Reviews

A feature of this database that I always enjoy is comparing the reviews of ordinary people to my own point of view on any particular film that I know well. It often happens that a movie that I enjoy very much is trashed as something really terrible. And it works both ways which brings us to Daisy Clover. I find the amount of positive feedback on this film mystifying. There are two things in particular about this movie, which make it impossible for me to enjoy. Number one is that even as a teenager when I saw this movie and it first came out I knew enough about 1930s Hollywood films to know that the appearance of almost everything in this film, with the possible exception of the automobiles is wrong. I don't expect documentary historical accuracy from costume make up and hairdressing departments. However, in most cases even in 1960s films, there were some attempts at referencing period fashion. In this case, all of those departments which include Edith Head have handed us a visual experience that is so 100% 1960s that it really is quite distracting all the time.

I can only surmise that Edith head must have been instructed to do this by her employer because she certainly knew exactly how to bring the 1930s back to life left to her own devices.

Then we come to the overwhelming implausibility of the storyline. I know that it is true that some young talent were shipped out to Hollywood on the basis of some photographs in a magazine or from a beauty contest etc., etc., but what studio had was ever moved to leave his plush office surroundings to visit a teenage girl who had made a record, even if it only was as far as the Santa Monica beaches. There were dozens of people at Hollywood Studios in those days whose job it was to do exactly that so that studio heads did not have to. The other reviewers have already piled on to the acting, singing, staging of the musical numbers and other areas which I will leave well enough alone. It is nice that some people enjoy this movie and good for them. I have enjoyed being appalled by it.

Considering the resources that were brought to bare in terms of the actors actresses, and the production, this should have been a lot better than it is. I know it is not a documentary but at the same time the whole thing looks way too modern for 1937. This applies includes the costumes make up and hairdressing. In terms of the storyline, I have often said, leave Agatha Christie alone, she does not need any help from anyone. The overlong prologue on the early life of Hercule Poirot does not advance Miss Christie's murder mystery plot. Neither do the politically correct additions in terms of race and sexuality. I also don't know why they bothered to go to Egypt because I think most of it is generated by computers.

The good thing about novels being turned into movies is they sometimes do make you curious about the original source material. That is why many people, including myself have actually read Dodsworth, War and Peace, Auntie Mame, Gone With the Wind, Mildred Pierce, Great Expectations, and on and on. With the exception of Gone With the Wind and Dodsworth, movies, usually suffer by comparison. Auntie Mame I find actually makes a better movie, even though they have turned it into an all out comedy, which in its original form it is not. I expect I will find the same result, as I am reading death on the Nile and its original form.

Wrongheaded critics: There are more than one user reviews posted here including one that says the film should get zero stars because it deals with slavery. I think such an attitude about a movie that was made at any time let alone the 1930s is absurd. Are they supposed to pretend that slavery in the 1700s somehow did not exist and that many many people were involved in this trade? It's idiotic. The film clearly shows that there were those risking their lives in opposition to the slave trade and that there were others who were corrupted by the wealth and power that they gained from it. So to those pretentious and moralistic critics, I say get off your self righteous high horse and look at this film and all others in its proper historical context.

Why don't performers put away some money for a rainy day.

Many of the reviews of this film mention the sadness of watching successful actors reduced to performing in this sloppy material. Maybe I missed it but nobody mentions the brief appearance of actress Freida Inescort who appeared in some of the top films of her day including Pride and Prejudice where she worked with both Lawrence Olivier and Greer Garson and the great Bette Davis vehicle The Letter where she plays Leslie Crosby's best friend and neighbor plus numerous other is if you look her up. Now neither she nor Tom Conway nor Chester Morris were ever top earners or a big stars but they earned decent salaries for years and I can only think that somehow they really must've needed the money to perform in a turkey like this one. I guess it's just a lack of foresight and some bad planning/luck. Let it be a lesson to us all.

I admit that I probably would not have noticed this except that Turner Classics played these two movies back to back as part of her star of the month recognition. It says in this trivia section that in Operator 13 we will see the only appearance of Marion Davies in black face. She can also be plainly seen although briefly in black face in the film Goin' Hollywood with Bing Crosby. At the end of her saying she even hugs Stuart Irwin and leaves a big dark smudge on his cheek. Having said that I would like to add that I think that Miss Davies would've done much better if she had not appeared in the overblown overstuffed overdressed extravaganzas that William Randolph Hearst caused to be built around her. I don't think that Mr. Hearst had faith in her talent and was trying to float her stardom on an ocean of somewhat unnecessary production values. His peculiar fetish of finding ways to invent a scene in which she should be dressed as a boy but in a rather unconvincing manner always winds up being rather a distraction. But I still like her, she was a trooper.

