REAL BLONDE |
| CREDITS: Director: Tom DeCillo. Cast: Matthew Modine, Christine Keener, Maxwell
Caulfield, Daryl Hannah & Elizabeth Berkely. USA 1997 (15). INTRODUCTION: DeCillo's follow up to the excellent "Living In Oblivion" and the disappointing "Box of Moonlight" finds him back on familiar territory by once again centering on the skin-deep world of that business we call show. SYNOPSIS: Out-of-work actor Joe (Modine) and his make-up artist girlfriend Mary (Keener) watch on as their neighbours dog gets stolen, their best friend Bob (Caulfield) gets a job on a soap, and their relationship falls apart. REVIEW: DeCillo's satire of the New-York entertainment scene , and the interconnected worlds of modelling and acting, is perhaps ultimately a little too close to home for DeCillo to give it the savaging it so richly deserves, but he is far more critical than Woody Allen, pointing out the shallowness, egotism and narcissism that Allen normally reserves for his portrayals of Munchkin Land (L.A.). Modine and Keener are competent enough in their lead roles but it is Caulfield (from TV's "The Colbys") who steals the show as the conniving Bob. Hannah is horrendously under-utilised as the titular real blonde and as for Berkley, well where do you go after "Showgirls"- into a series of self-parodying roles it would seem if this and her previous appearance in "The First Wives Club" are anything to go by. A dizzying array of guest stars include Kathleen Turner, Christopher Lloyd, Dennis Leary, Colin Mocherey (look closely for the man in the back row during the last audition scene) and the ubiquitous Buscemi, who reprises his role as the irate director from "Living In Oblivion", a part he got to play for real on the set of his own stunning directorial debut "Trees Lounge". The shallowness of the New-York art scene, highlighted by Bob's quest for a real blonde in a business full of the bottled type, and his eventual inability to perform when he finally encounters one in the delectable form of Hannah, the tangled mess of relationships, exemplified by Joe and Mary's relationship, and a healthy dose of neurotisism, mark the arrival of a new rival to Woody's somewhat tarnished crown. Neurotica with a Generation X twist, just the sort of film that Woody Allen would be making today, had he lived. Mutt's Rating: **** |