Happy birthday, Elvis! In honor of The King’s birthday this week, we present one of his best movies, the delirious Viva Las Vegas, co-starring the combustible Ann-Margret.
Elvis plays a race-car driver named Lucky who meets a spirited girl named Rusty. For once he has a co-star who is as dynamic a musical performer as he is. It includes classics like the title tune and saucy duet “The Lady Loves Me,” plus a sizzling Ann-Margret dance number. And a car race! Just the thing to start off the new year.
Go ahead, admit it. We won’t judge you. You, in the car, with the Ramones t-shirt, singing along to “Fernando” when it comes on the radio. And you, in the shower, singing “Dancing Queen” into the shampoo bottle. You, over there, pretending you don’t have the Greatest Hits CD on your shelf. Say it loud. You’re a fan. You can’t resist ABBA. Like the Borg, resistance is futile. Those songs are not just stuck in your head; they are a part of your DNA. Yes, ABBA’s platform-shod, glitter and spandex-wearing, unforgettable (even when you want to) music may be ear candy but it is high quality ear candy and I dare you not to sing along and smile about it.
ABBA (the name comes from the first letters in the first names of its four members) was one of the top pop groups in the world from 1972-1982 with sales of almost 400 million records (as we used to call them back then). In April of 1999 the musical “Mamma Mia!” opened in London and like the songs that inspired it, it quickly became an international phenomenon. It had just enough of a story to link the songs together as something more than a revue or what today is called a “jukebox musical.” And now, more than a quarter century since their last hit song, the movie version of the musical has been released or rather unleashed, powerful enough to make the most hard-hearted indie rock absolutist clap along.
ABBA songs are like helium balloons — lighter than air but irresistible fun. This musical featuring the songs of the uber-pop Swedish group who at one point exceeded Volvo as the greatest revenue-producing enterprise in the country is as bubbly as a glass of champagne and almost as intoxicating.
Donna (Meryl Streep, enjoying herself enormously) is a one-time girl-group singer who now runs a ramshackle resort in Greece. Her daughter Sophie (Amanda Seyfried of HBO’s “Big Love”) is about to get married. And without telling her mother she has invited three men she has never met who could be her father: businessman Sam (Pierce Brosnan), author/sailor Bill (Stellan SkarsgÃ¥rd), and decidedly un-spontaneous banker Harry (Colin Firth). They arrive just as the other alumnae from Donna’s group show up, multi-married and very well-preserved Tanya (Christine Baranski) and best-selling cookbook author Rosie (Julie Walters). Various slamming-door near-misses, some combustible confrontations, and many musical numbers later, everyone is ready for the platform-shoes and spangled bell-bottoms encore.
The light-weight story line is just enough to provide momentum between the songs but it gives them some surprising heft as well. At times it seems a little stunt-ish and there were some hoots from the audience for the opening notes of songs that we thought we knew too well. But we end up hearing them differently separated from the crystalline harmonies of Agnetha Fältskog and Anni-Frid Lyngstad and the lyrics fit surprisingly well into the storyline. But what adds real resonance is the way they are performed. Director Phyllida Lloyd cast actors in the roles. Their singing may not be perfect but they deliver the songs with gusto and sincerity. A couple of times there were snorts from the audience at recognizing the opening bars of a song they’d heard a hundred times, thinking it had been cheesily shoehorned into the plot. But within the first eight bars it seemed as though the song had been written for just that moment, especially Streep’s “Winner Takes it All.”
But the highlight of the movie is the dance numbers which make great use of the geographic and narrative settings. Broadway veteran Baranski does a fabulous job with “Does Your Mother Know” and Walters is charming with “Take a Chance on Me.” A literal Greek chorus joins in, at one point with swimming flippers. Take a chance on this one; in no time you’ll be a dancing queen.
