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Reviews
Breaking Away (1979)
So true, so true, so true
I have a difficult time watching movies, because I am aware of the production going on, the cameras in the background, and all the artificial ingredients needed to create a film. But this movie is so real that it makes me completely forget everything except the characters themselves. Perhaps this movie came about at the exact time in my life when I was breaking away, I don't know, but the script and the portrayal are brilliant. One expects the main character, Dave Stoller, to be the lead in the film, but truthfully, everyone is a lead in the film, and Paul Dooley-as Dave's father, is an absolute gem. The 'refund' sequence when he's laying in bed kills me every time! But the speech he gives about what it is like to be a cutter could have come from the mouth of my own father. It is a true delight of a film that should be on anyone's top 10-or top 5 list for that matter, and to this day it still blows me away!
A Hard Day's Night (1964)
No movie is perfect, but....
this one comes awfully close. It's the perfect movie for a group of musicians that can't act, yet pull it off like professionals! Everyone does a terrific job!!! One can't help but feel that they are all having a great time doing this, because they really are!!! Enough has been said about this movie that I need not go into the fact that The Beatles were compared to the Marx brothers for their wit and comic delivery. There are few movies that I have watched several times because I liked them so much, and none that I have watched more than this one. In the summer of '65 right before the movie 'Help' came to theaters, they ran HDN on TV, almost as a promotion for the show. My sisters and their girlfriends, who were all at least 7 years older than me and on their way to college, sat in our living room and watched the movie together. They were like mesmerized by the Beatles, and being only about 9 years old at the time, it was hard for me to understand what was really happening. But I sat there with them and had a really good time watching their antics, and listening to the girls comments about each Beatle being 'Gorgeous", whose favorite was whose, and beginning to understand that this was truly something special, something that I had never experienced before. Watch this movie, forget that they are The Beatles, turn off the songs, and you will see that it still holds up. That's how good it really is!
Monday Night Mayhem (2002)
The essence of Cosell and the broadcast-It doesn't get much better.
So many memories came flooding back for me while watching this, the nostalgic aspect was worth it right there. From most of 1970 until Meredith left, my buddies and I were fixated in front of the TV on Monday nights. It was an institution, and we always talked about the game and Howard the next day. No one could ever begin to capture what Howard Cosell was all about, but Turturro does one heck of a good job. Heard does an equally good job of capturing Arledge, and everything else just falls into place. While we were watching the broadcasts, no one had a clue as to what was really going on, but there were clues that everything wasn't as it seemed. This movie really brought the inside to the outside. I closed my eyes during the halftime highlight segment, and by jobe, I could actually hear Cosell doing the bit, especially the pronunciation of Jim Lash. But perhaps the best scene of the entire movie was Cosell announcing to the world that John Lennon had been killed. When he originally did it back in 1980, Cosell brought me to tears, and Turturro's imitation of that moment has the same effect. If you remember those halcyon days of MNF, then this is the holy grail for the fans. Nothiong will ever come close to the real deal, but this movie gives anyone who is interested a little peek, and that is telling it like it is.