'I LOVED HER IN THE MOVIES' REVIEW........BOB SLEDS THRU HOLLYWOOD DAMES....

I LOVED HER IN THE MOVIES (2016) by Robert J.Wagner with Scott Eyman - Nobody qualifies better for the position of Hollywood chronicler than actor Robert Wagner, who's now into the seventh decade of his busy film and TV career. After all, this guy has  thrived and survived through every possible milestone of an actor's lifespan......moving from juvenile pretty boy to young leading man to older leading man (a privilege rarely afforded the actresses he discusses in his book)....and finally to senior handsome character actor (which often involves lampooning yourself in comedies...)

          Wagner intimately knows and loves the long gone Golden Age of Hollywood and after the stunningly sad icon deaths of 2016, we're thrilled he's hearty, healthy and still with us to write about it......(and after you've sat through some of today's movies, that era glows more golden with every passing minute),  Okay, we realize he's no brilliantly witty memoirist like Carrie Fisher.....but we always enjoy Wagner's friendly, comfortable tours through Hollywood nostalgia. In this latest excursion, he crafts some skillful, at times painfully candid assessments of the Golden Age goddesses who crossed his path, from the 1930's through today.......sort of a longer version of the Robert Osborne/Ben Mankiewicz bookend segments on TCM movies.

          You'll meet quite a few of them here (Bette Davis, Joan Crawford, Lauren Bacall, etc), and delve into their backstories......the overall pattern: tough cookies who often came from impoverished, broken homes, their hard outer shells helping them cope with their reptilian studio bosses like Jack Warner, Darryl Zanuck and Louis B.Mayer.  With a few rare exceptions, Wagner treats these uniquely gifted women with admiration, even tempered candor, and sympathy, whenever called for......(although BQ admits to grinning widely whenever the book stumbled upon somebody Wagner grudgingly admitted to being a miserable pain in the ass....seriously, Bob, maybe you should devote your next book to all the actors you couldn't stand the sight of....)

            For classic movie FanMen and FanWomen (who become boys and girls again when they watch these movies)....''I Love Her In The Movies" is a 'lights,camera, action'  **** 4 star must read.

         

'TIPPI' REVIEW......THE ONLY ACTRESS GROPED BY HITCHCOCK, BIRDS AND LIONS....

'TIPPI'  by Tippi Hedren (2016) serves as a distinctly one-of-a-kind memoir from a distinctly one-of-a-kind actress. Plucked from fashion modelling by Alfred Hitchcock to star in "The Birds" and "Marnie", Hedren survived her director's creepy obsession, sexual harassment and employment blacklisting. She went on to endure an even more bizarre cinematic adventure.....making the legendarily notorious "Roar" with her late husband Noel Marshall, a film in which Marshall, Hedren and her family(including daughter Melanie Griffith) cavorted with all their adopted felines. Sounds cute, huh? The felines we're talking about were over a hundred untrained wild lions and tigers.

           Being a Hitchcock freak and having plowed through all the books on the director, we found the Hitchcock chapters in 'Tippi' a huge disappointing letdown, skimpy and rushed. (Considering the debate and controversy swirling around the making of the two movies,  Hedren could have easily devoted an entire book to this subject). But the eleven year strife, calamity and insane danger involved in the making of  "Roar" are fully chronicled here......Hedren, Marshall, Griffith, cinematographer Jan De Bont all ended up seriously mauled and wounded by the cats, along with numerous crew members. Their financing for the film evaporated frequently,while floods and fires afflicted their California canyon home, where most of the film was shot,  A completed cut of the film finally emerged in Europe in 1981.....it never had (as far as we know) any exhibition in American theaters.

           Fascinated by Hedren's account(it makes the filming of "Apocalypse Now" look like an episode of 'Happy Days'), BQ sought out the infamous "Roar" for a viewing and had no trouble finding it....anyone can stream it on YouTube.  What we watched almost defies rational description.....shapeless, plotless, embarrassingly acted, it's a 95 minute demented home movie in which Hedren, her daughter, her husband and his sons get chased, wrestled, bitten and pummeled by what looks like an endless herd of lions and tigers...(no bears, oh my). No CGI fakery here, when the actors scream and bleed from their wounds( as does Melanie Griffith), it's the real deal. Incredibly, the film mostly plays this stuff for slapstick laughs, except for a sequence dropped in the middle where the cats rip apart two villains who've been shooting at them. (apparently the only scene where both the cats and humans fake their deaths.)

            We certainly admire the filmmakers for their obvious deep love and care for these animals......but the sheer madness of the people involved in "Roar" blots out whatever environmental message they tried to get across.  Watching this film, you're not worried about the preservation of wildlife.....you're too busy wondering if Hedren and company went completely out of their minds.

