Reviews (67)

HENRILU
Based on the true story of the Beardsley family who lived in Monterey County, California, this is one of Lucy's finer latter-day performances (her drunk scene is a delight). Essentially, the story is a movie version of how the Brady Bunch got together and although a little dated it's a most enjoyable family film (for some reason, entertainment from the period 1967-1972 dates badly (especially TV shows, i.e. "Room 222", "Courtship of Eddie's Father", "That Girl", "Mod Squad", "Family Affair" and the like.) As a footnote: In 1942, Lucy had her great chance at a meaty dramatic role in "The Big Street" in which she starred with 37 year-old Fonda. Lucille played Gloria, selfish and rather bitchy showgirl who essentially becomes a cripple; Hank played Little Pinks a devoted admirer. Ball was mostly praised by the critics, but, alas, the picture didn't make a dime.

Great for the Entire Family
This movie brings together two Hollywood legends. Henry Fonda and Lucille Ball play widows who fall in love and bring their families together totalling an amazing 18 children! This star-studded classic includes Van Johnson and a very young and handsome Tim Matherson. The film is full of laughter and brings the viewers into the lives of the North/Beasley family and shares their adventures and growing love for one another. I truly appreciate the release of this wonderful film on DVD, but widescreen would have greatly been appreciated. With 18 children, widescreen is a must! Also a few more extra features would have been nice, such as commentary, photos, etc.. but beggers can't be choosers.
The picture is crisp on the DVD and the sound is quite clear. I highly recommend this movie for the whole family. It's got some lessons of love and life that all can learn from.

A Wonderful Movie That Deserves a Better DVD!
I agree. I love this movie too but I will not buy an edited pan and scan DVD and that is why I opted instead to pop a video into my VCR and tape this movie when TCM was showing it in widescreen and wait and hope that MGM/UA will release a widescreen DVD because when it comes down to it I would much rather have this wonderful movie on a DVD then video but that will only happen if it's widescreen!

Not "mine" - as long as it's in stupid standard screen!
This is a 4 star film reduced to 1 star because it's been butchered down from widescreen to standard screen for no reason whatsoever.

Heck, you NEED the vast viewing range of wonderful widescreen in this flick just to keep track of all those dang kids!

It was shot in widescreen in 1968, as were about 95% of all films made after 1953, so there's no excuse for chopping it down to this putrid pan-and-scan nightmare. Another Amazon reviewer (from Derby, CT) said it all about this ridiculous ripoff of an otherwise very cute movie:

"Great film but who wants to watch a film like this in pan and scan format. Listen up studios, WIDESCREEN, WIDESCREEN, WIDESCREEN!!!!"

Children and children and attitudes, oh my
Wouldn't I love to find jam all over this DVD. Then I could throw it away (which is all it really deserves anyway). Although we won't throw ours away - we'll donate it to the library. perhaps somebody will like it.

This was really pathetic 1960's cinema: Gone is the class and glamour of 1930's MGM. No taste in clothes, no taste in home decor (much), no taste in raising children. I couldn't believe that Mother didn't even reprimand the son for having the Playboy magazine? Family film? Not a chance in my house.

I have to confess I was laughing sometimes during this film, but not because it was funny. It was incredibly UN-funny. I don't find rude children and parents sort of lost out there somewhere amusing. I would never watch it again, and certainly advise anyone else never to watch it in the first place. ... Read more

Reviews (15)

A Fine Piece
Dubbed as the comeback for the three starring actors, this movie is rather laidback and allows the stars to easily do their best and make the movie work. Nick Nolte easily plays the bum who is taken in and cleaned up by the rich family and who is a charmer. Richard Dreyfuss plays the rich man who takes Nolte in and he does a good job with many funny scenes. Bette kinda steals the show as the rich, stuck up wife who is rather standoffish as she seems as if she's better than others in her own mind. The supporting cast which includes Little Richard, a dog, and others help to make the movie work well as they support everyone else with a nice chemistry throughout. THe movie also works because it is both funny and touching at the same time. Good Job!!

