Gideon58's Reviews

The Blind Side is the 2009 biographical drama that examines the relationship between a wealthy socialite named Leigh Ann Tuohy and a homeless teenager named Michael Oher, who would eventually go on to a successful career in college football and would be the 2009 round one draft pick by the Baltimore Ravens.

The film is supposed to be about the relationship between these two central characters; however, their relationship is not the primary focus of the film, as it should be, which is the main reason the film doesn't really work as it should.

Sandra Bullock won an Oscar for Outstanding Lead Actress for her performance as Leigh Ann, a strong-willed matriarch with a heart as big as all outdoors who sees Michael walking on a deserted road in the rain one night and, upon learning he has no place to stay, decides to take him in and it is the slow burn of the relationship between Leigh Ann and Michael that is supposed to be the heart of this story; unfortunately, I found the relationship that develops between Michael and Leigh Ann's son, SJ, a lot more compelling than his relationship with Leigh Ann.

I also think the film loses points for trying to encompass a little too much. The film begins to veer off track as we watch Leigh Ann being mocked by her high society girlfriends and watch Michael being tracked down by the NAACP when Leigh Ann's motives for helping Michael come into question. Writer director John Lee Hancock should have kept the focus of his screenplay where it seems to belong...on Leigh Ann's dedication to helping Michael carve out a new life for himself via a career in college football. Despite the fact that the basis of her inspiration for him lies in some kind of test he took where he allegedly made high scores in the category of "protective instincts." I went to high school and college and don't remember ever having taken any kind of test regarding "protective instincts", though it does provide the impetus for one of Bullock's best moments in the film, where she interrupts Michael's troublesome football practice by offering familial analogies to help Michael do what he has to do on that field.

The fact that this story is based on real people and events also had me questioning certain parts of the story and their credibility, which easily could have been glossed over or altered for the sake of a more entertaining story. I find it a little hard to believe that Leigh Ann's husband and family were so immediately accepting of Leigh Ann's decision to bring this stranger into their home. I also found it troubling that before beginning proceedings to become Michael's legal guardian that Leigh Ann actually went to Michael's crack-addicted mother to let the woman know what her plans were and the fact that Leigh Ann wasn't troubled by the fact that the woman wasn't terribly upset by the news was also troubling.

Sandra Bullock gives a solid performance as Leigh Ann and I understand to a point why she won the Oscar...it was her turn I guess, but personally, I think Bullock has done better work. For the record though, I LOVE Bullock as a blonde.

Country singer Tim McGraw charms as Leigh Ann's wealthy husband, who just seems to go along with everything Leigh Ann wants a little too easily and I find it hard to believe that the real Sean Tuohy was as easy going about this whole thing as the character in the movie is. Quinton Aaron is refreshingly natural as Michael as is Jae Head as young SJ. Mention should also be made of a very entertaining performance by Ray McKinnon as Michael's high school football coach, who is initially baffled by Michael but loved taking credit for everything he did.

John Lee Hancock had a very Oscar-baity story here that he is only partially successful in presenting. Despite problems in story construction and improper focus on character relationships, the film is worth checking out, but it is not everything that it has been made out to be.

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John Hughes and Chris Columbus teamed together to bring us one of the biggest box office smashes of 1990...a little thing called Home Alone. A comedy that not only made a lot of money but made a genuine movie star out of the young actor playing the lead role.

Macaulay Culkin lights up the screen as a young man named Kevin McAllister, a young boy who actually gets left behind when his family goes out of town for Christmas. Surprisingly, Kevin's realization that his family got on a plane without him sits pretty well with him and he settles into the ultimate kid's fantasy of having the whole house to himself. Unfortunately, playtime is cut short when a couple of bumbling thieves (Joe Pesci, Daniel Stern) somehow get wind of the fact that Kevin is alone in the house, setting in motion a cartoon-like, cat and mouse game between good kid and the bad crooks that puts the best Tom and Jerry cartoons to shame.

