Ask 411 Movies for 9.24.07: While Watching Lost in Space No One Can Hear You Scream
Posted by Leonard Hayhurst on 09.24.2007
Kill Bill, Lost in Space, Oscar controversies, more bad television to film adaptations and flat out bad television to review
I went with some friends to see Genesis on Saturday. They sounded really good musically and I have to take my hat off to Phil Collins for being on stage for the whole two and a half hours without a break. They did a nice mix of the big hits and some deeper cuts. I was disappointed they didn't do "Abacab" as apparently was a girl we overhead on the way out who was crying, "Genesis didn't sing Abacab and I have no friends." They also didn't do "No Reply At All" or "That's All" I would have liked. They did some of the older Peter Gabriel songs. One thing my friend Dan noted is that all the Collins tracks were about three minutes and all the Gabrial stuff was like twenty. I did dig the long medley of "In the Cage/The Cinema Show/Duke's Travels/Afterglow."
Actress Alice Ghostley passed away Friday of colon cancer. She was 81. I just reviewed The Graduate this week, which she has a bit part in. Ghostley is best remembered for her television work as Aunt Esmeralda on "Bewitched" and Bernice on "Designing Women." She also appeared in To Kill a Mockingbird, Gator, Grease, The Flim Flam Man, With Six You Get Eggroll and The Odd Couple II. Below is a series of clips of her work on "Designing Women" and an interview segment from a 2003 reunion show.
Brett Somers died last Monday of stomach and colon cancer. She was 83. Somers was a regular panelist on "The Match Game" for most of its original run. Somers scored the gig after her husband at the time Jack Klugman frequently talked about her the week he was a guest panelist. Below is a segment from "The Early Show" featuring a "Match Game" reunion of Betty White, Brett Somers and the also deceased Charles Nelson Reilly from 2002.
Q: Leonard,
I honestly must express my personal shock and alarm at the fact that you think The Avengers is the worst TV-to-film adaptation ever. I've seen it, and it's not half as bad as Car 54, Where Are You? or The Honeymooners. The former is just a muddled, embarassing mess, while the latter makes Ralph Kramden into such an unlikable character that it totally undermines the film as a whole.
Then again, I was pleasantly surprised by The Dukes of Hazzard, so maybe my opinion isn't the best.
~ Will Helm
PS: You can find all of those films in my archives, if you'd like to provide links.
A: Heaven forbid I should go against the great Will Helm, but I'm going to stick to my guns. Car 54 and The Honeymooners do indeed stink like a dead skunk on a hot day, but The Avengers was wracked by behind the scenes turmoil that translated on screen to such a dreadful, incomprehensible mess that was a travesty to the entertainment value and quality of the original series. Not to mention that Avengers was targeted and marketed as a major summer blockbuster. The other two films were not. They were innocuous comedies and pretty much presented that way. I loved, LOVED, "Car 54, Where are You?" Fred Gwynne and Joe E. Ross are an underrated and overlooked comedy team. The film adaptation has a pretty decent cast in David Johanson and John C. McGinley in the leads, but they never mesh and the writing is horrible. I also thought it was a nice nod to bring Al Lewis back in his original character. I don't have a problem with The Honeymooners changing the ethnicity of the characters even though it's unneeded. That was a concept that was tailor made for comedy shorts and a sitcom situation. The tremendous cast anchored by Jackie Gleason and Art Carney were key in making the show watchable. It was a show that worked by having the right specifics clicking together and the movie just missed the forest for the trees and why the series worked. I myself was also pleasantly surprised by Dukes of Hazzard. It's not Shakespeare, but neither was the original show. It's enjoyable for what it is thanks to a fun cast having a fun time. For Will's thoughts look here:
Q: Maybe I am in the minority here, but I was scanning through the channels the other night a caught the remake of 'Lost in Space' on one of the movie channels. I remember when I watched it originally, I thought it was good and thought that there would be more. Im pretty sure it got shredded by the media. But I was wondering, was there plans for more or was it always supposed to be just 1 movie?
-Mike
A: Yeah, friend, I think you're in a minority of one on that. Lost In Space grossed about $70 million in the US. Its budget was around $80 million so when you factor in international release, DVD and television it did turn a prophet. A bulk of its draw came in the first three weeks, which speaks to the success of the Hollywood marketing machine more than anything. Rotten Tomatoes has it with an abysmal 23% freshness rating. The critical consensus is that the effects were good, the acting was serviceable from a good cast, but the direction and script was atrocious leading to a convoluted film with little fun. Word has it that the entire principal cast signed contracts for two sequels, but they haven't materialized to date due to the poor reception of the movie and it's failure to recoup it's budget in its original US theatrical run. Really, when does that stop sequels from getting made anymore?
