Before watching the movie:
I found this because I was looking for Christmas movies. I thought I knew what this movie was about, then I read more than one description. Now I’m less sure. Something about a crisis hotline, and somehow a tangled mess of relationships is involved.
Lots of big-to-medium names here. It’s sold as a comedy, and Steve Martin is in it, so it should be fun.
Before watching the movie:
It’s easy to forget that Tom Hanks is in this movie because he’s overshadowed by two big stories: “Disney creates the Touchstone label to distance its core brand from edgier stuff like Splash“, and “Daryl Hannah is gorgeous”.
I think that before The Little Mermaid, it was a common assumption that mermaids were blonde, but I understand that there was a point when this movie owned the image of what a mermaid looked like to the extent that mermaids were blondes because Madison was a blonde, instead of the other way around.
I expect that 28 years later, this movie will look like a soft PG that you might see on Nickelodeon in the afternoon.
Before watching the movie:
On the one hand, Eddie Murphy is a fish out of water in the part of his career before he decided playing multiple roles was a good substitute for being funny. On the other, I’m a little worried that this might not have much more to say than Trading Places did, only more one-sided and with uncomfortable stereotypes about native Africans the whole way through.
Also, the last time I saw Eddie Murphy, he wasn’t being very funny. But that was more of a personal project for him, and he was unfunny in a meaningful way.
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Before watching the movie:
I’ve heard mixed reviews about this movie. Everything from “it was awful” to “it’s not so good”. When Leonard Maltin famously reviews a film with “it stunk. I’m Leonard Maltin”, it gives me pause, but I’m hoping some of the other reviews that lean toward “it’s okay if you’re expecting a dumb comedy” are more accurate. Mismanaged expectations are one of the biggest killers of film reputations.
Also, I tend to rate more favorably than many, or at least I think I do. I’ve recently had opportunity to compare how I rate films on a five-point scale to others, and found that on such a scale, the really good movies tend to get fours unless I was especially wowed by them, which is a higher bar for me than for others. Maybe doing this blog for three years has made me harder to please.
More on-topic, I can’t imagine Jeff Goldblum turning in a bad performance. I guess I don’t really know much about Begley other than this seems to be out of the general type I put him in.
Before watching the movie:
This movie came to my attention from a book of Drew Struzan movie poster art (his design was not used). I was interested by the art deco style of Struzan’s poster and headliners Eddie Murphy and Richard Pryor, but I was scared off by the way it seemed to be promoted as a serious film about organized crime. I was relieved to read today when I chose it that it is in fact an action comedy. About organized crime.
Before watching the movie:
Way back in my first year of doing this blog, I found a four-movie set of Michael J. Fox comedies. For practical reasons, the only one I ended up reviewing, or even seeing, was For Love or Money (though I prefer the other title, The Concierge), which happened to be the one I was least interested in. It was still a very enjoyable movie.
I recently remembered that and got around to tracking down the other movies from it that I hadn’t seen (I already own one from the set, which I’ve been wanting to watch again), and now that the musicals theme has reached its end, I can watch this one.
I know I’ve seen other stories of families backstabbing each other to get in good graces with the rich dying relative, but I can’t name any. The closest specific thing that comes to mind is a sketch by The Frantics.
Before watching the movie:
I’m not sure if this movie would be more effective for me if I was more familiar with Rudolph Valentino, but actually the fact that I know he existed and had such a reputation is probably more than I could say for a lot of my generation.
I’d like to say more, but there really doesn’t seem to be more to this than a Valentino parody. And Gene Wilder being Gene Wilder when he’s not being Valentino.
Before watching the movie:
This was a random find. I’m not even sure what got it recommended to me, but it looks fantastic. I somehow got the impression it was from the 30s/40s era it claims to be spoofing, but was rather surprised to find it’s from the early 60s.
Anyway, here’s a star-studded cast of horror actors (and Basil Rathbone) in a comedy about a mortician who takes a proactive approach to getting clients. It looks like it’s been unfairly forgotten.
Before watching the movie:
Often, one never realizes how little one knows about something until one has to describe it. I know this is a riotously funny movie with John Cleese. Possibly his first big thing after Fawlty Towers. I think I’ve heard something about some character’s fish friends. I did not know until I decided to watch it that it was about three crooks trying to find out where the captured fourth stashed the loot.
I almost called Jamie Lee Curtis and Kevin Kline up and comers, but while they’re younger and more current than Cleese and Michael Palin, I think they were actually pretty well established by the late 80s.
Before watching the movie:
I used to make a point of saying why I chose a movie, but I stopped because it was often just “it was on the shelf/streaming service”. However, this one has a particularly unusual path. Several years ago, I got a CD of Halloween-themed film music. One of the tracks was “Super Sleuth, from Without A Clue”. The name didn’t fit, the music didn’t fit, the source didn’t fit, it seemed an all around poor choice. However, it directed my attention to a movie that had the potential to fit my tastes very well. I don’t think I got around to looking it up on my rental service for another few years, but whenever I added it, it’s taken until now to get to the top of the list.
Frequent readers of this blog should know that I have a particular attraction to variants of Sherlock Holmes stories. I’m intrigued by the halfway application of the literary agent hypothesis, but mostly I just want to see Michael Caine play a bad actor trying to be Holmes. Ben Kingsley seems a terrific choice to play a straight man in a double act, and Michael Caine is terrific in everything.
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