The film's enjoyment lies in the viewer's complete acceptance of the premise as a fantasy. Yes, Kevin is part of a very large family, but there is NO way any family would get on a plane to leave the country without double and triple checking to make sure that all the kids are present and there is also NO way that two grown men couldn't overpower a child if they wanted to. If you can check these two large lapses in cinematic logic at the door, the film can be enjoyable. Yes, the cartoon-like violence that occurs between Kevin and the crooks is a little over the top, but it is what makes the film so funny.

Culkin charms in the title role and Pesci and Stern work well together as Kevin's bumbling tormentors. Mention should also be made of Catherine O'Hara and John Heard as Kevin's parents, who are very funny in the opening scenes. Chris Columbus' direction seems to be based on Warner Brothers cartoons, but who doesn't like Warner Brothers cartoons? So check your brain at the door and you'll see why this film was one of the biggest hits of 1990.

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Good reviews. Not seen Silver Linings Playbook yet, though it's on my list.

Martin Lawrence had one of his best roles in an overlooked and underrated 1999 comedy called Blue Streak.

Lawrence plays Miles Logan, a master thief who, prior to being arrested during a diamond heist, hid a very large diamond in the heating duct on the 4th floor of a building that was still under construction. A few years later, Logan is released and goes straight to the building and is blown away to discover that it is now a police station. Following a few lame attempts to get to the 4th floor, Logan realizes he has no option but to impersonate a police officer in order to get into the building. Things get stickier when the manufactured credentials that were created for him lead to his being put in charge of a major drug trafficking sting operation. He also finds himself genuinely caring about his rookie partner (Luke Wilson), who has come to idealize him, making it even more difficult for Logan to keep his eye on the prize.

This comedy consistently entertains primarily thanks to Lawrence's ability to keep Miles Logan likable, no matter what he does. Yes, it is a little unsettling to believe that it is this easy to impersonate a police officer and move through the ranks so quickly. It's hard to accept the fact that Logan doesn't slip up long before he does, but the viewer forgives and accepts because we like Miles and more important, his partner and his superior officers like him, so we want the charade to work and yes, we really want to see him get that diamond back.

Luke Wilson is charming as Logan's partner and in a refreshing change of pace, William Forsythe is on the right side of the law as Logan's commanding officer. Dave Chappelle also provides a few chuckles as an old acquaintance of Logan's who threatens to blow his cover. There is a well-staged shoot-out and a finale that will have you on the edge of your seat. 8/10

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Celebrity is Woody Allen's overblown and unfocused look at the deconstruction of a marriage and what the effects of the pursuit of celebrity and having celebrity thrust upon them do to the couple as they drift apart.

The 1998 film stars Kenneth Branaugh, far removed from the Shakespeare kings he was famous for prior to this, playing Lee Simon, a magazine writer who began and deserted writing a novel in favor of writing a screenplay. Lee was married to Robin (Judy Davis), a former schoolteacher and neurotic mess, who finds herself immediately attracted to a television executive (Joe Mantegna).

Lee's pursuit finds him agreeing to re-write his screenplay in order to get a famous actress (Melanie Griffith) who he is interviewing to do it and we are about two thirds of the way into the story before we meet the actor (Leonardo DiCaprio) Lee really wrote the screenplay for, an arrogant superstar with anger issues.

In the meantime, we watch the frightfully insecure Robin blossom through the career her new lover carves out for her, which actually leads to her becoming the anchorperson for a TV entertainment magazine and fighting everything that happens to her every step of the way.

Despite it being one of the Woodmeister's messier works, it definitely has its virtues, primarily the bravura performances of Branaugh and Davis in the leads. We've seen a lot of actors over the year appear in Woody's films as extensions of Woody and I can't recall an actor who channeled Woody better than Branaugh does here (John Cusack came close in Bullets Over Broadway). There are moments where you can close your eyes during Branaugh's scenes and you swear you're hearing Woody and with Branaugh playing this role, it is a lot easier to accept the various beautiful females who Lee becomes attracted to here. And there are very few actresses on the planet who play "hot mess" better than Judy Davis...Davis makes Robin, vulnerable, heartbreaking, funny, and endlessly fascinating. Love when she starts the fight with Lee in the movie theater during the screening, it's such a beautifully human event that still hits the funny bone. Or when Lee tries to break up with his girlfriend Bonnie (Famke Janssen) who starts screaming at him in front of moving men bringing her belongings into the apartment.