The future Countess of Carnarvon has a small role in this film.

I don't think that any of the other film fans who have written reviews here have brought it up so I would like to mention some interesting facts about the actress Tilly Losch. Aside from her ethnic dance in this film she plays a similar character in The Good Earth as a sing song girl who becomes the second wife of Wang Lung. Her film career is not notable but some of the rest of her life certainly is especially the fact that between 1938 and 1947 she was married to the Earl of Carnarvon who's ancestral home is the now famous Highclere Castle- better known to television audiences as Downton Abbey. The previous Earl of Carnarvon was world famous in his own right for providing the funds that led to the discovery of King Tut's tomb. There is some interesting information on the complexion of her marriage and how she fit into British high society to anyone who wants to do the research. But aside from that after the end of her marriage she reinvented herself yet again as an artist and I believe she even has work that has found its way into museums. This is a lady who when she is given lemons make lemonade.

You lost me during the credits.

I have never expected nor particularly desired much historical accuracy from a Hollywood movie having to deal with ancient Egypt. Maybe this generation has developed extended powers when it comes to the concept "suspension of disbelief". Or maybe they are less informed and less educated than previous generations but during the opening panorama when I see that they are showing pyramids on both sides of the Nile I have to say to myself "oh come on now! How stupid do you think we are?" I almost stopped watching right there but I said no let's see and I did find it a bit of an amusing roller coaster ride and I thought to myself to some people computer generated effects seem to be all they really need. From where I sit special effects frequently usurp character development and any empathy we might have for any of these actors and actresses. According to this page, this film is going to lose a lot of money so maybe in the future we will see more attention to the script the script and the script. One can only hope. The film is mildly entertaining and has some interesting art direction and costume design but for the huge amount of money they spent one could expect something more.

Whether this film is parody, Camp, surrealism, tongue-in-cheek or satire doesn't really matter. The only reason that I can see for it's being made is everybody got to go on vacation in Puerto Rico. If they were lucky the film generated enough income to pay for the travel expenses of the cast and crew and maybe some second rate hotel accommodations. It would have been worth the trip for me as much as I enjoy the ocean and maybe I would have gotten an opportunity to learn to scuba dive. I let it play because I was too lazy to look for the remote being semi-comatose after a gym workout on a hot and humid day.

I have always enjoyed silly tacky monster movies like this since I was a child. I must've missed this one somehow when it first came out and I don't remember ever seeing it on television before so naturally I had to give it a try. For me the most interesting part is the appearance of a great star, namely Cyd Charisse, in a very small role. It reminds me of seeing Joan Crawford in Trog and thinking "oh dear why did you have to do this?" At least Miss Charisse playing her part of some sort of a queen had a costume that showed that her legs were still good! I am hoping that she did it out of boredom because I hate to think that she needed the money that bad but I suppose we will never know how a Hollywood queen wound up in this second rate vehicle. Oh well that's show business.

One of the great disappointments to me about the world that we live in today is that it is readily apparent that no one knows how to use a dictionary anymore. One of the principles but I try to apply to my daily life and which I often say to others is "words have meaning". There is nothing blithe about this movie or any of the characters in it.

Look it up!

So far as I can see this movie is nothing more than an attempt to make a quick buck by using the name of Noel Coward and the star power of Judi Dench. Except for the underlying premise of an uninvited spirit the storyline in no way resembles anything intended by Noel Coward. The protagonist and his two wives are all thoroughly unlikable. As they get most of the screen time this is truly problematic. Judy Dench does manage to bring some charm to a completely under written role.

This brings to mind the fiasco of the 2008 version of another classic which is "The Women" based on the play by Clare Booth Luce. That drivel was another attempt to cash in on the name of a well remembered vehicle with an all-star cast as presented by MGM. The result is a storyline which has nothing to do with what The author had originally intended to present to us. In terms of sets costumes and locations it is visually attractive. But that is all.

