In Badlands, Kit Carruthers, a young garbage collector and his girlfriend Holly Sargis from Fort Dupree, South Dakota, are on the run after killing Holly’s father. Because the father disagreed with their relationship.
Badlands
Movie review of Harry and Tonto, starring Art Carney, in his Academy Award (best actor) winning role as Harry, a retired teacher in his seventies living in an area of New York City where he and his deceased wife raised his children – where he’s lived all his life. The building he lives in is torn down to make way for a parking garage. So Harry and his cat Tonto begin a journey across America. He visits his children, sees the world he never seemed to have the time to see before. Along the way, he makes new friends and says goodbye to old ones.
Harry and Tonto
Jerry Lewis‘ The King of Comedy is not the typical Jerry Lewis movie. It’s not a comedy. It’s not for the children. It is a very dark comedy (although rated PG). The King of Comedy looks at the behind-the-scenes life of Jerry Langford. Played straight, and brilliantly, by Jerry Lewis. He’s a talk-show host seemingly similar to Jay Leno or David Letterman.
The King of Comedy
In Orchestra Wives, beautiful but naive Connie meets her idol, trumpeter Bill Abbot, while his band’s on tour. After marriage, though, she finds out how catty the other wives can be. And how a previous tour nearly ended several marriages.
Orchestra Wives
There are a great many positive things to say about The Fighting Sullivans. It’s set against the backdrop of World War II. But at it’s heart it’s the story of a loving Irish Catholic family. As they raise five young boys and a daughter. Five very energetic, healthy, American boys, whose childhood the audience gets to share. As well as when they become young men, and volunteer for service in the Navy shortly after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor.
In How to Commit Marriage, seemingly happily married couple Frank and Elaine Benson (played by Bob Hope and Jane Wyman) are on the verge of divorce. But they plan to wait until after their daughter’s marriage. The groom’s father, Oliver Poe (Jackie Gleason) opposes marriage in general. And he dislikes Bob Hope’s character in particular.
This is the film based on the true adventures of Izzy and Moe. They were two retired vaudeville performers who, being unemployed, decide to become prohibition enforcement agents. They are initially treated with scorn from fellow agents as old men pretending to be cops. That abuse soon stops when the pair refuse to use the standard but futile methods of the agency. Instead, they employ their theatrical experience to use an amazing variety of disguises and tricks. They become two of the most effective agents in the force. Eventually, their outstanding string of successful raids and arrests starts drawing the attention of the mob and their bought cops, who desperately plan to stop this pair.
The Hustler – Blu-ray – Paul Newman heads a superb cast featuring Jackie Gleason, George C. Scott and Piper Laurie in the riveting film that received an Academy Award nomination as Best Picture of 1961 and brought all four of it’s Oscar nomination. Newman (Best Actor nominee) is electrifying as Fast Eddie Felson, an arrogant, amoral hustler who haunts backstreet pool rooms fleecing anyone who’ll pick up a cue. Determined to be acclaimed as the best, Eddie seeks out the legendary Minnesota Fats (Gleason, Supporting Actor nominee), who’s backed by Bert Gordon (Scott, Supporting Actor nominee), a predatory gambler.
Gleason is a wonderfully done television biography of Jackie Gleason, starring Brad Garrett, best known for his television sitcoms Everybody Loves Raymond and Til Death. I was absolutely flabbergasted by Brad Garrett’s performance. Not only did he do a wonderful acting job, but he truly made the character of Jackie Gleason come to life. Given his size, I would never have believed that he could carry off the role of the pudgy comedian Jackie Gleason. I was totally wrong.
Requiem for a Heavyweight is a very powerful, very hard-hitting movie about boxing. Rod Serling wrote a teleplay that shows the steamy underbelly of professional boxing — and it’s not a pretty picture. In short, Rocky it isn’t. The movie begins with Anthony Quinn, the ‘Heavyweight’ of the title, losing his final boxing match to (a very young) Cassius Clay. Anthony Quinn’s character, Louis ‘Mountain’ Rivera, has become punch-drunk and is on the verge of losing his eyesight in the boxing ring. His corrupt manager (played extremely well by Jackie Gleason, in a very serious role) needs to find a way to pay back the mob … and if that means ruining Rivera’s chance at happiness, then so be it.
