Bekkah:

I had low expectations for this unstreamable movie that I bought on DVD from an online thrift shop. I have not liked a lot of Jeff’s early movies and considering you can’t even pay to rent this movie online anywhere, I figured it would be garbaggge, but honestly it was not bad! I feel like it was probably very edgy in the 70s, with an abortion, a gay Black man, a suicide (CW), and a lot of talk of diaphrams, but this was interesting! It kind of felt like a play, which tracks with the whole movie (acting about acting). The title character was kind of an anti-Jeff and though I think Jeff would have been great as the star, he is too charismatic to pull of the narcissistic, unlikeable asshole, so I think he was adequately cast as Clyde Baxter (??) where he stole those two scenes. Obviously thrilled that Jeff’s career took off much more than whoever played the main character!

Danya:

OMG this movie was actually pretty interesting and enjoyable? Obviously Jeff should have been the star, but as Bekkah pointed out, the combined charisma of Christopher Walken and Jeff would have just combusted the very celluose. Sarah, as a poet who talks a lot about her mother’s diaphragm, is the most compelling character to me. It was chilling how the birth control options in 1950 mirror people’s choices today (should I get an abortion? oh no, but what if it kills me?). So that’s not great. Overall, I’d like to eat my next meal off of young Christopher Walken’s cheek bones, because they are fabulous.

7/10 Goldwich Villages

Next Stop on IMDB

The ups and downs of life as experienced by a group of aspiring young artists in the early Fifties New York.

Director

Paul Mazursky

Writer

Paul Mazursky

Stars

Lenny Baker Shelley Winters Ellen Greene