Which brings me to my point. Write your own story and let it rise or fall on its own merits and stop trying to squeeze the last penny out of someone else's achievements. Of course that would require some real talent and creativity none of which is evident here.

In spite of its fairly high rating I noticed a few extremely negative reviews about this film and all I can say is... You people should get over yourself. Don't they realize it was never intended to be anything more than a sexy little romp with swimming pools and gymnasiums in the background? One thing that has always been true of show business in all it's forms is that sex sells tickets. Nothing has changed since this film was made. This plot which revolves around a magazine that relies on sexy photographs to sell copies is exactly the world we live in today.

Maybe I am wrong but in recent years has it not been true that the magazine called sports illustrated sells more copies of its "swimsuit issue" than any other. At least this film gives the well-built young men equal time with the athletic young women that are featured here. Whenever possible film makers showed actresses with as little clothing as they could get away with but you almost never see a man with his shirt off and considering the physiques of many of the male stars there's a good reason for that. The great actors of that era were mostly famous from the neck up.

There are so many scenes in this movie that are artistically composed and beautifully lit and are under scored with great music but unfortunately I can not tell what one scene has to do with another. I don't know who's dreaming who is awake or really what the hell is going on at any given moment.

I challenge any individual who gave this a 10 out of 10 review to tell me what it's about. If somebody asked me I would say the story is about people who sit on a bridge and blow air into a bottle till it makes it sort of a low music note and then after that really bad things happen. And then so what? I have no problem with very drawn out long story lines that take a long time to develop. For God sake I watched 88 episodes of Game of Thrones just to see who would wind up sitting on one but this was completely unsatisfying. There was no character in it that I cared about. By the time I was halfway through I was already thinking there's no way that they can make sense out of these plot lines. I only watched the rest of it just to see if I was right. If I had paid money to see it in the theater I would've asked for my money back.

I was watching The Millionaire today with George Arliss and went into the database to refresh my memory of the matinee idol David Manners. As I was reading through his stage and film credits I noticed that one of them was "The Baretts of Wimpole Street 1934 with Claudette Colbert. In my opinion even a novitiate film fan knows that the 1934 film by that name is starring Norma Shearer and Frederick March. It should be noted that not even the best databases can be counted on to be accurate 100% of the time. But this one is a biggie I hope somebody notices my comment.

I was watching a very expensive Hollywood film with lots of excellent special effects but I got bored and looked for something else and I came upon this little gem. The movie that I was watching had such a convoluted and needlessly complex storyline that I knew there was no way that all of it could be recapitulated in a satisfactory manner.

"Wet Asphalt" has a very well defined story about irresponsible journalists that was easy to follow for one but also seemed completely relevant when applied to today's world when there is so much questionable journalism on network TV, cable TV and social media. For many years I have said that while Stars and performances are very important the script is really everything.

The lore of Hollywood tells us that once upon a time the head of production at MGM, Irving Thalberg, had said "if the audience sees a movie that is great for the last 10 minutes they will go away feeling that they saw a great movie". I wish that today screen writers would think about this before they indulge themselves in overly complicated plot lines that leave you with multiple unanswered questions.

There's really not much I can add to the comments posted about this bizarre film. I really only looked up this movie to see if I could find out anything about why one of the sets that is destroyed during the alien invasion has a picture of Hitler on it. Aside from that the only entertainment value in this movie is seeing just how bad a movie can be whether it came from Hollywood ,Japan or anywhere else. Anything knows anything about the "Hitler building" please make a post for me as I will check in from time to time, thank you!

I have to reluctantly agree to just about everything I've read in the reviews attached to this movie. Just as the characters They are portraying, Miss Dietrich and Mr. DiSica must have needed the money they could earn from this. And like a lot of other performers there was probably a bit of 'what else am I going to do -stay home?' At least they got to go to Monaco and probably stay in first class hotels. I was not in the least bit disappointed in the job done by Jean-Louis in regards to Miss Dietrichs wardrobe. Fortunately for me I will watch a film just to see the gowns. But I really read all of the reviews out of curiosity to see if anyone noticed what I think is true about this movie and that is as best as I can remember there's not a single close-up of Miss D. Well known for being almost fanatical about her image I propose that this was her own doing as a way of protecting herself from the usually snide and sometimes vicious critics who love to take aim at aging actresses in a way that their male counterparts usually do not have to suffer. I would watch it again and let many other aging actresses keep me company on late night television. I have seen recent films that cost 200 times more to make that still have less entertainment value.

