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DVD Cat on a Hot Tin Roof
Elizabeth Taylor has never been sexier than as Tennessee Williams's hot-blooded Maggie "The Cat" Pollitt, prowling around her boudoir in a slinky white slip. That's how you know her alcoholic, ex-football-player husband, Brick (Paul Newman), must have more than just his leg in a cast. It's the 65th birthday of wealthy (but dying) southern patriarch Big Daddy (Burl Ives), and his sons Gooper (Jack Carter) and Brick have come to suck up to him for $10 million in inheritance money. Gooper is a family man and father to a brood of "no-neck monsters"; youngest boy Brick is papa's favorite (as if you couldn't tell from the fellow's names), but hasn't sired progeny. Maggie is definitely in heat, but Brick refuses to sleep with her because he suspects her her of being unfaithful with his best friend, who recent committed suicide. Although toned down for the movies, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof is vintage Tennessee Williams. The film was directed by Richard Brooks (In Cold Blood, Blackboard Jungle, Elmer Gantry). --Jim Emerson
Every line filled with tension, and the acting is wondeful!
This adaptation of a Tennessee Williams play was nominated for six academy awards in 1959. It stars Elizabeth Taylor as Maggie, rejected over and over by her alcoholic husband, Brick, played by Paul Newman. His father, Big Daddy, played by Burl Ives, has just returned to his Mississippi mansion after exploratory surgery. There's bitter rivalry in the family as they speculate about his death. Jack Carson plays the older son, who, with his pregnant wife, played by Madeline Sherwood and their five obnoxious children are determined to inherit Big Daddy's fortune. But Big Daddy despises him, as he does his own wife of 40 years, Big Mama, played by Judith Anderson.
As this film was originally a play, most of it is sharp and cutting dialogue, every line filled with tension and double meanings. Close-ups reveal the artistry of the actors, all of whom are excellent. I especially liked Burl Ives, whose performance called for a wide range of emotions, showing his vulnerability as well as his strength. And as the characters battled with each other, the story, which I understand was rewritten to fall within the guidelines of 1950s censors, slowly revealed itself. Some critics say this ruined this movie adaptation. I can't comment on that because I though the story was great. Most of the film takes place inside a house and there's almost no physical action. Not necessary. The dialog does it all. And it does it well. Recommended.
Strong stuff for its day. Children by Diane Arbus
Tennesee Williams' "Cat on a Hot Tin Roof" is a powerful play and here has been made into a powerful film. Family ties, lies, power, money, death, sexual troubles and even sibling rivalry coalesce as the troubled Pollitt family deals with the terminal illness of its patriarch. Although the gay subtext has been muted to fit 1950's sensitibilities, it's still there, adding resonance to the film. There's a bit of the mannered approach common to movies of the period, which gives the film a more theatrical feel than many movie adaptations of plays. In some ways, "Cat" comes across as an early, Southern version of "Who's Afraid of Virginia Wolf."
The acting in this film is superb, if a little over-the-top at times. "Maggie the Cat" is a plum dramatic role, and Elizabeth Taylor more than does it justice. In her hands, Maggie's basic humanity alternates with her greed to eventually define her. Paul Newman likewise turns in an excellent performance as the troubled Brick. Burl Ives steals the show as Big Daddy, the larger-than-life dying patriarch. Jack Carson and Madelaine Sherwood play the elder, less-favored son and his fecund wife, Mae. Mae and her brood are played as wonderfully grotesque charicatures, greatly enhancing the oppressive atmosphere of the film. If you think of Diane Arbus shooting a movie, you'll get an excellent idea of what Mae and her little "no-neck monsters" are like.
Superb
Acting doesn't come any better than this. Newman and Taylor have such chemistry its unbelievable, and although the movie may drag in certain parts, overall it is a great character study. Taylor is heartbreaking as the sexually deprived wife as Newman, a hardened man who suspects his wife of infidelity. Once again the theme of homosexuality is present ( as it is in all of Williams' plays), but in the movie it is thankfully downplayed and subtle. The definitive film version of the play, whose highlights are pretty much every scene in which Maggie and Brick are alone in their room bickering.
