| It's approximately 1/7th "Mr. Smith goes to Washington", 1/3 "Brazil"
and 23/47 "Tucker" (the remainder being lost due to friction).
Your fractions may vary.
I forget the character names. New York, December, 1958. Tim Robbins
arrives in town freshly graduated from business school in Muncie.
No jobs to be had -- he has no experience. Until he finds an opening
in the mailroom of Hudsucker industries. Through an unusual set of
circumstances he quickly finds himself in charge of this mega-
corporation. Jennifer Jason-Leigh, hardbitten ace reporter and
Pulitzer Prize winner, turns into a one-woman Woodward/Bernstein
undercover agent who smells a big story behind the new CEO.
The semi-Machivellian bad guy behind all this is played by Paul Newman,
who represents the real interests of the board of directors. The whole
story plays out in the closing month of 1958 because at the start of
business in 1959 -- well, that would be telling.
The acting is good but the characters are all cardboard cutouts,
mere pawns for the plot. Then again, the plot is pretty cardboard, too.
The real star of the show is the surrealism that pervades throughout.
Don't go looking for great performances or an exciting story. Go to
experience the thrill of falling 44 stories (45, counting the mezzanine)
at full speed, or go to see some larger-than-life machinery at work.
Or even to see Charles Durning play the ukelele (talk about surreal).
Even at that the movie is a tad too long, perhaps because some of the
things you want to see happen never come about. I figure it was worth
the $3 and my time to see the movie, but I'm glad I didn't spend more.
PG, more G than P. Won't last too long, but I think you should see
this one on the large screen if you're inclined to see it at all.
John
|
| Dreadful script. All references, no new jokes. As I was watching yet
another sequence of Three-Stooges-from-NYU, I whispered, "This is like
a Sam Raimi script." And so it was. He really should stay away from
comedy. Putting cheep laffs into derivative horror and adventure can
give you something a little original; putting cheep laffs into a
derivative comedy just makes you more derivative.
Production bee-you-ti-fool as always. Too bad it's so familiar. Those
who live and die by production design shouldn't go head to head with
Terry Gilliam. Acting mostly perfect, including Jennifer Jason Leigh's
unjustly attacked Rosalind-Russell-in-a-Warner-Bros-cartoon approach,
and except for Paul Newman's bland naturalism.
Not peak Coen ("Raising Arizona" and "Miller's Crossing"), or even
middling ("Blood Simple"), but at least not as infuriating as "Barton
Fink". Non-film-buffs who like pretty pictures might like it more.
Ray
|
| Saw this movie on video over the weekend. I enjoyed it, especially
some of the camera work.
A LOT of the music sounded very familiar, from other movies, and some
classical symphonic stuff. However the credits didn't list any of the
details about most of it. I was sure the starting music was something
by John Williams. Anyone have details on where it came from ??
|