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Lot of romance, but little history
By STEVE PERSALL
© St. Petersburg Times,
published December 6, 2001
New releases
Pearl Harbor
[Photo: Touchstone Pictures]
Pilots Rafe McCawley (Ben Affleck, foreground) and Danny Walker (Josh Hartnett) are caught in the cross fire in Pearl Harbor. |
A love triangle among two pilots and a nurse (Ben Affleck, Josh Hartnett, Kate Beckinsale) gets interrupted by Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941. The assault sequence is a rouser, but it's only a fraction of the otherwise slow running time. Alec Baldwin co-stars as fighter ace Jimmy Doolittle, whose raid on Tokyo had no direct connection to Pearl Harbor but it's an upbeat ending to the movie.
First impressions: "Pearl Harbor is merely another big-budget Roman candle for (director Michael) Bay to light up for a holiday, like Armageddon and The Rock . . . Twisting history can't make compelling heroes of two pretty-boy actors playing hunks by numbers . . .
"Cuba Gooding Jr. and Tom Sizemore appear in roles so meaningless in retrospect that one wonders why they bothered. Perhaps they also expected Pearl Harbor to be something deeper, more meaningful than it turned out to be. Bay is just playing Armageddon again, turning real-life drama into hokum stretched out from here to eternity."
Second thoughts: Don't be surprised if America's renewed patriotism leads to multiple Oscars for a movie that didn't impress many viewers before Sept. 11.
Rental audience: War buffs with romantic streaks; romantics who don't mind their swooning interrupted by artillery fire.
Rent it if you enjoy: The beach scene -- only the beach scene -- in From Here to Eternity.
Summer Catch
Freddie Prinze Jr. plays a baseball pitcher taking one last shot at the big leagues, playing in the fabled Cape Cod League where many stars were born. Romancing a debutante (Jessica Biel) is the last distraction he needs so, of course, that's where the plot goes. Old pros Bruce Davison and Fred Ward chaperone their young co-stars.
First impressions: "As predictable as the Yankees making it into the playoffs. Think Major League: Back to the Minors meets American Pie 2. And Summer Catch isn't even a sequel. This formulaic baseball movie is long on cliched plotting and short on exciting ball playing. In between are a variety of timeworn, testosterone-fueled high jinks." (Claudia Puig, USA Today)
Second thoughts: Got knocked out of box office contention faster than the Devil Rays.
Rental audience: Prinze fans (and they're getting fewer).
Rent it if you enjoy: Dinner theater productions of Bull Durham.
American Outlaws
Legendary outlaw Jesse James (Colin Farrell, Tigerland) stymies a dastardly cattle baron who hires lawman Allan Pinkerton (Timothy Dalton) to eliminate the gang. Scott Caan (Novocaine) co-stars as fellow wanted poster boy Cole Younger. Director Les Mayfield's movie died at the box office with it boots on.
First impressions: "For years there have been reports of the death of the Western. Now comes American Outlaws, proof that even the B Western is dead. It only wants to be a bad movie, and fails. Imagine the cast of American Pie given a camera, lots of money, costumes and horses, and told to act serious and pretend to be cowboys, and this is what you might get." (Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times)
Second thoughts: Why not just call this Young Guns III and be done with it?
Rental audience: Anyone who hasn't seen a Western so the movie won't pale by comparison.
Rent it if you enjoy: Returning to the video store for a refund you won't get.
DVD
New and noteworthy for digital players
Crowe's 'shamefully personal' DVD: Almost Famous Untitled (The Bootleg Cut)
[Photo: DreamWorks Picture]
Fifteen-year-old William (Patrick Fugit) lands a plum writing assignment that puts him on an eye-opening tour with the rock band Stillwater in Cameron Crowe’s Almost Famous. |
Cameron Crowe must be the first filmmaker to invite his mother to participate in a DVD commentary. Why not? Almost Famous was the story of his youth based on his experience as a 15-year-old rock 'n' roll journalist for Rolling Stone. Alice Crowe didn't like the idea, and Frances McDormand made that perfectly clear by playing a version of her in the movie.
Their conversation, amiably defensive and confessional, is a highlight of Almost Famous Untitled (The Bootleg Cut), a 2-disc set crammed with goodies for film buffs and music lovers alike.
Crowe calls this expansion of the first DVD "shamefully personal" and nobody can blame him. His mother's pack-rat habits provided some of the best props in the movie and the action was scripted from memory. Crowe's expertise and deep affection for music and filmmaking makes the set "items that we directed to ourselves, really, because when you're a fan of something you want to get into everything that's available."
The new material includes six deleted scenes -- about 45 minutes of footage -- edited into the "bootleg" version on disc 1. The original theatrical cut is available on disc 2 with the extra scenes viewable separately. But the DVD is also devoted to real-life rock history and not just the fictional band Stillwater portrayed in the film.