Good comedy which should have been great
Based upon "Boudu Saved From Drowning", this flick also reflects other works such as Moliere's "Tartuffe", maybe even a bit of "The Rainmaker". As such, it's got a solid basis upon which to build a movie.
What is presented is a mildly amusing soft-hearted satire of contemporary life among the rich who spend more time self-analyzing than most people working. Richard Dreyfuss is fine as the suddenly successful manufacturer and Bette Midler is perfect as the suddenly rich spouse trying to put too many pieces together at the same time. Nick Nolte is the "down and out" (?) visitor who is saved from drowning in their swimming pool. He immediately becomes all things to all the neurotics involved. It's an obvious plotline which follows.
In a scene seemingly derived from Mazursky's earlier "I Love You, Alice B. Toklas!", the madness culminates in a big party. Next door neighbor Little Richard, as the decidedly flambouyant Orvis Goodnight, gets down on piano and rocks out on the uptemo "Great Gosh A'Mighty" [a successful single for LR in '86, by the way]. It's a fun scene, but it's shot too much like a video and the music is not up front. Richard does a nice job in an earlier scene which does not involve music. He appears suddenly in Dreyfuss' backyard, raving about the kind of emergency help available for whites as opposed to blacks. The racial overtones seem dated here, as they do in scenes with Nolte and the domestic help.
The movie has an under-developed air about it, like Mazursky's "The Pickle" and the above mentioned "...Alice B. Toklas". The viewer wants to be challenged into deciding if the suicide attempt was a put-on by Nolte so as to hang with rick folks for a while. You might want to fire up the treadmill or vacuum while this tape rolls.

A Must See Comedy
It has been some time since I saw this flick, but it is a must see for anyone who has not seen it.

One of the best comedies ever made
Despondent over the loss of his dog, Jerry the bum is rescued from an attempted suicide in the swimming pool of a wealthy Beverly Hills businessman, Dave Whitman, and subsequently teaches Whitman to eat garbage, cures the neurotic dog, seduces Whiteman's ungreencarded maid, new-aged-gurued wife, and anorexic daughter, gives the gay son permission to come out of the closet, destroys Whitman's New Year party, teaches the whole family to walk on hot coals and ruins the garden by urinating on the flowers. All of this and a good deal more, produces continuous laughter.

Still great
After more than 15 years, this comedy still elicits huge laughs and the primary reason for that is it's sharp. It bites. No comedy can last through the years without some noticeable degree of sharp social irreverence built into it. It just can't be done. And this comedy is nothing if not irreverent.

Based on the '30s French farce Boudu Saved from Drowning, the American director Paul Mazursky does a terrific job of fusing stinging satire with mock pathos as Nick Nolte's street bum Jerry, having lost the last thing important to him--his dog--decides to end it once and for all. Stumbling into the upper crustean Beverly Hills, he manages to locate a swimming pool at whose bottom he decides to meet his maker. The pool, as it happens, belongs to Richard Dreyfuss' Dave Whiteman, a very wealthy wire hanger mogul, and his daffy wife played by Bette Midler.

Dave's maid, the always fetching Elizabeth Pena, is playing hanky-panky with Dave, yet Dave is not without a heart. He catches sight of Jerry right after his plunge and rescues him, and the rest, as they say, is hysterical.

Everybody, as it happens, winds up loving Jerry--Dave's wife, Dave's maid, Dave's dog, Dave's son, and Dave's daughter. And even Dave himself. What 'love' means here depends on who is doing the loving. Dave's neighbor is Little Richard who can't help but toss in a couple of his songs here and there, which adds to the romp that is this film. Jerry manages to teach just about everybody a thing or two about life--even the dog learns how to eat regular dog food from him.

These days, as the rich get slightly--but not a lot--less rich, and the poor definitely get poorer, it's refreshing to see a comedy that irreverently laces into both. This really refers to class under attack here, and that word has more than one meaning. Social class, what we think of as class (as in 'a class act'), and what we learn from each other (it's Jerry who leads the class--he's the real teacher here) all get the treatment.

