movies!

[ellen_datlow]

Friday night I watched Gypsy with Natalie Wood, Rosalind Russell, and Karl Malden. It's close enough to the show (both the production with Bernadette Peters and Patti Lupone) to be eerie but different in a few weird ways. The child who plays Baby June in the movie never gets any older than she is at the beginning, so when she runs away one thinks of a (very) underage kid running away. She doesn't run away with Tulsa but someone else--Tulsa is the young man who dances for Louise and since he's the one who obviously has talent and gumption for him not to be the one who runs away with June doesn't quite work. Louise, who starts as a child actress then becomes Natalie Wood is right...but the contrast with the almost adult Louise and the still child-like June creates in the viewer a disturbing cognitive dissonance.

In any case Russell was excellent but not nearly as loony as we need the character to be today. And the ending is much softer than in either live performance. Rick Bowes says it's the way the interpretation of the play has changed over the years. It used to be a somewhat realistic view of vaudeville and how show business was pretty brutal. It's not about the relationship between Rose and her daughters.

Also watched Enchanted Friday and I loved it!! Call it a guilty pleasure or call me daft but I found it utterly charming. And Amy Adams is great. The songs were much better in context than on the stage performed at the Academy Awards.

Saturday night I watched Ong Bak: The Thai Warrior about the stolen head of Buddha from a village and the young man who swears to bring it back or die trying. Pretty schematic in plot but it had some nice fight scenes.

Today I went to see Vantage Point the multi-point of view thriller with Dennis Quaid, Forrest Whittaker, William Hurt, Sigourney Weaver (in a very minor role), and some gorgeous hunks. It was terrific till about three quarters of the way through when it just kind of fell apart and became unbelievable and then worse-- at the end-- soppy. But it had one of the best car chases I've ever seen--better than those in Bourne. Glad I saw it as I'd wanted to since I saw the trailers.

Comments

[barb-krasnoff.livejournal.com]

When I used to watch Gypsy as a kid, I also had a bit of a problem with the young actress who played Baby June throughout the film, but interestingly enough, the film is actually somewhat true to life there -- the real Baby June (known in later life as June Havoc) actually did run away with a boy from the troupe at what may have been age 13 (or age 16; there seems to be some dispute about the year she was actually born).

[ellen-datlow.livejournal.com]

Well, she looked 13 in the movie, about 16 in the current stage production...the problem in the movie is that she never looks different from the age she started at--Louise does...

[barb-krasnoff.livejournal.com]

Yes, I never understood why they didn't have a different actress play June in later years in the movie -- and it is weird when they're singing "If Mama Was Married." Saving money on another actress? A directorial decision gone wrong? Who knows.

[ellen-datlow.livejournal.com]

Exactly the problem-it as a (probably) expensive Hollywood production --surely they could afford one more actress...