It's great to see and hear the late Creem magazine music grump Lester Bangs discuss rock 'n' roll in the 1970s: "the same old gunk dressed up in new clothes." Bangs takes potshots that hindsight confirms about rockers of the era including Jethro Tull, Brian Ferry and Emerson, Lake & Palmer ("Musical sterility at its pinnacle," says Bangs).
Crowe counters with his choices for the best albums of 1973, offering brief comments about such classics as David Bowie's Aladdin Sane, Jackson Browne's Late for the Sky and Bruce Springsteen's debut.
The only time-waster is B-Sides, a short film culled from video recordings backstage during the film's production. Better to spend an hour reading Crowe's seven Rolling Stone articles from the '70s with such artists as Van Morrison, Led Zeppelin, the Allmans and Joni Mitchell.
Disc 2 also includes a 15-minute chunk of Stillwater's Cleveland concert and a hotel room duet with Bob Dylan and Joan Baez look-alikes only briefly seen in the movie. The text of Crowe's Academy Award-winning screenplay is available, plus the standard DVD bonuses: production notes, cast and crew biographies and a preview trailer.
The most clever extra is titled Stairway to Heaven, a song that Crowe couldn't secure the rights to include in Almost Famous or this DVD.
The scene in which it would have been heard is shown, when Crowe's alter ego (Patrick Fugit) convinces his mother to let him take the Rolling Stone gig by making her listen to Led Zeppelin. As the phonograph needle lowers, viewers are instructed to "Grab your copy of Led Zeppelin IV and cue it up to Stairway to Heaven" with a countdown to push "play." The scene continues in silence for the length of the song except for brief dialogue. Try it.
Almost Famous Untitled also includes an audio CD of Stillwater's greatest hits including four songs not included in the original film. Not a bad sound, considering Crudup was a guitar rookie until taking lessons from Peter Frampton, and Jason Lee is mimicking Robert Plant's vocals. Sprinkling a few professional musicians into the casting helps. If nothing else, the disc verifies Crowe's thoroughness in making Almost Famous the most authentic rock 'n' roll screen fiction ever.
Rewind
Videos worth another look
When Ameche put Pinellas on the map
[Times photo: 1984]
Don Ameche and Hume Cronyn consult at the corner of Central Avenue and Fourth Street in downtown St. Petersburg while in town to film Cocoon.
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Pinellas County said farewell to a friend when Don Ameche died of prostate cancer on this date in 1993. The 85-year-old actor was part of the county's most acclaimed foray into film production, winning a 1985 Academy Award as best supporting actor for Cocoon.
Some local residents still recall Ameche's charming demeanor during his five-week visit with the cast and crew. Just ask the regulars at St. Petersburg's Coliseum dance club, where several key scenes were filmed.
Ameche was born Dominic Felix Amici in 1908, the son of Italian immigrants who settled in Wisconsin. Broadcast radio was born nearly a decade later and both entertainers grew up together, teaming in the 1930s with Ameche's crisp enunciation and soothing voice. When Hollywood saw the suave face behind the voice, Ameche became a leading man type.
Few actors remain active over six decades and fewer overcome an 11-year gap in movie roles. Ameche was gone for most of the 1970s but not forgotten by director John Landis while casting Trading Places. That comedy, plus a few other Ameche career highlights, are suggested for your home video pleasure:
The Story of Alexander Graham Bell -- Ameche makes science fun with Henry Fonda as his assistant. The best measure of this film's popularity in 1938: after this, telephones were called "ameches" for years. Interesting trivia: Ameche's brother, Jim, later played Bell in The Story of Mankind.
Heaven Can Wait -- Not the Warren Beatty football fantasy, but Ameche playing a deceased man at the gates of hell recalling the life that brought him there. Directed with his usual champagne sparkle by Ernst Lubitsch.
Down Argentine Way -- Betty Grable takes a South American vacation and falls for a debonair racehorse tycoon (Ameche). Also noteworthy for Carmen Miranda's debut.
Alexander's Ragtime Band and In Old Chicago -- Both noted in previous Rewind columns, but still worth seeking out.
Trading Places -- Ameche's career was dormant for a decade before John Landis cast him and Ralph Bellamy in the 1984 comedy. They played gamblers toying with the polar lives of Eddie Murphy and Dan Aykroyd.
Cocoon -- Ron Howard's sentimental science fiction adventure is still St. Petersburg's finest moment on screen. Ameche and several other old-timers (Jessica Tandy, Hume Cronyn, Gwen Verdon, Jack Gilford) vaulted back to prominence. That Oscar voting was understandably sentimental.
Things Change -- One more triumph before exiting. Ameche plays an Italian shoe-shiner, a dead ringer for a Mafia don. The buffer takes a murder rap for the gangster he resembles and gets taken on a last fling by a mob flunky (Joe Mantegna). Written and directed by David Mamet.
Corrina, Corrina -- Whoopi Goldberg plays saintly housemaid for a widower (Ray Liotta) with a mute daughter and a wise grandfather (Ameche). Ameche's final performance was completed just days before his death.
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