Q: Small Wonder reviews
Please keep up these reviews. At first I thought, "Who the heck would want to do a review of this crap?" The more I read them the funnier they get. Hey, will you do one for all these campy 80's shows? Charles in Charge, Silver Spoons, My Two Dads, etc. you could have column material all the way until Judgment Day!
-John
Do you mean Judgment Day the apocalyptic event or the wrestling pay per view? Every time I sit down to review an episode of "Small Wonder" I have to ask myself why. There's a reason they are only one show a week. When I bought the DVD set I was reminded of the story from the Onion a few years ago of a guy that got drunk and bought off of Ebay the entire run of "Mama's Family" for several hundred dollars. And no, I will not review "Mama's Family." "My Two Dads" might be a possible if I can find a DVD of it. "Silver Spoons" and "Charles in Charge" I can live without. They're actually out on legitimate DVD releases, so somebody somewhere thought they had value.
I noticed that someone asked about Grindhouse released as a complete set and it got me to thinking about Kill Bill. I had heard that both movies were supposed to be released together as a complete movie, like Tarantino originally envisioned. What happened to this release? I've held off on buying Kill Bill Vol. 2 just in case.
Thanks,
-Charles
A: Hey, are you just Quentin Tarantino trying to drum up publicity? If you are, you need to remake Hanny Caulder. Kill Bill: The Whole Bloody Affair is slated for release December 25th this year. What a perfect film for Christmas day. It will be four discs and rated NC-17 with several cut scenes replaced. There is no word on the presentation of the films or included extras. This seems to have been pushed around a bit on the release schedule and details are sketchy, so I wouldn't hold my breath until it actually comes out, but that's the latest word. Several outlets have packaged together the already released DVDs and sold them that way.
Q: Hey Leonard,
Of course hindsight is 20/20 and the oscars make mistakes all the time in the view of history like citizen kane not winning best picture. Here is a list of movie losers vs. winners and can you please explain why the lesser movie beat the better movie:
Note: I am not including classic motion pictures like Rocky vs. Network/Taxi Driver/All the President's Men and Pulp Fiction/Shawshank Redemption vs. Forrest Gump because the winner is a classic movie and in the top 100 movies of all time according to afi.
Saving Private Ryan vs. Shakespeare in Love
Jerry Maguire/Fargo vs. The English Patient
Goodfellas vs. Dances w/ Wolves
Field of Drams vs. Driving Miss Daisy
Color Purple vs. Out of Africa
Raging Bull vs. Ordinary People
Ten Commandments vs. Around the World in 80 days
High Noon/Singin' in the Rain (not nominated) vs. Greatest Show on Earth
It's a wonderful life vs.the best years of our lives.
Sorry I haven't seen too many from the 30s and 40s to make judgements about those.
-David
A: Inside Oscar by Damiem Bona and Mason Wiley was very beneficial for this question.
The Best Years of Our Lives is also considered a classic and won seven of its eight nominations in 1946, plus an honorary award for real life double amputee Harold Russell. It's a Wonderful Life received zero wins in five nominations. Life debuted to mix reviews and so-so box office. Lives was touted as the Oscar frontrunner from its debut and wound up being the highest grossing and best reviewed film of the decade. In the ensuing years, Life has gained a strong following due to its positive universal message, while Lives isn't as hot button topical in dealing with World War II vets attempting to reacclimatize to civilian life. Lives just hasn't aged well, but it was the right pick at the time.
The Greatest Show on Earth is often considered to be the weakest best picture winner of all time and one of the few flicks to win the award after receiving scathing reviews from critics. The movie was the highest grossing film of the year and marked the resurgence of famed silent director Cecil B. DeMille. High Noon and The Quiet Man were considered the frontrunners with Moulin Rouge and Ivanhoe also-rans. It's believed that Noon and Man split the vote and the huge block of old fogies that hadn't even set foot into a theater since the silent era gave the win to DeMille's laughably bad epic of a struggling circus. Singing in the Rain got shafted because MGM put everything they had behind Ivanhoe. An American in Paris was a surprise big winner the year before and MGM thought the Academy wouldn't bite again on a Gene Kelly musical.
