Somehow I had never really heard of this film until it was picked for a movie night. Not sure how, since it was nominated for multiple Oscars and won one of them. I also walked into it with no idea what genre it would be. I think I assumed drama, just based on the cast and plot outline.
I was very wrong. It didn't take long into the movie for me to see some of the strong comedy moments. I was pleasantly surprised to get a lot of very hilarious scenes and characters. My biggest enjoyment was Norma Cassady. That character was just so over the top and wonderful. I want to see a spinoff with just her reacting to different environments.
Now don't get me wrong, Julie Andrews is always wonderful in everything. Her musical scenes were all great as expected. James Garner and Robert Preston were also enjoyable, and Alex Karras (Mongo) surprised me with his acting skills.
The only real negative I have is with the runtime. This movie feels about 20-30min too long. I don't really know where to cut this time after the first act, but the movie just feels like it should have ended sooner. The first act took a long time for me to get into it too. I was worried that the whole film would be this slow, but luckily it picks up about 15min in and sticks to that the rest of the way.
If you've never seen this, I'd certainly recommend giving it a viewing. I think you'll have a good time, especially if you watch it with a few friends.
An actress pretends to be a man.
The issue that I had with this movie really has nothing to do with the movie itself, but more due to the fact that it was nothing like what I was expecting. I was expecting a typical classic movie where a girl dresses as a guy to get a head in a man's world...etc. But it was so much more complicated than that. Yes, it's about a girl who pretends to be a guy, but she pretends to be a queer guy who is a cross-dresser pretending to be a girl. She fakes a gay relationship with another man and has to deal with falling in love with a straight man while pretending to be a gay guy. There's just so much drama and run around. And then, it is so much more risque than I was expecting. Very open talk about sex, nudity, lots of raunchy dancing and singing. And while none of that is necessarily bad in and of itself, it is quite shocking when you're expecting the typical classic, feel-good musical. And this is not that. Not a bad movie, and may have enjoyed it more had I known what I was getting myself into.
Shout by Phil DevereuxBlockedParent2016-12-17T13:11:03Z
A lot of fun and surprisingly progressive for 1982!