A great satire well worth watching, if not owning. Don't miss. ... Read more

Amazon.com

Splicing scenes featuring his protagonist, Ivan (John Savage, The Deer Hunter), among excerpted interviews with real soldiers from John Huston's landmark World War II documentary Let There Be Light, director Andrei Konchalovsky brilliantly sets the stage for a morally ambiguous tale of a war hero's return home to a small town. Disappointingly, the opening of Maria's Lovers promises much more than it ultimately delivers. Ivan has survived the tortures of a Japanese POW camp by continually dreaming of his childhood sweetheart Maria (Nastassja Kinski). When he returns to find her with a boyfriend and a grown-up libido, Ivan can't reconcile his guardian vision with the real Maria. Even as she declares her love for him and they hastily marry, Ivan's nightmares intervene. In short, Ivan can't perform. Minor roles for Robert Mitchum and Keith Carradine (as a ridiculous wandering minstrel who seduces Maria after Ivan flees in shame) seem wasted on a melodramatic script that often sounds as if it was poorly translated into English. The nostalgic scenery of Brownsville, Pennsylvania, (rolling fog, river ferries, careening factories) is compelling, as is Kinski (who is at her most seductive and downright breathtaking), but Konchalovsky's affection for his characters and their landscape cannot surpass his stilted vision of America. --Fionn Meade ... Read more

Reviews (6)

Can't Take FANGS Seriously
FANGS is the sort of horror film that is horror only as one considers its genre. If it had had just a few more laughs, it might have qualified as an updated ABBOTT & COSTELLO MEET SOME MONSTER OR OTHER. What director Kelly Sandefur has tried mightily to do is to splice some humor from the aforementioned A&C comedy horror genre with the slimy industrialist prototype right out of the mayor from JAWS. Sandefur's success is middling at best. Corbin Bernson is satisfyingly one-dimensional as the sleazebag real estate developer who is determined to keep his town's apple blossom festival from being cancelled by swarms of genetically engineered vampire bats, who, by the way, look exactly like the stringed rubber cutups they truly are. There is something to offend nearly everyone from the cloyingly annoying valley girl accent of Bernson's blonde daughter to the Barney Fife caricature of the film's entire cadre of deputies. Still, one is not supposed to watch this with a critical eye; one viewing a life is quite sufficient. For those who want to kill 90 minutes in harmless but not mindnumbing excess, there are worse fates than FANGS.

TOOTHLESS HORROR, BUT GREAT COMEDY
FANGS is not what you would expect; instead of a gory "mutated bat goes mad" movie, you get a breezy romantic comedy featuring Whip Hubley and Tracy Nelson working their way through an awkward relationship. Corbin Bernsen is around as the nasty villain; Michael Gregory (long ago from "General Hospital") is around for nasty co-villain; the real culprit is identifiable, and the bats are poorly effected creatures. But there's a lot of laughs and some fun comic scenarios to merit it a view; not at all a terrible movie, enjoyable, but nothing to scare Bram Stoker fans.
Merry Christmas!

Somewhat disappointing to a horror fan
I was disappointed with this movie. I expected it to make me jump at least once. It did not. The best thing going for it is a funky kind of comedy. It is definitely not a movie that I would want to watch again and again, although I did enjoy it the first time. I would advise you to rent it before buying a copy. Once you see it, you may well decide that it is not a "keeper."

Somewhat limited history of vampire films.
This somewhat uneven history of vampire films takes you from the 20's through about 1990, through a selection of movie trailers and some film clips. Of varying sound and picture quality, rough editing and lack of rights to show clips for a good number of films, is fairly narrow in its presentation. Showing trailers from the Universal series and Hammer series, in addition to a few other films here and there, doesn't give you any real background or much research, and no interviews. From after 1975 all the films are represented only with VHS box covers. Buy instead Flesh and Blood about Hammer Films which is much better, but don't expect anything new here, except some nice shots and narration by Veronica Carlson, who hosts the program. 60 minutes.

Think of it as a Monster Vampire Movie Trailer
This is a fairly standard but quite entertaining collection of clip catalouging but a small fraction of al the Dracula/Vampire movies that have been spawned by Hollywood in the last hundred years. There is no attempt to get into deep meaning or to really differentiate between the variant styles employed in such films, but you will recognize all of your favorites and probably come up with a few new flicks to track down at your local video store. ... Read more

Reviews (4)

Intense Thriller
After being released from a mental institution, a typical borderline psychopath poses as a nanny in an attempt to form a perfect life with a handsom man. But she becomes dangerously jealous as her delusional dreams begin to crumble. Her escalating erratic behavior turns violent as she wrecks havoc on the household. Lots of action and suspense and a very intense plot. If you're into thillers like "Fatal Attraction", "The Hand That Rocks The Cradle", "Hush", etc. Then you should definatly see this one.

Worth the money
I purchased this DVD while perusing DVD's at Best Buy. I had never heard of it but the cast persuaded me to buy it. Traci Nelson did a fabulous job, very believable and very creepy. The movie actually reminded me of, "The Perfect Bride". The plot line was very similar. The movie was worth the price and for a low-budget film it did beautifully.