There are also memorable moments offered by Charlize Theron as an arrogant supermodel, Winona Ryder as a struggling actress, Bebe Neuwirth as a hooker, and Aida Turturro as a psychic, but it is the on-target performances of Branaugh and Davis that make up for a screenplay that doesn't seem to be exactly sure what it's trying to say. 7.5/10

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A Pocketful of Miracles is a sparkling 1961 comedy, based on a Damon Runyan work, that was the final directorial assignment of the legendary Frank Capra. It is actually a remake of a 1933 film called Lady for a Day.

This film stars Glenn Ford as Dave the Dude, a highly superstitious gangster who buys an apple every day from a peddler named Apple Annie (Bette Davis) because he believes her apples bring him good luck. One day, Dave panics when Annie is not at her usual spot peddling her wares. Upon tracking her down, he learns that she is frightened because she is about see her daughter Louise for the first time since she was a child. Louise has been living a luxurious life in Spain with a wealthy Count and his son, to whom she is engaged. Annie admits to Dave that she has exaggerated about her life in the letters that she has written to her daughter, so Dave, with the assistance of his moll, Queenie Martin (Hope Lange) decide they are going to make Annie appear like a queen for her daughter's visit.

This classic comedy effortlessly utilizes Damon Runyan-like characters in a warm family story that is irresistible. Davis has rarely been so warm and vulnerable onscreen and it is fun seeing her reunited with Ford for the first time since the 1941 melodrama A Stolen Life. Peter Falk received a Best Supporting Actor nomination for his hilarious performance as Joy Boy, Dave's stooge. The impressive supporting cast includes Arthur O'Connell, David Brian, Edward Everett Horton, Sheldon Leonard, and Thomas Mitchell. Ann-Margret makes her film debut here, playing Louise, but the most pleasant surprise here is the performance by Hope Lange as Queenie Martin....this kind of character is such a refreshing change of pace for Lange. Queenie is brassy and unsentimental, a stark contrast from the "Cut-my-arm-off-if-it-will-make your-life-easier" characters that she usually played.

For a film that is almost 60 years old, this film still impresses thanks to an entertaining story, a sterling all-star cast, and the directorial magic of Frank Capra. 8/10

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Steve Martin became an official movie star via a 1979 comedy that became an instant classic called The Jerk, a comedy that is silly, improbable, and constantly strains the boundaries of logic and continuity, but provides consistent laughs anyway.

Martin plays Navin Johnson, the adopted son of a family of black sharecroppers, who had no idea that he was adopted ("You mean I'm gonna stay this color?"), who finally leaves the comfort of the Missouri farm where he was raised to find his "special purpose". We watch as Navin inexplicably becomes the sex slave of a circus performer named Patty (Caitlin Adams), who has him convinced that this is his special purpose. When he does escape Patty's iron grip, he does find happiness with a cosmotologist named Marie (Bernadette Peters), while at the same time, inventing a special kind of eyeglasses that make him a billionaire and turns him into a bum almost as quickly, which is where Navin is when we meet him at the beginning of the film, which is actually told in flashback.

Carl Reiner's energetic direction and a hysterical screenplay by Martin, Carl Gottleib, and Michael Elias work in sync beautifully to bring us a rolling-on-the-floor-funny story that despite the absolute ridiculous and stupid things that happen to Navin, we find ourselves buying it and being behind the character. We laugh when Navin finally realizes that he's not black and we laugh when a psycho played by M. Emmett Walsh picks Navin's name out of a phone book and decides to murder him and we laugh when for his first date with Marie, Navin orders dinner from Pizza in a Cup. We even laugh when Navin hits it big and has his dream house built and offers us a description of the various rooms.

Martin is wonderful in the title role and always keeps Navin likable and he has a very nice onscreen chemistry with Bernadette Peters, which actually led to a brief real life romance and an onscreen reunion 2 years later in Pennies from Heaven, I also loved Richard Ward and Mabel King as Navin's adopted parents and Bill Macy as the guy who partners Navin in his eyeglass invention, which comes to be known as "Opti-Grab."

