I've never understood how people can have the audacity to say that Ed Wood made bad movies when there are films like "Die Laughing" out there. I'll admit, I'm a "Harold and Maude" fan, and so naturally I decided to see what else Bud Cort had made in his career. He was great as Harold, he was fun in "MASH", I liked him a lot in Faerie Tale Theatre's "The Nightingale" - pretty good track record, I thought.
I think the fact that this is the first movie he made after nearly dying in a car crash speaks volumes, really. No doubt there were hospital bills to pay, and the inevitable movie-making horse to get back on.
There are points in this movie where you can practically see the desperation written on his face. "I was in 'Brewster McCloud' you know..." His is a minor part, however, a very camp, over-the-top part, but a secondary one nonetheless. "Die Laughing" was a star vehicle for Robbie Benson - the latest in a long line of asexual, clean-cut 70s teen icons. Frankly, it could have been Andy Gibb or Lief Garrett in this movie. Robbie Benson manages to mug, gag, slapstick, and almost dribble his way through this. At one point, his mugshot is displayed, and my ex commented that either he was in some way mentally challenged or the photo was shot whilst he was experiencing an enema.
It never really gets better than this. The best actor in the whole thing is a monkey. Quite why a monkey appears in this movie is only revealed in the last fifteen minutes, by which time I'd already invested over an hour and was just waiting to see Bud Cort in spiky boots and 80s glasses, purely for comic relief.
Quite a lot of people must have had hospital bills to pay - Charles Durning, Elsa Lanchester, Peter Coyote - not lightweights when it comes to acting chops. Maybe there was something in the drinking water in the early 80s? But by far the most ludicrous point of all in this overlong, overstretched and preposterous pile of monkey business is having to believe that a late-Punk, early-New Wave rock audience would go nuts for a third rate John Denver sound-a-like, because yes - Robbie sings! There he is crooning about a barbershop quartet! Watch him warble about lurve just before he gets off with his ex-girlfriend's sister! See him win a talent contest with the power of schmaltz! "That man has KISS tickets all over his body!" he shouts to the audience, who five seconds previously were swooning to his special brand of Eezee-Lite Muzak.
I'd like to say that this was the one that MST3K missed - but I think even they had standards. And for that, we should be truly grateful.
I think the fact that this is the first movie he made after nearly dying in a car crash speaks volumes, really. No doubt there were hospital bills to pay, and the inevitable movie-making horse to get back on.
There are points in this movie where you can practically see the desperation written on his face. "I was in 'Brewster McCloud' you know..." His is a minor part, however, a very camp, over-the-top part, but a secondary one nonetheless. "Die Laughing" was a star vehicle for Robbie Benson - the latest in a long line of asexual, clean-cut 70s teen icons. Frankly, it could have been Andy Gibb or Lief Garrett in this movie. Robbie Benson manages to mug, gag, slapstick, and almost dribble his way through this. At one point, his mugshot is displayed, and my ex commented that either he was in some way mentally challenged or the photo was shot whilst he was experiencing an enema.
It never really gets better than this. The best actor in the whole thing is a monkey. Quite why a monkey appears in this movie is only revealed in the last fifteen minutes, by which time I'd already invested over an hour and was just waiting to see Bud Cort in spiky boots and 80s glasses, purely for comic relief.
Quite a lot of people must have had hospital bills to pay - Charles Durning, Elsa Lanchester, Peter Coyote - not lightweights when it comes to acting chops. Maybe there was something in the drinking water in the early 80s? But by far the most ludicrous point of all in this overlong, overstretched and preposterous pile of monkey business is having to believe that a late-Punk, early-New Wave rock audience would go nuts for a third rate John Denver sound-a-like, because yes - Robbie sings! There he is crooning about a barbershop quartet! Watch him warble about lurve just before he gets off with his ex-girlfriend's sister! See him win a talent contest with the power of schmaltz! "That man has KISS tickets all over his body!" he shouts to the audience, who five seconds previously were swooning to his special brand of Eezee-Lite Muzak.
I'd like to say that this was the one that MST3K missed - but I think even they had standards. And for that, we should be truly grateful.
