question.

I liked the look of the film. It's bathed in sepia tones that makes it look like the pictures you've seen of the Great Depression. It's even rather beautiful in a way, which is really saying something given the grungy, depressing world in which it's set. But I'd never want to watch this again.

Both Nicholson and Streep were nominated for lead acting Oscars in the year of this film's release.

Grade: B+

My takeaway from "Young Winston" is that Winston Churchill's early life wasn't really all that interesting.

Richard Attenborough does what he always does, which is take a subject he admires and then makes such a reverent, tasteful movie out of it that it threatens to bore one to tears. It's no wonder that the screenplay to "Young Winston" devotes a weirdly obsessive amount of time talking about Winston's father's syphilis, as that's the juiciest bit of gossip in the whole story. The rest is handsome but dull and way too long for the wisp of a story it has to tell. Seriously, Winston Churchill's life had to be more compelling than this, right?

The standout for me was Anne Bancroft, lovely as ever as Churchill's mom. The movie doesn't deserve her.

This isn't a bad movie by any means, it's just a very uninspired one.

Nominated for three Oscars in 1972: Best Original Story and Screenplay, Best Art Direction, and Best Costume Design.

Grade: B-

"Darling Lili" is like a committee of people got together in a room and decided to make a movie that absolutely no one would enjoy.

It's mind boggling that somewhere along the way some combination of studio executives saw this thing and thought it was in a condition to be released as a movie. I can't think of a single thing about this that works. It's like Blake Edwards didn't really want to make a musical but felt obligated to since Julie Andrews was in it, so it's a quasi-musical where the plot grinds to a halt every fifteen minutes or so so that Andrews can sing something that doesn't move the story along whatsoever. Andrews seems bored to be in this, and doesn't have any of the danger or pizazz that a spy should have. She also has zero chemistry with Rock Hudson. In no world is it believable that these two would fall helplessly in love with one another.

The movie gives Andrews a juicy role to play, but the screenplay doesn't do a thing with it except have her fall into a tedious jealous woman stereotype for most of the film. Blake Edwards doesn't know what kind of movie he wants to be making -- is it a thriller, is it a comedy, is it a romantic drama? It ends up being all and none of these things at the same time.

Wow, it's rare to come across a movie as misguided and awful as this mess. To think that this hit screens around the same time as movies like "Midnight Cowboy" and "The French Connection" just shows how clueless studios were at the time about what audiences wanted, and how desperately they were trying to jam these sanitized road show movies down people's throats long past the point that anyone had an appetite for them.

In fact, the only merit this movie has is as a historical relic of this transitional time in Hollywood. It reminds me of the transition from silents to sound, and that couple of years where every movie made was terrible and nearly unwatchable now, but are still somewhat fascinating as a record of filmmakers trying to figure out how to adapt to changing times. But other than as a history lesson, "Darling Lili" isn't enjoyable in any other way.

To prove that the Academy loves to nominate terrible movies for multiple awards, "Darling Lili" received nominations for its costume design, original song score, and the song "Whistling Away the Dark."

Grade: F.