Nothing deep here, just one laugh after another right up to the slightly contrived ending, which I can forgive because the journey to that point had me on the floor. 7.5/10

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I love The Jerk. Probably my favorite comedy.

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The late John Cassavetes and his wife, Gena Rowlands were able to carve an impressive niche into cinema history while Cassavetes was still alive, but the zenith of their work together had to be the 1974 film A Woman Under the Influence an explosive and blistering look at mental illness from a perspective that has been rarely explored onscreen.

Most films dealing with characters with mental issues take place after the diagnosis has been made and the character is either in therapy or has been committed. This film takes a different tack as we meet Mabel, a suburban housewife and mother of 3 played by Rowlands, whose mental issues initially appear to be something as simple as bipolar personality, something that can be dealt with via medication, but it is clear as we see Mabel interact in various social situations, that there are serious mental issues going on here, but for some reason, no one really wants to talk about it. Her husband Nick (Peter Falk) knows there is something wrong, but is still harboring a great deal of denial about it, despite the fact that he absolutely blows up at anyone else even hinting at the fact that there is something wrong with Mabel. There are moments where we see Nick punishing Mabel for behavior she doesn't know how to control for the sake of his own denial and it is heartbreaking to watch. It is also heartbreaking that Mabel is unsure of what's going on but gauges everything through her children....as long as her children love her, she doesn't care what anyone else says.

This film is such a troubling watch because we want Mabel to get help and we see the people in her orbit walking on eggshells around her instead of telling her what she needs to hear. It is almost 2/3 of the way into the film before Mabel is actually committed and even sadder is the fact that when she's released, she really doesn't seem any better.

Gena Rowlands delivers the most powerful performance of her career as Mabel, a master class in acting that won her a Golden Globe and an Oscar nomination. Rowlands is gutsy and unhinged and absolutely riveting in a role that would be any actress' dream. Mabel is warm and sad and frightening. The scenes where she tries to fight Nick's decision to commit her and her eyes literally roll in the back of her head and the scene where she's in the street screaming at strangers in an effort to find out what time it is because she has to meet her kids' school bus are absolutely devastating. The school bus scene is especially powerful because Mabel appears so mentally shredded you're convinced that she isn't even in the right place to meet the bus and you're surprised when the bus actually shows up. Rowlands so completely commands the screen with this performance that during the 30-45 minutes when her character is not screen (when Mabel has been committed), the film comes to a screeching halt.

Peter Falk is explosive in an almost Brando-esque turn as Nick, a husband who is at a loss how to help the woman he loves more than life. Falk has rarely been so powerful onscreen and mention should also be made of the director's mother, Katherine Cassavetes, who plays Nick's mother.

A once in a lifetime cinematic experience thanks to evocative, in-your-face direction, a pair of devastating lead performances, and a story that leaves you with hope and wonder about what happens after the credits roll. 8.5/10

I enjoy reading your reviews, Gideon. It's just a shame that you still haven't taken people's suggestions about adding photos and playing with the format a bit. You deserve more rep than you get. It would also probably help if you participated in more threads, since you generally just keep to yourself in here and don't mingle with the rest of the mofos.

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He did go back and add some, but yeah, just doing it going forward would be good. But #1 priority, I think, is adding the title of the movie before the text. Nobody wants to skim the opening sentences just to find out what's being reviewed.

One other friendly suggestion: more personality! They're good reviews, but a little buttoned-down. This has its virtues, but obviously you get more conversation with a more conversational style. The more of you we get in each review, the less like every other review of that film it is.

Crazy Stupid Love is a 2011 comedy that has some funny scenes, some clever dialogue, and a charismatic cast, but suffers from a rambling screenplay that tries to encompass a little too much and takes way too long to get where it's finally going.

The film stars Steve Carell as Cal Weaver, a man rocked by the announcement from his wife of 25 years, Emily (Julianne Moore) that she has slept with a co-worker and wants a divorce. From there, the story expands into so many unexpected directions that it becomes a little dizzying to keep track of everything that's going on. It begins when Cal begins getting advice on getting back into the dating scene from a player named Jacob (Ryan Gosling) whose interest in helping Cal doesn't really make any sense.