Around the World in 80 Days is easy to explain. Producer Mike Todd bought the Oscar. Todd was a successful Broadway producer who dabbled in film, even developing his own wide screen process called Todd-AO. Days was the first film he produced and he called in numerous favors to stock the film with an all star cast. The term cameo was created for this film. The fact that he was married to Elizabeth Taylor helped out too. Todd sunk a lot of money into marketing and promotion. He ran ads thanking every member of the cast and crew. Todd even offered to fund the Oscar telecast out of his own pocket, but they had already singed with Oldsmobile as a primary sponsor. On The Ten Commandments the Academy had already done their duty to director Cecil B. Demille with The Greatest Show on Earth. Remember that politics and timing is everything with the Academy Awards and not so much quality.
Actually, The Elephant Man was considered the front-runner for best picture in 1980 over Raging Bull and Ordinary People. People was sold on the strength of Robert Redford as director. The Academy always seems to bite when a notable actor steps behind the camera. One element that possibly worked against the other two films was the fact that they were shot in black and white. Many were also turned off by the brutal depiction of violence in Bull and LaMotta as an unsympathetic lead character, even though DeNiro did win best actor.
The Color Purple was subjected to controversy from several activist groups. Many African American organizations protested Steven Spielberg as director. They didn't feel that a middle aged Jewish director known for fantasy and adventure films was the best choice to relate the story of prejudice and tribulations in the lives of black women in the south. Gay and women's groups also decried the exclusion of the lesbian storyline from the source novel. While the film received 11 nominations, Spielberg himself was snubbed from a best director nomination. This caused its own controversy as several critics questioned the snub and columnist Martin Grove recommended the Academy form a panel to investigate any tampering in the selections. This was met with a very chilled reception by the Academy. Directors Henry Jaglom and John Huston among others expressed their disgust at this notion. However, Spielberg did win the Director's Guild award for best director. This was seen by some as a good consolation. Spielberg also produced Purple and would have received the Oscar for best picture if it had won. Of course, this was all made up to Spielberg years later with Schindler's List. A film that these earlier advocate groups probably approved of him helming.
1989 was a very crowded Oscar year, especially for Universal pictures who had three strong candidates in Born on the 4th of July, Field of Dreams and Do the Right Thing. All three of those movies had their critics and their supporters, but Universal could only do so much in pushing one for best picture. They went with July when it did very well at the Golden Globes. Thing also had its supporters among various minority groups as did Glory. However, it was Driving Miss Daisy with its almost anachronistic view of a relationship between an elderly white lady and her black driver that appealed most to what was still then an elderly and stuck in its ways Academy voters block. It was basically the racial story that certain voters could stomach over Thing.
Much like with Raging Bull, Goodfellas was hindered by its violence and language. It did receive great critical notices and was considered a comeback for Scorsese who had slipped in the eighties. The situation with Wolves was similar to what Scorsese faced back in 1980 with Redford and Ordinary People. Once again the Golden Globes were an indicator as Kevin Cosnter won best director and best picture. Additionally, the Persian Gulf War was going on and in times of war people often steer away from true life, gritty and violent films for those with a more positive message and feel. Despite elements of violence and negativity in Wolves it did feature a more uplifting and positive worldview when compared to Goodfellas. It was also a sort of ‘my bad' for the long poor Hollywood depiction of Native Americans.
The English Patient was very well received by critics and film reviewers with a backlash against it only starting after the Academy Award wins. Spearheading this was an episode of "Seinfeld" where Elaine breaks up with her boyfriend because he is offended by her lukewarm reception to the film. Jerry Maguire and Fargo were both seen as subversive, but lighter faire. The tone of the Academy changes from year to year depending on a lot of factors. Sometimes they go serious and sometimes they go uplifting. Also to be mentioned is that Miramax was reaching its pinnacle as an Oscar marketing machine. That would really come to light in 1998 with the triumph of Shakespeare in Love. Harvey and Bob Weinstein are known for their aggressive Oscar campaigns that revolutionized the process. Not only did they put out ads, but sent screener copies to Academy voters. On the side of Saving Private Ryan you have the violence element again, along with lingering sentiments again director Stephen Spielberg even though he did win best director. However, when you boil it down it was the Weinsteins coming out on top and nothing with the films so much themselves.
Don't die.
"There's a hold up in the Bronx, Brooklyn's broken out in fights/ There's a traffic jam in Harlem that's backed up to Jackson Heights/ There's a scout troop short a child, Khrushchev's due at Idlewild! Car 54 where are you?"