            In the book's final chapters, Hedren includes one single stunning insightful paragraph......in which she realizes that the total lack of a compelling script for "Roar" doomed it to its status as nothing more than an unwatchable oddity, a vanity piece set apart only by its makers foolishly putting their lives at risk.  That's a brutal moment of self-awareness that rarely occurs in the rest of the book. But 'Tippi' does fulfill its promise to take you through a remarkable life and we wouldn't have missed reading it......like all survivors, Tippi Hedren got in the last word on her old nemesis Hitchcock......with Hitch most likely spinning in his grave as Hedren enjoyed an acting gig on a network revival of "Alfred Hitchcock Presents."   For its vivid account of the "Roar" experience alone, we'll give 'Tippi' 3 stars.***

           

CRYIN' IN THE RAIN,,,.THE SWEET, IMPOSSIBLY SAD "BRIGHT LIGHTS" WITH DEBBIE REYNOLDS AND CARRIE FISHER

BRIGHT LIGHTS; STARRING CARRIE FISHER AND DEBBIE REYNOLDS (2016) reminded us of one of the last sardonic bon mots from Bette Davis...."Aging's not for sissies.."  That witty painfully true observation casts its shadow over this film, which found itself in the position of Most Timely Documentary Ever   ..arriving days after Fisher and Reynolds passed away within a day of each other.

In its candid detailing of Reynolds' and Fisher's singularly unique mother-daughter dynamic(unique in that there's not too many mother-daughter combos who were both show business icons for their generations) the film can't help but depict a sad chronicle of Debbie Reynolds' deteriorating health. Unlike many of her film contemporaries who long ago retired and fled the public eye as aging took its expected toll, Reynolds had show-biz so built into her DNA, she couldn't....and wouldn't leave performing and the adoration of audiences.   Simultaneously amusing, confounding and alarming her daughter, Debbie Reynolds gamely continued her nightclub act, even though she could barely walk.

While Reynolds refuses to go gently into that good night, Fisher,conveniently also her next door neighbor,  muses (and often sings along) with her mother, deploying her piercing laser wit on their lives together.... ....recounting Reynolds' career as a reigning American Sweetheart thrown into notoriety and chaos by her atrocious, worthless husbands and Fisher's equally extraordinary life as a pop culture touchstone, incisive raconteur, and survivor of addictions and mental illness. You can only helplessly watch the now ironic scenes of Carrie Fisher, appearing in relatively good health, bemoaning the fact of her mother's lifeforce, that of a 30 year old, trapped inside a failing body.

Given the tragic circumstances, the indelible, individual moments in this film take on a poignancy that's almost impossible to watch......Fisher at the bedside of the emaciated, dying Eddie Fisher, who famously left her mother for Elizabeth Taylor.....Reynolds once again energizing herself on stage, singing her one pop music hit, the title song from her film "Tammy."....and truly  revelatory footage of a fifteen year old Fisher appearing as part of her mother's nightclub act and  displaying a superb singing voice.

The directors of "Bright Lights", Alexis Bloom and Fisher Stevens, couldn't have imagined their film, a quirky,amusing and melancholy examination of two remarkable women, would suddenly become a eulogy for its subjects. But Fate's a bitch, as we all know.......the movie, for the most part, nimbly skates through Fisher and Reynolds' life.....it wasn't meant to function as the final word on their lives.....and that's fine with us.....cause like everyone else,  we don't want to believe they're really gone. Beached Quill give a full five stars *****, a FIND OF FINDS.

'LA LA LAND' REVIEW......WHY WE DON'T QUITE LOVE IT TO PIECES......

LA LA LAND (2016) is a movie we longed to embrace like a long lost beloved relative, a deliberately retro singin'  'n dancin' valentine to romantic passion....with modern Los Angeles rendered as a candy coated fantasy world existing only as a place for young lovers to swoon into each other's arms (It's the kind of dreamy LA the sweethearts have all to themselves....the rest of the population seems confined to jazz clubs and pool parties.). Could such a miracle occur? Could writer-director Damian Chazelle ("Whiplash") resurrect a full fledged MGM musical, the likes of which disappeared from the face of the earth decades ago, never to appear again except in "That"s Entertainment!" compilation films?

For most of its lengthy running time, he pulled it off. We succumbed right away to Chazelle's showstopping Freeway traffic jam dance number.....and found his romantic duo enchanting, the star-crossed, chemistry-to-burn team of an uncompromising jazz musician (Ryan Gosling) and a perpetually struggling young actress. (Emma Stone). We forgave Ryan and Emma for their tiny, whispery, barely serviceable singing voices......after all, they held the notes a hell of lot better than Clint Eastwood and Lee Marvin in "Paint Your Wagon" and Burt Reynolds and Cybill Sheperd in "At Long Last Love"  (...which I don't think anyone saw except me and Burt and Cybill's immediate families.)

