8/29/08---oh yeah, I also watch movies

So I've watched a few movies over the last couple of weeks and wanted to give you some quick reviews.

1) Foul Play:  Goldie Hawn & Chevy Chase in a movie that's probably best viewed as a time capsule of the late 70's.  Seriously.  I mean, there were some serious flashbacks going on while I watched this movie.  Couple of quick things.  Wow, how is it that we all didn't realize what a major a-hole Chevy Chase was?  He's basically doing his Saturday Night Live schtick here in his first film role, and he gets old really quick.  What's sad about that is that Goldie Hawn is really good here as the damsel in distress who's trying to stop a plot to assassinate the pope (!).  This was right before her run with Private Benjamin and other big successful movies, and she really has a natural charm to her.
Great support provided by Burgess Meredith, who's hilarious as her landlord, Rachel Roberts & Dudley Moore.  This was really Moore's breakout performance in the U.S.
He already was a big star in the U.K., but this is the role that really got him noticed.
A fun little romantic comedy with a suspense twist that's almost totally ruined by Chase.
Still---***1/2
2) The Great Race:  Its the mid-60's, and apparently somebody told producer//director Blake Edwards to just spend one hell of a lot of money making a chase movie.
Here he gets Tony Curtis (fine), Jack Lemmon (terrifically hammy), Peter Falk (very funny as a henchman) & an absolutely gorgeous Natalie Wood to make that movie.
Seriously, there are a couple of scenes in here where Natalie is walking around essentially wearing a teddy.....and.....wow!  Suffice to say, she was no longer the girl from Miracle on 34th Street.  I mean SMOKING hot.  Anyway, back to the movie.
Curtis & Lemmon are rival daredevils who become involved in a race from New York to Paris in 1908.  Its all pretty harmless, and there's a great piefight besides.  ***1/2
3) The Boatniks:  Late 60's Disney fluff with Robert Morse (who?) and a very young Stephanie Powers, who was an absolute knockout.  The best part of the movie is watching veterans Phil Silvers & Norman Fell chew through the scenary as a couple of jewel thieves.  I kept wondering when Joe Flynn was going to show up.  Wasn't he in every live action Disney film made in the 60's?  To tell you the truth, I really rented it pretty much because I remember seeing it as a kid.  Apparently I wasn't a huge film buff back then.   **3/4
4) Atlantic City:  So here's a movie that I've always thought about renting, but never got around to it.  Its one of those films that I had always heard good things about--heard it was up for a bunch of awards, etc etc---but never got around to watching.  What a mistake.  Director Louis Malle's look at the decaying Atlantic City through the eyes of former mob gopher Burt Lancaster and casino employee Susan Sarandon is a really nice little film about losers in life ultimately winning the small victories that mean more to them than they would to you & me.  Both are really good, in particular Sarandon, who really burst onto the national scene with her performance here.  Interesting film.   ****
5) The House on 92nd Street:  A really fun look back at the FBI's battle with the Nazi's right before the start of WWII.  The always capable Lloyd Nolan is the FBI agent, and the villians are the really obvious, nasty ones.  There's a terrific supplement to the DVD where a film noir expert discusses whether or not the movie really is film noir, or just an interesting look at history (apparently told pretty much through the eyes of J. Edgar Hoover, who saw over the making of the film).  Anyway, if you rent the film, make sure to watch that part of the DVD, because its really interesting.   ***3/4

Later,
Jeff