Great Movie
I rented this movie, even though i had never heard of it, and i loved it! i watched it 3 more times, it's not the highest quality movie, or one with a high budget, but it's put together so well

Wonderful schlocky entertainment!
This is one of best best "bad" movies I have ever seen. Bruce Boxleitner is as wooden as a cigar-store Indian, while Tracy Nelson's screen-chewing performance as a psycho nanny rivals anything Sir Laurence Olivier ever committed to celluloid. Dana Barron also stands out, actually because she's a very good young actress with a great career ahead of her (if there's any justice in the world). Seriously, this film is so awful and cliched and gross that it's impossible not to love. Everyone seems to be having a good time revelling in the muck; you should too! ... Read more

Reviews (4)

Far from perfect
Not only is this movie unoriginal and superficial at its very core, but also its logic is flawed and it is not really a good kids movie.

There are far too many prototypes: the not-so good team coached by a washed-up ex-minor league player, the "evil" coach who has won a string of championships that wants to "rule" the baseball league with another title, the "heart-broken" kid who wants to win for Dad, the mom who wants the best for her little boy, the rise and fall of the "lovable loser" type team, etc. It seems to all be a bunch of one-dimensional and predictable characters that begin to work each and every baseball cliché.

I agree with the reviewer, Brett, who mentioned the flawed logic of this movie. It's hard to exactly know what the message of this movie is. Do the parents want their team to win? Do they want their kids to practice, not to practice? Why do they want them to quit a game that is a passion just because some coach tells them they aren't good enough? The naivety of this movie excels all baseball movies I've seen. Couldn't they put a little more thought into some of these characters?

The slight positive to this movie were the few chuckles that were there. Ed Asner does a decent job as the ex-minor league player turned coach, and has a few good lines:
"Baseball is spelled F-U-N-D-A-M-E-N-T-L-E" ..

"Can you spell irritating, kid?"

However, overall, the lines and the action aren't fun, but rather superficial, and it's ending left me, well, confused (kind of like they just said, "Let's stop the movie right here."). A movie that could have been much more, but failed miserably.

Even if it is just suppose to be a fun movie, Perfect Game doesn't even come across as a true kids movie. I would suggest that if you want a kid's movie with a little more spirit, rent "The Rookie" instead. If you are wanting a good baseball movie period, see "The Natural" or "Field of Dreams."

Couldn't be more predictable if it tried.
Would it have killed the makers of this movie to even attempt to do something worthwhile? This is a kids' baseball movie that has been done too many times already.

The setup: The "evil" coach Bobby Geiser (Patrick Duffy) has won eight consecutive local Little League Championships and all the other coaches are jealous of him. In order to try and even the playing field, Geiser agrees to allow a lot of kids who aren't very good at baseball to be on his team. Our hero, 10 year old Kanin, is going to be on Coach Geiser's team this year. So what's the problem? To be honest, I'm really not sure. The kids' parents flip out when they find out that the coach has been holding extra practices for his good players in order to make sure they stay sharp.

This is where the movie nosedives even further. The parents decide to get rid of the coach and all of the good players on their team. Then they tell their kids that they should just cancel the rest of their season and not even play anymore. It's twisted logic which I can't understand. Why make your kids stop playing a sport they love simply because the coach was holding extra practices? Just goes to show you how parents are ruining youth sports programs these days...even in the movies!

Anyway, I won't spoil how things turn out but I need to get one more gripe off of my chest. In several scenes, the baseball used during the games is not real. It is an extremely poor computer special effect. Has the film industry sunk so low that they can't have a baseball movie using a real baseball? Why use CGI when you don't even have to? This movie has no soul.

memories
reminiscent of the Kenny Roger's hit "The Greatest". Superb acting by young Cameron Finley (Kanin) as he struggles to become a great ball player like his dad. A movie that will surely bring back Little League memories, whether as a player, parent of coach. Great family film for young and old alike.

A Great Family Film!
There are all too few movies around that we can take the kids to. And many of them are tough for adults to sit through. Thankfully, this one is a gem. Ed Asner is charming as always and Patrick Duffy makes a great bad guy. But the kids are the stars of this story of a young boy who just wants to be one of the team. Don't miss this one. It'll make a great addtion to the kids' video library. ... Read more