And then.....in the film's closing moments......Chazelle slapped us across both cheeks and more or less yelled, "Sucker! You thought you were watching a real MGM musical? You thought you were going to dance out of the theater with a spring in your step and a song in your heart?  Fat chance, buddy. You forgot you bought a ticket to an up-to-date 2016 Independent movie.....and we ain't here to make you feel good, we're here to deliver quirky dysfunction and unsettled unease. So sit there, suck it up, take it and like it."

We didn't like it. To put it simply, MGM's Lizard of Oz Louis B. Mayer would have tossed Gene Kelly out of a high window if he ever proposed 'La La Land's ending for "Singin' In The Rain" or "An American In Paris"

Coldly examined, the odd finish didn't even make much sense plot-wise...and Chazelle further tortured us with a false depiction of an alternate reality that the film primed us for all along....no doubt congratulating himself for already slipping in an extra ending to the film without having to include it as a special feature on the DVD and Blu-Ray.

So sadly, we  can't offer 'La La Land' the unconditional love we hoped to give it....the best BQ can do is strongly admire the movie for its lilting musical numbers sung and danced by its adorable, fetching pair of lovers. We realize that duplicating a long gone genre is a dicey tightrope walk that few directors have any appetite for...(the last time we recall anyone attempting something close to 'La La Land' -  the Renee Zelwegger/Ewan McGregor "Down With Love", an overly arch,preening recreation of the Doris Day/Rock Hudson "Pillow Talk", which, like 'La La Land' kicked off with the old 20th Century Fox CinemaScope logo....it came off as way too precious and self-absorbed, dying a quick death)

Director Chazelle managed to avoid the numerous pitfalls that might have left the film open to ridicule, bringing off the near impossible feat of delivering a flavor-of-the-awards-season critics' darling. (I could waste ten more paragraphs describing the history of movie musical atrocities produced with  the most talented actors and best intentions, to underline 'La La Land's unique achievement....) But ultimately, he chose his film not to fully re-create its genre.....opting instead to leave its audience on a sour, bitter note......when the credits roll, you'll know it's a 2016 film and not the 40's or 50's. And given the 2016 we've had and the years ahead facing us.....we could have used a genuine MGM ending. We'll only sing out 2 & 1/2 stars.

EUROSPIES FOR YOUR EYES ONLY! YEAH, BABY.....THE BEST BOOK TO HAVE HANDY IF YOU LOVE (AS WE DO) THIS LONG FORGOTTEN GROOVY GENRE!

THE EUROSPY GUIDE by Matt Blake and David Deal is an indispensable encyclopedic tour through the most neglected of cheesy-movie genres.....the hundreds of films ground out by European filmmakers (mostly Italian)in the 1960's to cash in on the fabulous success of the James Bond films.

Let's back up first to 1964....."Goldfinger" with Sean Connery, the 3rd James Bond film, takes the entire movie world by storm and the suave secret agent becomes a world wide fad, a cinematic hula-hoop that everyone haS to have a piece of. American filmmakers quickly started their own faux-Bond franchises, such James Coburn's 'Our Man Flint' and Dean Martin's Matt Helm series. But nobody jumped on the Bond-Wagon with more fervor and sheer quantity than the Italian Grade C producers. They flooded the world market with an avalanche of wanna-be 007s....loading up the movies with the requisite karate chops,car chases, bikini babes and diabolical arch-villains  seeking world domination with secret radio-active whatever weapons. (It was really these movies that Mike Meyers targeted in his "Austin Powers" trilogy.)

The carbon copy secret agents in these films were often played by washed up, down-on-their-luck American actors, wandering over to Italy in search of work. Doing these movies kept them one step away from winding up in dinner theatre productions of "South Pacific." or signing autographs at Auto shows.  But the imitation-Bond roles in these movies mostly fell to obscure European actors whose names would show up as 'Americanized' in the films' credits   .....(Fictitious Example: someone  named Enzio Linguini would tranform into 'Martin Blake'......BQ's own fave was a spaghetti western actor who dubbed himself 'Montgomery Wood' Now there's hero for you!)  The quality of the 'Eurospy' movies varies wildly from  'not bad'  to 'okay' to 'acceptably tolerable' to 'hilariously awful'. Most of them suffered from threadbare budgets, wobbly cinematography, laughable special effects, arthritic stunts and acting that ranged from painful to non-existent......but for fans of way-off-the-beaten-track cinema, that didn't make them any less fun to watch....personally, we couldn't get enough of the blaring 60's jazzy scores that wailed all through these films, some of them even composed by master Maestro Ennio Morricone.