Jacob eventually gets involved with a woman (Emma Stone) who only shows interest in him after her co-worker/boyfriend (Josh Groban) breaks her heart. The story becomes even more complicated and murky as we finally learn who Stone's character is, but by this time, we really don't care because to be honest, Gosling has more chemistry with Carell than he does with Stone.

The storyline involving Cal's son and his babysitter also walks the fine line between good taste and perversion, despite a superb performance from Jacob Bobo as the boy. But what this film does contain at its heart is a vividly human performance from Steve Carell as Cal, an actor with a lovely Jack Lemmon-ish everyman quality whose mere presence onscreen evokes immediate sympathy and the desire to put your arm around him and tell him that everything is going to be all right and he is well-matched by Moore, who brings a calming center to the insanity that is the rest of the proceedings here. The screenplay is well-intentioned but goes horribly off-course, despite an extremely likable cast. 6/10

Hey, you can do what you want, but I would strongly consider adding the titles of the films in question, as suggested above, so people don't have to start reading to know what film it is.

Despite an attractive cast, 2009's He's Just Not That Into You is a rambling and overlong comedy drama that tries to offer humorous insight into navigating the oh-so-choppy waters of dating in the New Millenium, but aggravates in its one-sided man-bashing and the overlong journeys that the multiple storylines take to their conclusions.

The multiple stories are loosely tied together by the fact that three of the female leads (Jennifer Aniston, Jennifer Connelly, Ginnifer Goodwin) all work in the same office.

Aniston plays a woman in a committed relationship of 7 years with a man (Ben Affleck) who likes their relationship as it is and has no desire to get married.

Connolly plays a tightly wound woman, married to a music executive (Bradley Cooper) who is putting her marriage at serious risk because she won't tolerate her husband's smoking, which might have had something to do with his being drawn to a struggling singer (Scarlett Johansson), who is the obsession of a real estate agent (Kevin Connolly), though she does not return his feelings.

Goodwin plays an emotionally needy woman, desperate to be in a relationship, who after being dumped by Connolly, meets his best friend (Justin Long), who begins to offer Goodwin insight into interpreting male dating signals while misinterpreting signals of his own.

Despite a smooth directorial hand from Ken Kwapis, the film suffers from a rambling and disjointed screenplay that is kind of all over the place, leaving plot lines and characters hanging in the air and inserting characters that feel like they are left over from another movie. The Drew Barrymore character who addresses social media's effect on dating, definitely seems to be an escapee from another movie and Aniston's character is seen in a bunch of pointless scenes with her family after she breaks up with Affleck.

Some satisfaction is gleaned from the Goodwin/Long story as it is addressed throughout the film and even though it is hard to buy young Long being such a complete expert on the male dating psyche, he manages to infuse his character, Alex, with a likability that is infectious. Ditto, Goodwin, who somehow makes her hot mess of a character, one of the few characters in the film we really root for.

The cast is pretty, the story is well-intentioned, but the film suffers due to some simplistic character-bashing, some unappealing characters and a screenplay that could have used tightening, as the film is at least 30 minutes too long. 5.5/10

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2008's Tropic Thunder was a scathingly dark and roll-on-the-floor funny satire and an on-target look at behind the scenes Hollywood that was a triumph for its director, co-writer, and star, Ben Stiller. This film is on the surface a satire of the film Apocalypse Now and the subsequent documentary Hearts of Darkness and if you watch closely, you will also notice affectionate winks at films like The Deer Hunter, Full Metal Jacket, Forrest Gump, Saving Private Ryan, and even Scarface. I love when films make fun of Hollywood and let us in on the joke and Stiller has let us in on the joke with a vengence here.

The film has a brilliant opening which shows trailers and music videos of the various stars before they begin work on the movie-within-a-movie of the title. The film is then joined on location where it has gone millions over budget, forcing the director to take a new tack and flying the five principal actors to a remote Vietnamese location, at which time the director is accidentally killed, but the lead actor is convinced that it is a hoax and that the director wants them to continue the film on their own. Filming is complicated as the lead actor begins a descent into madness while being kidnapped by a group of Vietnamese drug dealers who he thinks are actors. Things get even messier when the villains mistake our hero for the mentally retarded character he played in a previous movie.

