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DVD Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice
While its particulars remain rooted in the sexual revolution of the late 1960s, Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice is remarkably timeless as a classic comedy of manners. Making an impressive, high-profile directorial debut after success as a screenwriter, Paul Mazursky took the pulse of California society better than anyone, especially with this well-cast, sharply observant comedy that begins when sophisticated couple Bob and Carol (Robert Culp, Natalie Wood) attend a weekend retreat that opens their eyes to the possibilities of open marriage and mutual acceptance of extramarital affairs. When they reveal their newfound liberties to straightlaced couple Ted and Alice (Elliott Gould, Dyan Cannon), the subtle, behavioral richness of the largely improvisational screenplay (by Mazursky and Larry Tucker) rises to the surface, conveyed through the kind of natural rhythms and pauses that were dramatically in vogue in the fast-changing Hollywood of 1969. The film hasn't lost any of its punch, perhaps because American sexual politics have returned to the conservatism that existed before Bob and Carol emerged as the signature comedy of the swinging sixties. The absence of the late Natalie Wood is the only drawback to the DVD's excellent commentary, which reunites Mazursky, Culp, Gould, and Cannon in a casual atmosphere of humorous reminiscence. --Jeff Shannon
A sex farce that is unfortunately frozen in the time period in which it was made. The four principal characters are best friends living in the vapid and empty void known as California in the late 1960s. Director-writer Paul Mazursky makes fun of all the pseudo hippness of LA-LA land, which culminates with the four characters deciding, in the spirit of the times, to have an orgy together. They all end up in bed staring at each other, lost. For a look at the pseudo psychobabbling California lifestyle of the late 60s, it's a howl - but it hasn't dated very well. It's a moment captured perfectly, but the moment has passed. After seeing it once, there's no desire to see it again; for a younger crowd that hasn't lived through those times, the movie might not seem like anything at all. Robert Culp, Natalie Wood, Elliott Gould, and Dyan Cannon are the actors involved in this ambitious but dated movie.
What the World Needed Then. . .
Films like Arthur Penn's "Alice's Restaurant" (1969) were now dealing openly with the effect that the changes in society had on the youth of the nation. But it yet remained for a film to study the shifting lifestyles of early middle-aged people who tried to embrace both the new morality and the youth revolution, attempting to reorder their lifestyles to fit in with the breezy image of how liberated people ought to behave. The film that filled this vacuum was "Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice", an updating of the Doris Day comedies that had flourished during the first half of the decade, and then disappeared when, in 1967, the radical changes going on around us made such pictures seem suddenly obsolete. First-time director Paul Mazursky was given a tight budget of $2 million from Columbia Pictures to make "Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice" and he managed to persuade Natalie Wood (then a major star) to reduce her usual $750,000 salary in favor of 10% of the film's profits. The result was the year's surprise smash hit and Natalie earned $3 million from her share of the profits alone.
Filmmaker Mazursky's great gift, first suggested in his excellent screenplay for "I Love You, Alice B. Toklas" (1968), and in evidence throughout his direction of B&C&T&A, was a talent for blending strong social satire with lighthearted situation comedy, and giving the end result an underlying sense of seriousness that elevated his work of entertainment into an "art" film. This would provide the basis for his most satisfying films, including "Blume in Love" (1973), "Harry and Tonto" (1974), and "An Unmarried Woman" (1978). The great moments in B&C&T&A are the ones which demonstrate his total familiarity with and understanding of the upper-middle-class California scene, which he presents with razor sharp humor but, notably, without the kind of condescension that would diminish the impact of such a film.
The satire is expert--sharply written, well and dryly observed, and generally very funny. Mazursky's direction was somewhat influenced at the time, I would suspect, by the John Cassavetes of "Faces" (1968). The close-ups are tight and constant; and the dialogue is filled with interruption, irrelevance, repetition, and people talking over each other. The acting couldn't have been better: Natalie Wood crying "beautiful" at each new expression of modern candor; Dyan Cannon giggling through a scene with a deadpan psychiatrist; Robert Culp pursuing the free life with earnest intensity; Elliott Gould struggling out from under his stoned friends as they clutch each other on the couch. Best of all is the scene between Ted and Alice (both Gould and Cannon received Oscar nominations for their performances) in the privacy of their bedroom, as they face the classical marital dilemma of whether they are in the mood for lovemaking.
What made this film far superior to the witless general run of comedies at the time was the tolerant understanding of Oscar-nominated screenwriters Mazursky and Larry Tucker and their obvious affection for the characters. Importantly, B&C&T&A was the film chosen to open the 1969 New York Film Festival, which marked a significant departure from the usual opening night event of the latest import of a film by some respected European auteur. In 1969, critics finally acknowledged that the long-held distinction between honest European art films and synthetic American entertainment films had at last broken down. [filmfactsman]
WHY!!!???
