borromeot

Well, yes. what else was behind this "idea". Money. What's wrong with that, you may ask? Look at the movie. That's my answer. Not a moment of originality let alone truth. Very dispiriting because Cate Blanchett is an actress I truly admire and I felt uneasy, uncomfortable seeing her in the midst of this misguided money grabbing scheme - pun intended - An all female cast of glittering names, a power force on their own, right? So why not make sure they get a script and an idea that is worthy their talents. Within the last two years there's been a sort of abrupt stop and there are only reboots - Will & Grace, The X Files for heaven's sake, Baywatch, not to mention the comedies with Amy Schumer one a remake of "Shallow Hal" the other one with Goldie Hawn. Goldie Hawn! and they can't come up with a vehicle that is at least funny. Talking about Goldie Hawn, Overboard was remade, and Flatliners. The brilliant Melissa McCarthy made about a hundred films, can you remember one? Okay I stop. I love movies, I always have that's why I notice that something is going on, I don't know what but I don't like it. I don't like it at all. What I've been doing after every depressing movie I go back and heal myself with a vintage comedy, it always works.

I'm a great fan of Miguel Arteta and Mike White's work. They travel a road that will take us to unusual places. I don't know if unusual is the right word because all of a sudden everything seems familiar, perhaps is the way Arteta and White got us there that is unusual. Opposite worlds sitting at the same table. Selma Hayek is wonderful and every though that crosses her heart and mind is perfectly visible to us. John Lithgow finds a new and disturbing face to his gallery of startling characters and Connie Britton is sublime as the hostess walking a thin line between empathy and something else. Wow! It really grabbed me and shook me. So, a highly recommended movie trying to survive in a sea of Avengers and remakes. Bravo!

I never quite figure out Blake Edwards as a filmmaker. He had a side that was as sophisticated and poignant as it was funny. Think "The Party" or the first Pink Panther, the other side was pure commercialism without any regard for its audience. SOB is a blatant example of that. Here he even uses his characters to badmouth "Last Tango In Paris" - The premise is terrific for a biting Hollywood satire but a premise is just a premise. He has to resort to farting during a sequence that should have been a comedy showstopper. Hey he got his wife to go topless and his wife was Julie Andrews - he must have heard cash registers in his mind like Richard Mulligan's character when he decides to put his wife in a porno=erotic something or other to make zillions of dollars. Richard Mulligan plays his suicidal director like he was in a Mack Sennett routine. Outrageous and I'm tempted to say, unforgivable. I must also confess that made me uncomfortable to see William Holden in the middle of it all. Shelley Winter, Robert Preston, Stuart Margolin, Larry Hagman, Robert Vaughn even a glimpse of the very young Rossana Archette keeps the film going. Loretta Swit - of MASH fame - plays a gossip columnist in such a way that may very well explain why she didn't have much of a film career. So, even if I'm aware I've spent a couple of hours with a bunch of characters I hope I never meet in real life, SOB deserves to be seen if only because it is a piece of film history solidly set on its day.