Ben Stiller plays Tugg Speedman, the lead actor whose career has been primarily manufactured through an action franchise called Scorcher. Robert Downey Jr. plays Kirk Lazarus, a five-time Oscar winning Australian actor who has had an operation to alter his pigmentation so that he can play an African American character in the movie. Jack Black plays Jeff Portnoy, a drugged out comic actor making his first foray into the action genre. Brandon T. Jackson plays Alpa Chino, a rap star making his film debut and Jay Baruchel plays Kevin Sandusky, a struggling actor appearing in his first major role.

Watching the interplay between these five characters had me rolling on the floor from opening to closing credits, particularly the exchanges between Lazarus and Chino, as Lazarus seems to be descending into his own mini-madness where he almost forgets that he is Caucasian and how it annoys Chino to no end. Robert Downey Jr. is nothing short of brilliant and just about steals the movie as Lazarus, in a characterization that is so off-the-wall yet steeped in enough realism that the performance earned Downey an Oscar nomination. I lost it every time Chino felt the need to remind Lazarus that he wasn't black. Baruchel made an appropriate voice of reason among the group and Jack Black's character gets funnier as he starts jonesing for drugs.

Mention should also be made of a trio of supporting turns from Danny McBride as the maniacal special effects director, Matthew McConaughey as Tugg's fast-talking agent and especially Tom Cruise, almost unrecognizable but hysterically funny as the producer of the film who thinks Tugg's kidnapping is a hoax and is willing to throw him under the proverbial bus (or rice patty if you will). There's even a classy turn from Nick Nolte as the author of the book the movie is based on.

Stiller's direction is detail-oriented and immediately conjures up the images of the films that are being saluted here. His screenplay with Justin Theroux is brutally accurate in its cynicism as well as its realism and is brilliantly served by a perfect cast. One of the funniest movies I have seen in years that will demand repeat viewings. 8.5/10

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Director Robert Zemeckis, whose directorial resume rivals directors like Spielberg, Scorsese, and Sidney Lumet, made a strong impression with Death Becomes Her, a delicious 1992 black comedy that combines refreshingly human and flawed characters with an over the top story and some eye-popping visual effects.

This is the story of Madeline Ashton (Meryl Streep), an extremely vain actress and Helen Sharp (Goldie Hawn) a writer, who have been professional and personal rivals since childhood and have been fighting over the same man for years, a nerdy plastic surgeon named Dr. Ernest Menville (Bruce Willis). It is revealed that, in a search for eternal youth, both women have taken a magic potion that has some unforeseen side effects, driving the good Dr. Menville crazy and yet somehow bringing the women closer together.

This film has a lot going for it and at the top of the list is a dazzling, Oscar-worthy performance by Streep as Madeline Ashton...Streep hits all the right notes here, offering a character with equal parts of vanity and bitchiness. Streep has rarely been this entertaining onscreen and I think the fact that this film is a comedy had a lot to do with her being overlooked at Oscar time. I think this performance is better than half a dozen of the performances for which she did receive nominations. Hawn beautifully underplays in a less showy role but compliments Streep perfectly. Isabella Rossellini is appropriately ethereal as the keeper of the magic potion and mention should also be made of a brief but funny appearance by director Sidney Pollack as a doctor examining Streep. It's fun seeing Streep and Pollack onscreen together seven years after he directed her in Out of Africa.

My main problem with the film is Bruce Willis' character, Dr. Ernest Menville. Nerdy is OK, if there is a sexiness going on like Ryan O'Neal in What's Up, Doc?, but there's nothing sexy about this character. Why these two women are so obsessed with this guy doesn't make sense nor does his attraction to Madeline and Helen. He doesn't appear to really have feelings for either woman but it takes way too long for him to separate himself from these women.

This film did win an Oscar for Outstanding Visual Effects and this is one that the Academy got right...the visuals here are just dazzling and more importantly, imaginative, not the kind of things you normally associate with standout visual effects. Watch the subtle changes in Madeline's body when she takes the potion or the hole in Helen's stomach when she gets shot or the final destruction of the ladies' bodies in the extremely effective finale. Throw in a smart screenplay by Martin Donovan and David Koepp, a superb musical score by Alan Silvestri, and the master directorial hand of Robert Zemeckis and you have a winner. 8.5/10

I remember liking Tropic Thunder a good bit. I need to revisit.