The Eurospy movies had little or no playdates in American theatres.....bunches of them turned up on local TV stations, the rest of them remained strictly unseen Stateside.. And in even with the onset of VHS and DVD, few of the 'Eurospies'  made it to homevideo compared with the onslaught of their brethren, the  Italian westerns and 'Giallo'  horror films that flooded the markets. (Which is why we deeply admire the authors of "The Eurospy Guide" for their superhuman diligence in tracking these films down for a viewing....God only knows where they found them....maybe bobbing along in the Venetian canals....)

As of now, you can indulge yourself in the sheer crappy madness of Eurospy films on YouTube, where mass quantities of them have come to rest......the streaming quality varies on these, but you can mix your Martinis, strap on your shoulder holster and wallow in epics like "Agent 353-Passport To Hell", "Lightning Bolt", "Mission Bloody Mary", and "OSS-117-From Tokyo With Love".....and don't forget to keep your copy of "The Eurospy Guide" handy, since we're targeting it with 5 Stars*****, easily a FIND OF FINDS.  Very cool, baby...

EVERYTHING'S COMING UP 'ROSIE'.....2 BOOKS YOU DARE NOT MISS....

THE ROSIE PROJECT and its sequel, THE ROSIE EFFECT by Graeme Simision are those rare beasts that we hardly ever come across (and believe us, BQ scours libraries and bookstores exhaustively)...rare in that they are charming, witty, laugh-out-loud romantic comedies that can entertain men and women readers equally.

The closest comparison to Simision's strangely endearing Prof. Don Tillman would be Jim Parsons' portrayal of the relentlessly dysfunctional Sheldon Cooper in "The Big Bang Theory."  Tillman, a brilliant academic hard-wired like a super computer is afflicted with Asperger's Syndrome, a form of autism that renders him robotic and stunted when dealing with other people..... and immune to the everyday subtleties of humor, irony and sarcasm. So naturally, Tillman's decision to launch an analytical, scientific search for a potential wife leads to endlessly funny and heartwarming complications.

Tillman's search also inadvertently leads him to Rosie, a no nonsense barmaid on the hunt for her biological father. She, of course, possesses none of Don's qualifications for a mate.....ah, but and you and I know better, don't we? The collision of these two complete opposites, along with Don's hapless encounters and interactions with normal society (which rarely go well) makes these books delightful page turners. Pretending for a moment we're on "The Bachelor", BQ hands out a full 5 ***** roses to the "Rosie" duo. Put both of them on your "to read" agenda.

'NERVE' REVIEW.....WE WORKED UP ENOUGH NERVE TO WATCH 'NERVE'

NERVE (2016),way out of our demographic, is a movie someone as old as BQ has no business looking at....a breathless plunge into the frenzied world of Millennial social media....you know, YouTube, Twitter, Facebook,Texting,  Snapchat, yada yada. But we love watching everything equally,so we dove head first into this thriller directed, appropriately by the "Catfish" guys. ("Catfish" being the documentary and subsequent MTV show in which hapless internet surfers discover that the loves of their lives, who fashioned on-line personas as beautiful, young, excitingly gorgeous people, are in fact, 87 year old bald cross dressers or something similar.....let the internet buyer beware....)

"Nerve" imagines an omnipotent powerful website, a la "Facebook", that generates vast profits by daring high schoolers to post videos of themselves as they attempt death-defying stunts....and reap instant deposits into their bank accounts if they succeed without injuring or killing themselves.  Yes, we asked the same question out loud that you would.....which is, aren't there already hundreds of thousands of foolhardy souls posting videos of themselves engaging in potentially lethal stunts? And doing it free of charge, for the pure joy of an adrenalin rush and more Youtube clicks?

Ah well, you just have swallow the premise if you're going to sit through this....and amazingly, we hit 'delete' on our common sense for 96 minutes and damn if we didn't enjoy the zippy carnival ride this movie takes you on. Our plucky little heroine (Emma Roberts) throws her innate caution to the wind and takes up the increasingly nutty 'Nerve' challenges (to the delirious excitement of the website's audience, watching and texting on every electronic device imaginable, except for microwave ovens and George Foreman grills)  Joining her in her all night, New York City escapades.... a fellow player/mystery guy played by Dave Franco.....yes, the brother who looks like he was cloned from a scraping of James Franco's index finger.

BQ's big question.....which remains unanswered by the film....who is running this borderline diabolical website. We waited in vain for a reveal, for the climax to lift up the curtain, maybe show a motor-mouthed Jesse Eisenberg-ish supervillain behind it all....but, alas, no. (What we really hoped for - the "Nerve" website masterminded by a pimply 13 year old boy camped out in his parents' basement....or better yet, Donald Trump's imaginary bedridden 400 pound hacker, lolling about with an I-Pad in one bulbous hand and economy-size Cheetos in the other... . Film-makers, feel free to use those ideas for any planned sequels....)  After restoring our common sense(we can't remember which combination of FN and F key we used) we'll still click on *** 3 stars for "Nerve"....a fast, fun little time waster.