Weekend re-watches:
40 years after it's original release, this movie still makes me laugh out loud. "You mean I'm gonna stay this color?"
If you're looking for the facts on the life of Fanny Brice, this is not the place to find them, but if you're looking for a richly entertaining musical, get your fill here. This film features maybe the most incredible film debut in history with Barbra Streisand's Oscar-winning performance as Fanny Brice...the ease and power with which she commands the screen completely belies the fact that this was her very first movie. She is in practically every frame of the movie and never once makes you regret it.
Billy Wilder took home three Oscars in 1961 for this 1960 Best Picture Oscar winner which he produced, co-wrote, and directed. This slick and edgy tale of corporate and sexual politics is still razor sharp and masterfully directed and as for the performances...Jack Lemmon's performance was #1 on my list of favorite performances of his and Shirley MacLaine was robbed of the Best actress Oscar, in the performance of her career. Jack Kruschen received a Best Supporting Actor nomination for his compassionate doctor, but that nomination really should have gone to Fred MacMurray, cast radically against type in his best performance ever as the slimy JD Sheldrake. And don't sleep on Ray Walston and Edie Adams either. Everything works here.
Easily the most acclaimed Scorsese/DeNiro collaboration, this is powerhouse moviemaking...a haunting and angry look at PTSD, loneliness, and alienation that scratches at the gut long after the credits roll. I've talked in many reviews about films that provide the "midnight to dawn" atmosphere of New York City, but no film ever did it better than this one. Love the scene with Scorsese as the husband planning to kill his cheating spouse and Travis' encounter with the secret service agent. Another movie staple this one did better than anything was the "suiting up" sequences...the scenes of Travis preparing for his mission...the preparing of the guns and holsters, the taping of the knives to his boots, the practicing drawing his weapons...absolutely mesmerizing. Scorsese, DeNiro, Jodie Foster. and especially Bernard Hermann were ALL robbed of Oscars for their work here...Scorsese wasn't even nominated! WTF? Though I find the ending a little troubling, this is still the cinematic marvel it was in 1976.