Looking for a benchmark in movie acting? Breakthrough performances don't come much more electrifying than Marlon Brando's animalistic turn as Stanley Kowalski in A Streetcar Named Desire. Sweaty, brutish, mumbling, yet with the balanced grace of a prizefighter, Brando storms through the role--a role he had originated in the Broadway production of Tennessee Williams's celebrated play. Stanley and his wife, Stella (as in Brando's oft-mimicked line, "Hey, Stellaaaaaa!"), are the earthy couple in New Orleans's French Quarter whose lives are upended by the arrival of Stella's sister, Blanche DuBois (Vivien Leigh). Blanche, a disturbed, lyrical, faded Southern belle, is immediately drawn into a battle of wills with Stanley, beautifully captured in the differing styles of the two actors.... More Info about this DVD Actor(s): Vivien Leigh - Marlon Brando Director(s): Elia Kazan DVD Release Date: Released the 18 May 1999 Usually ships in 8 to 10 days
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Paul Newman has his glorious youthful swagger in this southern-fried melodrama, which marked his first picture with Joanne Woodward (they married after shooting ended). The script is a melange of William Faulkner stories, although it appears more under the influence of Tennessee Williams and Picnic than the Nobel Prize winner. Drifter Newman catches the eye of schoolmarm Woodward and her father, a rural Mississippi bigshot (Orson Welles). This is not one of Welles's better moments; he appears to be conducting make-up experiments. There is some enjoyable flapdoodle along the way, in the Freud-meets-Gone with the Wind manner of '50s southern cooking, but the ending is embarrassingly compromised. The same production team would leave out the box-office concessions a few years... More Info about this DVD Actor(s): Paul Newman - Joanne Woodward Director(s): Martin Ritt DVD Release Date: Released the 20 May 2003 Usually ships in 24 hours
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After his successful direction of the Broadway hits Barefoot in the Park and The Odd Couple, Mike Nichols made his filmmaking debut with this outstanding and still-powerful screen adaptation (by Ernest Lehman) of Edward Albee's taboo-shattering play. In their fourth film together (and by far their finest), Richard Burton and Oscar winner Elizabeth Taylor play a New England couple whose marriage hangs by a thin thread of self-deception, vicious verbal jousting, and embittered mutual need. George Segal and Sandy Dennis (who also won an Oscar) play the younger, unsuspecting couple who awkwardly witness the devastating rivalry of their hosts. Handling adult themes with intelligence and forceful dramatic impact, this was the film that finally shattered Hollywood's self-censoring... More Info about this DVD Actor(s): Elizabeth Taylor - Richard Burton Director(s): Mike Nichols DVD Release Date: Released the 18 May 1999 Usually ships in 24 hours
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"I was the slut of all time!" declares Elizabeth Taylor in the role for which she won her first Academy Award®. Taylor plays Gloria, a model of loose morals who discovers a last chance at love and redemption when she spends a week with Weston Ligget (Laurence Harvey), a man who married into money and hates himself for it. They fall in love, but before they can find happiness they have to overcome their own worst natures. BUtterfield 8 (named after Gloria's answering service) is a big boozy melodrama, full of gorgeous clothes, catty comments, and emotional showdowns--but along the way it plumbs some genuine sadness. No one can be simultaneously overblown and utterly sincere like Elizabeth Taylor; the movie is mired in the morality of the time, but her performance... More Info about this DVD Actor(s): Elizabeth Taylor - Laurence Harvey - Eddie Fisher Director(s): Daniel Mann DVD Release Date: Released the 19 September 2000 Usually ships in 24 hours
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This black-and-white film adaptation of Tennessee Williams's Southern gothic play is perhaps more famous for the rumored off-screen shenanigans of its stars than for its over-the-top repressed sexuality (only Williams could pull off that paradox, and pull it off he does). Supposedly, stars Katharine Hepburn and Elizabeth Taylor battled for screen time; Hepburn warred very publicly with director Joseph Mankiewicz; and a postaccident Montgomery Clift relied heavily on painkillers and support from friend Taylor during the grueling shoot. Even this, however, cannot top the events of the film itself, revolving around the unseen playboy Sebastian and his mysterious death, which has something to do with young boys, a decadent European vacation, and Taylor in a provocative wet, white bathing... More Info about this DVD Actor(s): Elizabeth Taylor - Katharine Hepburn - Montgomery Clift Director(s): Joseph L. Mankiewicz DVD Release Date: Released the 15 August 2000 Usually ships in 24 hours
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