Well-written piece, Matthew! Everything about the film sounds so bad, but also sounds very early 90s, trying to appeal to the Skinemax crowd, but with just a touch of class in the moral dilemma. Except the execution is so poor, the class is nowhere to be found.
I don't know what I'm talking about. Movie bad, review good!
Interesting & worthwhile review—a contrast, it sounds like, from the movie :) I've never seen the movie—a life choice I feel ratified in after reading this—but at the time I heard about it, of course,* and your thoughts on the difficulty of their making Robert Redford, acting like a creep, into a romantic lead reminds me of a joke I heard around the time the movie came out: "Would you sleep with Robert Redford for a million dollars?" "Sure, but you'd have to give me some time to come up with the money."
Which leads me to another thought: there was a meme some years ago about "what movie would be improved if you remade it exactly as is except swapping Danny Devito into one of the roles?".** This sounds like it would have been a good answer!
* I think when people complain they don't make adult (i.e. mature, not x-rated) movies any more, what they mean is that they used to be central to cultural conversation in the sense that of COURSE I'd have HEARD of this implies, whereas nowadays the movies you heard about tend to be franchises.
** I still like my answer from the time: Gone with the Wind, with Danny Devito swapped into the role of every single character in the movie, from Rhett and Scarlett on down to the extras.
Thanks! I love the Danny DeVito idea, and I'll have to remember it for future movies like this when I'm thinking of ways they could have been improved.
Such a bad movie!! Wait what happens at the end? Does she end up on her own and blazing a trail to GI Jane? I like Demi in a fair share of films but this one 🫤
Well-written piece, Matthew! Everything about the film sounds so bad, but also sounds very early 90s, trying to appeal to the Skinemax crowd, but with just a touch of class in the moral dilemma. Except the execution is so poor, the class is nowhere to be found.
I don't know what I'm talking about. Movie bad, review good!
Interesting & worthwhile review—a contrast, it sounds like, from the movie :) I've never seen the movie—a life choice I feel ratified in after reading this—but at the time I heard about it, of course,* and your thoughts on the difficulty of their making Robert Redford, acting like a creep, into a romantic lead reminds me of a joke I heard around the time the movie came out: "Would you sleep with Robert Redford for a million dollars?" "Sure, but you'd have to give me some time to come up with the money."
Which leads me to another thought: there was a meme some years ago about "what movie would be improved if you remade it exactly as is except swapping Danny Devito into one of the roles?".** This sounds like it would have been a good answer!
* I think when people complain they don't make adult (i.e. mature, not x-rated) movies any more, what they mean is that they used to be central to cultural conversation in the sense that of COURSE I'd have HEARD of this implies, whereas nowadays the movies you heard about tend to be franchises.
** I still like my answer from the time: Gone with the Wind, with Danny Devito swapped into the role of every single character in the movie, from Rhett and Scarlett on down to the extras.
Thanks! I love the Danny DeVito idea, and I'll have to remember it for future movies like this when I'm thinking of ways they could have been improved.
Such a bad movie!! Wait what happens at the end? Does she end up on her own and blazing a trail to GI Jane? I like Demi in a fair share of films but this one 🫤