I think I'm re-visiting it over the weekend...that movie had me on the floor.

Stephen Sondheim's iconic Broadway musical Company was beautifully revived in 2011 with a star-studded cast, some updating of material, and accompanied by the New York Philharmonic with longtime Sondheim musical director Paul Gemignani at the baton.

This musical originally premiered on Broadway in 1970 and won the Tony for Best Musical, as did Sondheim for Best Score. Company is the story of Robert, a 35 year old bachelor whose best friends are five married couples who constantly worry about him and are in constant pursuit of the perfect woman for him.

Harry and Sarah are approaching middle age and bring Robert in the middle of their battles with sobriety and dieting. Robert thinks Susan and Peter are the perfect couple until they announce their plan to divorce. Jenny and David smoke pot with Robert and Jenny pretends to enjoy it more than she really did. Paul and Amy have been living together for years and have finally decided to marry, which has Amy freaking out. Larry and Joanne are an older couple so comfortable in their lives they really don't see how unhappy they are with each other.

Dean Jones originated the role of Robert in 1970 and Elaine Stritch became an instant Broadway legend with her performance as Joanne. The musical was revived in 2007 with Raul Esparza playing Robert and had the "novelty" of having all the actors playing musical instruments throughout the show, which I personally found very distracting.

That's why I prefer this version...back to the source material, keeping the 70's sensibility alive but making the show still New Millenium-friendly. A song that was cut from the original production called "Marry Me a Little" has been restored, as well as a VERY funny scene where Peter (Craig Bierko) comes on to Robert after he informs him of the divorce. Needless to say, with Nail Patrick Harris playing Robert, this scene produces huge laughs.

The role of Robert and Neil Patrick Harris seems to be the perfect marriage of character and actor. Harris proved to be more than up to the vocally demanding role, with "Marry Me a Little" being a standout performance. After watching Harris playing womanizer Barney Stinson on How I Met Your Mother all those years, it was great to see him play a flawed, but genuinely nice guy.

Broadway legend Patti LuPone, as always, puts her personal stamp on the role of Joanne and literally stops the show with her rendition of "The Ladies Who Lunch". It's clearly a matter of personal taste, but I have always felt that Elaine Stritch owns that song and LuPone's performance did nothing to change my mind, but the audience on this DVD loved it.

Mention should also be made of Stephen Colbert, who was surprisingly effective as Harry, perfectly complimented by Martha Plimpton as Sarah. Colbert and Plimpton were a well-oiled machine and I have never enjoyed Harry and Sarah's scene so much. Loved Julie Finerman as Amy as well. She also stopped the show with "Getting Marred Today" and Christina Hendricks brings a depth to the role of April, a dim-witted stewardess Robert is dating, that I have never seen in previous Aprils.

Sondheim's flawless score includes "Little Things", "Sorry-Grateful", "You Could Drive a Person Crazy", "Another Hundred People', and the classic "Being Alive." As I've mentioned before here Sondheim is probably Broadway's best composer and is definitely Broadway's best lyricist because Sondheim doesn't write music the way people sing, he writes it the way they talk.

For Sondheim and musical theater purists, this is a must-see. 9/10

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PLAYMATES was a 1972 ABC Movie of the Week which starred Alan Alda and Doug McClure as a pair of divorced dads who meet during a weekend outing with their kids, who strike up a friendship and start hanging out together. Their relationship becomes complicated when the two men introduce each other to their ex-wives and they start secretly start dating each other's exes.

This formulaic romantic comedy isn't groundbreaking in any way but it does boast a surprisingly deft screenplay and energetic performances from a willing cast. The connection between Alda's sophisticated businessman and McClure's blue collar everyman is a big plus as is the casting of Barbara Feldon as Alda's ex and Connie Stevens as McClure's.

The clever script and the rock solid chemistry of the four leads make this film an unexpected delight that still holds up remarkably well, despite some dated elements. 7.5/10

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