Sally Field

Punchline (1988)

Punchline (1988)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(On TV, November 2019) Tom Hanks has been America’s everyman since the late 1990s, but before then he spent a decade playing highly dramatic roles and before then he spent much of the 1980s in straight-up comic films. One of the least known of them must be Punchline, a film I didn’t even know existed before it showed up on my TV schedule. Here, Hanks play a hungry young stand-up comic who meets and develops a crush on a housewife (played by Sally Field) who tries her hand at stand-up. Much of the film is meant as an examination of the lives of comics on and off the stage, pressured into making it big, reassuring family and friends that they’re still sane and trying not to crack under the pressure. It’s not a comedy in the most conventional sense of the word, although we do get to see a few comic routines along the way. (The final routine by Hanks’ character is a killer set, but amazingly enough it doesn’t seem to be transcribed anywhere on the web at the moment.)  I’ve long been fascinated by stand-up comedians, so Punchline had an extra resonance that may not find a grip on other viewers. Still, it’s not a bad movie: it may disappoint those expecting a funnier tone, but it’s quite watchable, and I suspect that some viewers may be just as amazed as I am to find an early Tom Hanks movie they didn’t know about.

Not Without My Daughter (1991)

Not Without My Daughter (1991)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(In French, On TV, September 2019) There is an inherent vexatiousness to Not Without My Daughter, pulled on one side by true events and on the other by a ham-fisted depiction of both an abusive husband and an oppressive regime. The well-known story of an American woman who finds herself stuck in Tehran with her daughter as her husband changes a two-week vacation into an indefinite stay, it feels like a nightmare given form. And therein lies the rub, because Not Without My Daughter never misses an occasion to paint both the husband (Alfred Molina, good in a thankless role) and the Iranian society under the worst possible light: The husband as alienated and sullen in the States, then flips fundamentalist on a dime, has no compulsion threatening and punching his wife, taking away their daughter and using his family against hers. Meanwhile, the regime oppresses everyone within its borders, rounds up kids for war and forbids divorced American from getting custody of their kids, setting up the quandary that drives much of the escape-from-Iran plot that dominates the film’s last half. There is very little distinction between the evil husband and the national regime (to say even less of the husband’s family acting as enforcer) and our protagonist (played with poor wide oppressed eyes by Sally Field) must depend on cultivated renegades to secure her way out. Not Without My Daughter is a film almost custom-made to stroke every negative prejudice that Americans may have against Iranians in 1991 or since then, and there’s a sense that it lays it on far too thickly to be credible. It may be based on true events, but does it tell the true story—and more importantly, is this the kind of story we need? There is little else to say about the film because there is little else worth noticing about the film except its inflammatory intention. Brian Gilbert’s direction is unobtrusive to the point of being bland, the production values are fine without being impressive, and the screenplay is structurally sound independent of its content. In many ways, it feels like a Lifetime movie-of-the-week except set in a foreign country. I’m old enough to remember how Not Without My Daughter was mildly controversial when it came out despite its underwhelming critical and commercial returns, and it does remain just as problematic today—a handy symbol that bigots can point to, and an intentionally distorting portrait of a foreign culture. Surely, we can do better than this.

Absence of Malice (1981)

Absence of Malice (1981)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(On Cable TV, July 2019) We seldom get feature-length classes in journalism ethics, so Absence of Malice is a welcome entry in the genre. Featuring no less than Sally Field as a journalist with a dodgy sense of propriety, Paul Newman as an aggravated suspect singled out by the media, and Bob Balaban as a slimy underhanded District Attorney, this is a film that shows a complex dance between police, media, and private interests. It’s seldom glorious, but it does portray a nicely cynical view of the city newspaper desks of the early 1980s, with the “public interest” running afoul of private interests when unscrupulous individuals get involved. It’s a crime thriller, a newspaper drama, a doomed romance all at once. Wilford Brimley gets a short but spectacular role late in the film as the troubleshooter sent from Washington to untangle the mess and assign punishment—his folksy demeanour hides an iron mind and a determined fist. Meanwhile, Balaban plays a far less admirable version of his usual characters, while Newman and Field are up to their usual standards at the time. The atmosphere of Miami is well presented, and the period details are striking—I mean, the film begins with a montage showing us the minutia of publishing a daily metro newspaper, instantly endearing me. The rest of the film does toy with mounting curiosity as how it’s all going to play out—the script cleverly features first-act secrets, mid-movie coyness and final revelations hopping over each other, a sure-fire way to keep the audience interested. Absence of Malice amounts to a decent film—perhaps not a classic, but one worth revisiting even in these accursed times when the daily metro newspaper is regrettably becoming a relic of the past.