Why are Paul Mazursky's BEST films NOT on DVD!!!??? I am referring to:
Tempest (1982)
Willie and Phil (1980)
Unmarried Woman, An (1978)
Next Stop, Greenwich Village (1976)
Harry and Tonto (1974)
Blume in Love (1973)
I am waiting and will buy all of them, particularly Tempest and An Unmarried Woman, if they ever become available on DVD.
This silky smooth film noir pits gruff police detective Dana Andrews, stiff and blunt in his street-bred manners, against a cultured columnist and acidic wit (Clifton Webb at his prissiest) in a battle of wits during a murder investigation. The cop is a romantic hiding under a hard-boiled exterior who falls in love with the beautiful victim through the portrait that hangs in her apartment. Gene Tierney, whose heart-shaped face mixes the exotic with the girl next door, brings the poise and calm of a model to her role as the object of every man's gaze and the target of a killer. Laura, handsomely shot in dreamy black and white, is the first and best of Otto Preminger's cool, controlled murder mysteries. In the gritty world of film noir it remains the most refined and elegant example... More Info about this DVD Actor(s): Gene Tierney - Dana Andrews Director(s): Rouben Mamoulian - Otto Preminger DVD Release Date: Released the 15 March 2005 Usually ships in 24 hours
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This vastly underrated Arthur Penn film from the mid-1970s ranks as one of the era's nastiest and most fascinating pieces of business, a detective story that shuttles back and forth between Hollywood and the Florida Keys, with a plot nearly as complex as Chinatown. Gene Hackman stars as a tired, aging private eye who, as a favor to a friend, agrees to track down a runaway teen. But the case turns out to be something much larger: a smuggling ring of Mayan antiquities. The human impulses get darker and darker and Hackman's character gets pulled in deeper and deeper, even as his own life is falling apart. Ultimately, in one of his best and most unsung performances, Hackman winds up hurting the people he is trying to help. A great cast includes Susan Clark, Jennifer Warren, a young... More Info about this DVD Actor(s): Gene Hackman - Jennifer Warren Director(s): Arthur Penn DVD Release Date: Released the 12 July 2005 Usually ships in 24 hours
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Prime Cut is a strangely likeable if decidedly oddball thriller from 1972. A happy collision of gangster genre grit (validated by Lee Marvin's granite-faced lead performance) with a strain of shameless (though shrewd) exploitation not unfamiliar to screenwriter Robert Dillon (X: The Man with the X-Ray Eyes), plus the kinetic, semi-documentary wit of director Michael Ritchie (The Candidate) makes Prime Cut both a straightforward noir and a satire of itself. Marvin plays Nick, an aging enforcer for the Chicago mob, sent to Kansas City to deal with a ruthless cattle baron (Gene Hackman) who owes a half-million to Windy City racketeers. Hackman's character (inexplicably named Mary Ann), dismissive of old-guard crime chieftains, has set up his own heartland empire... More Info about this DVD Actor(s): Lee Marvin - Gene Hackman - Sissy Spacek Director(s): Michael Ritchie DVD Release Date: Released the 14 June 2005 Usually ships in 24 hours
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Not short on murder, mayhem, or any other screwball '70s conventions, Foul Play is a wonderful vehicle for Goldie Hawn. She plays Gloria, a librarian "ready to take a chance again," who ends up the target of an assassination ring. Chevy Chase, fresh off of Saturday Night Live, does the closest thing to real acting he would ever achieve (okay, maybe Fletch) as Tony, the cop assigned to protect Gloria. Dudley Moore made an indelible impression on American audiences as Stanley Tibbets, a surprisingly kinky symphony conductor. But it's the quirky things that make this film: the grandmothers playing Scrabble with expletives, Burgess Meredith's snake Esme, the old Japanese couple in the back of the careening limo. From the opening credits with Barry Manilow crooning the... More Info about this DVD Actor(s): Goldie Hawn - Chevy Chase Director(s): Colin Higgins DVD Release Date: Released the 16 November 2004 Usually ships in 24 hours
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Otto Preminger expanded his vision in the 1960s with a whole series of ambitious, expansive dramas with huge casts and big themes. Advise and Consent (1962), an examination of deal making, party politics, and congressional diplomacy in Washington's legislative halls (based on the novel by Allen Drury), is one of his best. Preminger broke the blacklist with his previous film, Exodus, and it rings through in this drama about a controversial nominee for secretary of state (a confident, stately Henry Fonda) accused of being a Communist. The nomination process becomes the center ring of the political circus, with fidgety accuser Burgess Meredith in the spotlight; devious, silver-tongued Charles Laughton cracking the whip as a southern senator with a grudge against Fonda; and... More Info about this DVD Actor(s): Henry Fonda DVD Release Date: Released the 10 May 2005 Usually ships in 24 hours
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