So, I think I was predisposed to not liking Robert Benton's 1979 Best Picture winner Kramer vs. Kramer. I mean, firstly it's the sort of saccharine weepie movie that I just don't like. I mean, gimme something that earns it and I'll cry like a baby (I'm looking at you Thelma & Louise, Dancer in the Dark, etc), but movies like this think you should be getting the tissues out purely by virtue of the type of movie it is. That doesn't score points with me. And then secondly, the big one, it was the film that beat my favourite film of all-time to Oscar glory. That would be All That Jazz, of course. The movie that won four Oscars but when it came to the major stuff it lost them all to Kramer (notably Best Picture, Director, Actor and Screenplay - of of which are leaps and bounds ahead of Kramer vs Kramer).So, it came as a slight surprise that I didn't altogether hate the movie. Meryl Streep and Jane Alexander were great in their nominated supporting roles (Streep of course got her first of two Oscar wins out of this movie) and the writing was good. Those final few scenes were really well done. I confess to not being a Dustin Hoffman fan in general (I'm not sure what it is), nor was I a fan of this kid whoever he is.
But in the end, the whole thing just didn't grab me. You know how it's gonna go from the opening frames. The movie sits side-by-side on the Best Picture mantle with Ordinary People from 1980. Two strangely contemporary movies, but Kramer isn't as good as Ordinary, a movie that doesn't get enough of it's due in these days. But, how odd is it to compare 1979 to 2001. 2001 had an audacious musical in the form of Moulin Rouge! lose out to a safe hearttugger. Oh well, just like All That Jazz get's praise these days much more than Kramer, Moulin Rouge! will be the film that people discuss in 20 years and go see in retrospectives, while A Beautiful Mind gets a spot as Midday movie fodder. C
5 comments:
C??? What???
Not a Dustin Hoffman fan???
I love this film. It may not hold a candle to Thelma and Louise or Dancer in the Dark, but it's still better than 95% of movies that are made. It was also a huge critical and audience favorite, which is why it won. It hit struck a nerve at that time in the popular imagination. Hardly a Beautiful Mind vs. Moulin Rouge situation.
Well, I have no idea how it actually played out back in 1980, but I just thought it was funny the similarities. A safe dialogue-driven drama against a radically audacious musical fantasy.
And again, I was just saying that T&L and DitD earn their make-me-cry stripes. KvK felt like it deserved them and didn't feel the need to actually make me cry. Like they were saying "THIS KID IS BEING TAKEN AWAY FROM HIS PARENT!!!! IT'S REALLY SAD!!! CRY GOD DAMMIT!!!!!"
...yeah. And I'm not a Hoffman fan. Or, I am when he does comedy like I Heart Huckabees. I sorta hated him in Midnight Cowboy
Oh, and much like Kramer Vs Kramer, A Beautiful Mind had a really big box-office take for a drama film compared to All That Jazz and Moulin Rouge!, which were only mid-range successes.
And KvK and ABM were both could've been directed by anyone and aren't seen as director's films whereas ATJ and MR! are definitely projects of their director's makings and are by true geniuses.
...And, yeah, All That Jazz and Moulin Rouge! are both in my Top 10 of all time. And I also give ABM a C. The similarities are sorta scaring me.
i see you spent your saturday afternoon as productively as i did...
i hadn't seen KvK since it was released and was really struck this time by how dated it is - the whole going to california to "find herself", women power, talking about her shrink, the father/child alienation, the general beigeness of everything. was 1979 really that long ago? (don't answer that, i just remembered what birthday you're about to celebrate)
i liked the kid, didn't mind dustin and loved meryl (just watch her in the courtroom scene trying not to make eye contact with jane alexander)
but i too prefer all that jazz
I actually taped it and watched it on Sunday so I could fast forward the ads.
lol.
I got nothing better to do!
I was surprised to see it was nominated for Best Cinematography, considering there was nothing remotely special about it.
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