Tina's September Movies

Here are the few movies I had a chance to see in September. Numbering picks up from previous months, and movies I had not seen previously are marked with an *.  Movies are rated on a scale of 1 to 5 cans of tuna fish, with 5 being the top of the scale.

96. Love Story (1970) – What can you say about a 25-year old woman who died – 42 years ago? That she appeared in a corny, sappy and irresistible movie that even now I adore watching – not all the time, but every once in a while. Erich Segal’s tearjerker involves rich preppie Harvard guy Oliver Barrett IV (Ryan O’Neal, looking FINE), who falls hard for poor, smart and snarky Radcliffe girl Jennifer Cavalleri (Ali MacGraw). They meet cute, marry, suffer through estrangement from his incredibly wealthy father and endure poverty as they put him through law school, and just as he is getting himself established with a prestigious law firm in New York, she comes down with movie star disease (you can assume it’s cancer, but they never name it, she has no symptoms, and it will kill her quickly, the doctor advises Oliver). No amount of money will save Jenny, leaving poor Ollie to look forlorn. The memorable score by Francis Lai adds to the melodrama, and I can’t help but think about the Carol Burnett-Harvey Korman send-up of this movie, but, truth be told, I am a sucker for sap and I love “Love Story!” 4 cans and a box of Kleenex, please!
97. Thief* (1991) – James Caan channels his Sonny Corleone tough-guy persona in this story about Frank, a man in the car business by day and the safecracking business by night. An ex-con, Frank is an expert safecracker, but he wants just one more big score so he can get out of the business and on with his life. He marries Jessie (Tuesday Weld) and adopts a young son, but the complicated score he is working on gets more complicated when his “client” (Robert Prosky) changes the terms of their deal. If you know anything about filmmaker Michael Mann, you will immediately recognize his visual style and pounding soundtrack (think “Miami Vice” but without the pastel suits). There is plenty of violence and tough-guy posturing, and Frank, like Sonny Corleone, doesn’t mind taking matters into his own hands. Drop the gun and grab the cannolis. 3 cans.
98. Chapter Two* (1979) – James Caan sheds his tough-guy persona here to star as George Schneider, a New York author who is grieving the loss of his beloved wife Barbara. His friends and his brother Leo (Joseph Bologna) want to set him up with new women, and when he meets actress Jennifer (Marsha Mason), he falls hard and fast. In no time, they get married, but George has trouble allowing himself to enjoy his new life and wife while he hasn’t finished mourning the last one. George can be charming one minute and sullen the next, but Jenny is patient and plucky and in for the long haul. This movie was written by Neil Simon, who based the story on his own experiences and was married to Marsha Mason. It contains some of the witty repartee for which Simon known, but not enough to lift the veil of gloom. I give it extra points for co-starring Valerie Harper as Jenny’s best friend. 2½ cans.
99. Somebody Up There Likes Me (1956) – Paul Newman plays middleweight champ Rocky Graziano, whose roughneck style in the ring came from his life on the streets on New York. Rocky Barbella, his real name, was a hoodlum growing up, someone the cops knew by name and sight, always in trouble, hanging out with a gang (including a young Sal Mineo), looking for the next score and backing down from no one. His bleak future grows yet bleaker when he is drafted into the Army. Intolerant of any kind of authority, Rocky simply leaves one day, but eventually he is captured and sent to Leavenworth to do hard time. There, one of the inmates sees him fighting and tells him to come by Stillman’s Gym when he gets out. With nothing better to do, Rocky shows up one day, offers to spar, refuses to train, and devastates opponents with a brutal right hand. Along the way, he changes his name to avoid bad publicity, actually finds a nice girl to marry him, and turns his life around completely. Newman is all twitchy and jumpy as Rocky and scores a knockout performance as the champ. This movie does make you wonder why anyone would want to be a professional fighter, although in Rocky’s case, he would have been fighting in the streets for much less of a payday. 3½ cans.
100. Arbitrage* (2012) – Richard Gere has eased handsomely into silver-fox parts. Here he plays Robert Miller, millionaire head of a family-owned investment firm, a philanthropist and philanderer who is trying to sell his company before it crumbles around him. He is altruistic and generous – and desperate about that little $400 million hole in the books. Like the part he played in “Unfaithful,” he commits a reprehensible act and acts amorally, relying on others for the cover-up, which he professes to do because too many people would be hurt. Never mind the crime and its ultimate end, he’s just ever so thoughtful. I kept waiting for more suspense or twists, but instead had to watch the dogged, Columbo-like detective (Tim Roth) try to crack the case by harassing the young man Miller enlists to help him, who the detective figures will crack. I haven’t seen Gere this emotional and frustrated since Louis Gossett Jr. tormented him as Private Mayo in “An Officer and a Gentleman.” Here, he is neither. 3 cans.
101. Inherit the Wind* (1960) – Esteemed barristers Henry Drummond (Spencer Tracy) and Matthew Harrison Brady (Fredric March) face off in a sweltering Hillsborough, Tennessee, courtroom in this movie based on the Scopes Monkey trial. Young teacher Bert Cates (Dick York) is accused of teaching Darwin’s theory of evolution to his high school classes, much to the consternation of the religious right, led by Reverend Brown (Claude Akins), whose daughter is engaged to Cates. The drama examines every angle of the story, of religious fervor, of scientific analysis, of the relevance of the Bible and the role of religion and in the laws and how they are administered in the court system. Tracy delivers a stellar performance, matched in histrionics by the more volatile March, in this thought-provoking drama. Preachy at times, it nonetheless holds your attention, though I confess I can’t imagine this film having a wide commercial success, given the subject matter. It is a classic that I finally took time to see. 4 cans.
102. A Star Is Born (1976) – Barbra Streisand’s prodigious talents and prominent proboscis are on display in this tale of a singer whose star is on the rise while her husband’s career hits the skids. Kris Kristofferson plays John Norman Howard, a rock star whose performances on stage are fueled by drugs and alcohol and whose life is in free fall when he meets club singer Esther Hoffman. With his help and connections, she becomes a star and marries him, despite his warnings that he’s probably not good for her in the long run. The end of the movie is inevitable, but just seeing Barbra in her curly perm and pantsuits and hearing her sing “Evergreen” makes the movie worth seeing – but no more often than once every 20 years or so. 3 cans.