No one can deny that Jim Jarmusch has done some, even a lot of good things over the years which is why this movie is so inexplicable. The only reason to watch it is to see if it can possibly be as bad as people say it is. I can't understand why any of the excellent actors and actresses in this cast agreed to do this. Any further discussion is just adding one waste of time on top of another.

One of the reviewer's complains that people are reviewing a movie that they have not seen the full version of and I just have seen what claims to be a fully restored version on TCM. It runs Close to two hours. I often enjoy movies that are quite terrible but somehow are unintentionally funny Or in someway watchable. But for myself only, I just found this really silly and boring. The one interesting thing about it is well photographed scenery and architecture. I gave it a four for that. But it unfortunately is not a travel log. We have "travel talks" for that. And yes, Peter Lorre is cute and fun as the taxi driver.

I read with dismay the poor reviews given by people who say that the story moves too slowly. It is not a James Bond movie. It is not an action film. Life itself moved at a much slower pace in 1940. The fastest ship available still took four days to cross the Atlantic ocean. It seems that some viewers have the attention span of a flea. It is alarming to me that so many young people that I encounter seem to have little or no knowledge of American history. But that is a topic for another day. I think this miniseries is an excellent warning to us all about how much damage can be done by a few individuals occupying the highest offices of our government. Take notice and beware.

I guess I'm writing to review the reviewer. This guy mentioned above I noticed was the only one on the Footlight Parade page to give it a rating of one and proceed to trash mercilessly every single thing in the movie from James Cagney's dancing to Busby Berkeley's production numbers. He does the same thing here with 42nd St. and with 4 Footlight parade he actually wrote in on two separate occasions making remarks along the same lines. This guy is what my aunts used to call "a pill".-Bitter and hard to swallow. Absolutely no sense of humor or fun. I will be on the lookout for this characters reviews in the future because do you know what? I will bet that he doesn't like anything. I have known a number of people in my life who are not happy about anything unless they can find something to criticize and I expect that this is another example. I wonder what he or she has ever done in their life that is so much better.

Of course these movies are terribly silly because they were not intended to be taken seriously from the get go. The one and only purpose was to distract the depression weary audiences from their many woes for an hour and a half at a price that they could afford which in those days was sometimes five or Ten cents. That's a lot of entertainment for the price. Goodness knows I have seen movies recently that cost 100 times what it cost to make these pictures and yet they are almost unwatchable even with an all star cast. Sam Pam Bam... Lighten up!

I have read carefully all of the reviews posted here and I agree very much with most of what has been said. It is problematic that some of these ladies were a little bit old for their parts. It is also clear that much talent has been wasted particularly in the cases of Ann Miller who does not get to dance and Dolores Gray who does not get to sing outside of the voiceover during the titles. Most people would not even notice that the great character actoress Celia Lovsky is given literally nothing to do except appear in one of the backstage scenes and speak one or two brief lines in the bedroom scene. Some of the tiniest details have been missmanaged such as the fact that when the character of Mary holds up her hand and declaims "Jungle Red !" her fingernails are not red at all. Of course the biggest problems are the script and the script and the script. The men and the musical numbers that have been inserted into the original storyline seem to be merely distract rather than enhance. If I try really hard and pretend that the original 1939 version does not exist then this movie can seems not so bad except that I have not really been able to convince even myself to stretch imagination that far. I also agree the one person who makes the most of of her part is Dolores Gray . Even the great Agnes Moorehead seems to be overacting dreadfully trying to make something out of nothing as the part of the Countess is woefully cut down. One thing that MGM really did manage to deliver is the look of this film. The set designers in general and the costume designer in particular really held up their end of the bargain.

But the point I really want to make is why I think this movie was even made at all. In my mind the only thing that makes any sense is that whatever deal they made with the author, Clare Booth Luce, allowed MGM to do so and they could get a few more bucks out of it which is really why most remakes are foisted upon us.

And another thing... If you compare The Opposite Sex to the latest remake- I think in 2008- it suddenly becomes brilliant! That abomination completely misses the point of the story that Miss Luce was trying to tell us. But that is another story entirely.