Steel Magnolias (1989)

Steel Magnolias (1989)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(On Cable TV, May 2019) I’ll be the first to admit that I’m not the target audience for Steel Magnolias—I imagine it being best suited to a cross-generational selection of female viewers, the closer to its southern setting the better. But no matter who you are, the film is a feast of great acting and excellent dialogue dunked in a warm bath of gentle southern-USA atmosphere. I had a lot of fun watching the first two thirds of the film, what with such notables as Dolly Parton, Julia Roberts, Olympia Dukakis, Sally Field, Shirley McLaine and Daryl Hannah at her arguable peak. It’s not an entirely cheerful film (the third act focuses on a character’s death and the other characters’ subsequent mourning) but it’s often very funny—especially once you factor in the combination of gifted actresses biting into theatrical dialogue. The last third of the film will work either better or worse depending on the audiences—while the point of Steel Magnolias is to show how the tightly-knit community reacts to the death of one of their owns, the film does milk those moments as hard as it can, and does feel overly manipulative at times. That’s not enough of a problem to stop recommending the film, though: the quality of the dialogue and the relationship between the characters remains the best reason to see the film, even if you think it won’t appeal to you.

Norma Rae (1979)

Norma Rae (1979)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(On Cable TV, March 2019) While I’m not an active labour militant, I am glad to be a unionized, and thankful for the work the union does on my behalf. Unions are an essential counterbalance to the power of management, and all workers would be better off if they were part of a union. Perhaps more importantly: everyone would be better off if everyone was part of a union. Those aren’t particularly controversial statements where I come from, but one of the greatest cons ever perpetrated on the (North-) American population has been to convince people that unions are not in their best interest. As Norma Rae shows, this is not new—its story (adapted from real events) takes place in a small North Carolina town where workers at a local textile factory gradually realize the unhealthy working conditions affecting them. With the help of a union organizer, our heroine gets to upset things, advance the cause of a union and find self-fulfillment along the way. In the tradition of many gritty 1970s movies, this is a blue-collar story through and through, with Sally Field doing great character work as a brighter-than-average factory worker—it’s easy to see how the role led her to her first Academy Award. For such a small-town low-stake film, Norma Rae is substantially more interesting than expected. There are a handful of strong scenes (most notably the work stoppage that represents a significant turn in the plot) and a considerable amount of verisimilitude in the way director Martin Ritt portrays its down-to-Earth, unglamorous, even seedy setting. It also portrays its unionization message in a clearly understandable way, bolstered by believable characters and dramatic situations. At a time where unionization has reached an all-time low, Norma Rae’s message still resonates today … unfortunately.

Smokey and the Bandit (1977)

Smokey and the Bandit (1977)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(Second Viewing, On DVD, September 2017) I distinctly remember seeing Smokey and the Bandit when I was a boy, but other than a few curious moments of recognition or anticipation on this second viewing, I had forgotten nearly every detail of the film. Much of it isn’t too complicated, dealing with a cross-state beer run enlivened by a vengeful sheriff tracking down the woman who left his son at the altar. The transport truck moving the beer west isn’t nearly as interesting as the black Trans-Am (driven by Burt Reynolds, no less) running interference by attracting as much attraction as speedily as possible. Elements of the premise, these days, can benefit from historical annotations: That Coors wasn’t sold east of Oklahoma; that it spoiled within days due to lack of preservatives; and the various intricacies of police jurisdiction. But little of the technicalities matter when the point of Smokey and the Bandit is to stage stunt sequences, riff of Reynolds’s charm (less potent today—see the need for annotations—but still effective), feature Sally Field in a rather comic role and generally have fun sticking it to The Man. It’s really not subtle—Jerry Reed’s insanely catchy song “East bound and down” essentially acts as a Greek Chorus explaining the main points of the movie. Otherwise, Jackie Gleason’s antagonist is a pure caricature that starts grating early and never becomes more sympathetic. There’s some sweet comedy in the way the “legend” of the Bandit seems universal in the film’s universe, reaching minor characters via CB radio (a technology essential to the film’s atmosphere) and making them react in extraordinary ways to facilitate their progress. The stunts are fine as could be expected from stuntman-turned-director Hal Needham, the banter between Reynolds and Field is occasionally great, but it’s Smokey and the Bandit’s general atmosphere that remains compelling today, even if often on an anthropological level.