Very strong language including crude sexual references and racist epithets
Alcohol/ Drugs:
Drinking, smoking, drug use
Violence/ Scariness:
Guns, brutal beating, drug overdose
Diversity Issues:
A theme of the movie
Date Released to Theaters:
December 5, 2008
In the words of Etta James, at last.
At last, albeit imperfectly, the extraordinary story of the rise and fall of Chess Records has been given the loving attention it deserves. Magnificent performances and soul-shaking music make up for some narrative stumbles and dubious fictions in this, the higher profile of two films this year about the legendary Chicago record label.
Adrian Brody plays Leonard Chess, a Jewish immigrant who was one of the first to record and market the work of black artists in the 1950s, when it was still called “race music.” With talent like Mississippi Delta blues player Muddy Waters, harmonica virtuoso Little Walter, powerhouse vocalist Howlin’ Wolf, the silky soul chanteuse Etta James, and proto-rocker Chuck Berry, Chess recordings established the foundation for “race music” to become blues, then rhythm and blues, and then rock and roll.
That is a lot to get through in one movie, and if at times it descends into VH1 “Behind the Music”-isms, muddled chronology (the Rolling Stones show up before the early Elvis), and distortions of fact, it is understandable. The movie touches on some of the difficult issues of race and gender without much depth, as when the performers, limited by lack of education and the bigotry of the day, begin to resent the paternalism — and sloppy bookkeeping — of Chess. Generations of oppression and naivete about business make them suspicious that he is keeping too much of their money. And dramatically it falls victim to what I call the “and then” syndrome, piling events on top of each other without a strong narrative arc.
Jeffrey Wright as Muddy Waters, Gabrielle Union as his significant other Geneva, and Mos Def as Berry are outstanding as always; they are among the finest actors and most mesmerizing performers in Hollywood. Columbus Short, an appealing presence in “Stomp the Yard” and “This Christmas” is a revelation as Little Walter. And Beyonce Knowles (who also produced) gives James a gritty authenticity this glossy pop star has not reached before. What matters here is the characters and the music and in both categories the performances really deliver.
This episodic story of the Smith family in the St. Louis of 1903 is based on the memoirs of Sally Benson. Its pleasures are in the period detail, the glorious songs (including standards “The Trolley Song” and “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas”) and the loving and nostalgic look at a time of innocence and optimism, where a long-distance call was almost as thrilling as having the World’s Fair come to your very own city. We see the family over the course of a year, celebrating Halloween and Christmas, riding the ice truck in the summer and building snowmen in the winter. They face the prospect of having to leave St. Louis so that Mr. Smith can accept a promotion. They wonder whether the older girl’s two boyfriends will propose. They treat each other with great loyalty and affectionate tolerance. And then they live happily ever after.
The Smith’s older daughters are Rose (Lucille Bremer) and Esther (Judy Garland). Rose is attracted to Warren Sheffield, and a bit impatient because he has not proposed. Esther has decided to marry “the boy next door,” John Pruitt (Tom Drake), even though they have not yet met. When the girls have a party, their two little sisters (Joan Carroll and Margaret O’Brien as Agnes and Tootie Smith) creep downstairs. Tootie is allowed to do one song with Esther (the cakewalk “Under the Bamboo Tree”) before being sent back to bed. Esther asks John to help her turn out the gas lights before he leaves, to have some time alone with him. The next day, he joins her as she and her friends ride on the trolley, and when he catches up with them, she sings “The Trolly Song.” Later, Warren escorts a visiting out-of-town girl (June Lockhart) to another party, and Esther and Rose conspire to fill her dance card with the least appealing partners at the dance. When she is revealed to be so friendly and tactful that she gets Rose and Warren back together, Esther has to take all of her dances. Tootie is heartbroken about moving to New York, and while the rest of the family tries to hide it, they are, too. Mr. Smith gives up, they stay in St. Louis, and when the fair opens, they are there.
One of the movie’s most evocative scenes is Halloween, celebrated very differently in those days, but like today the one night of the year where children have the power to frighten the grown-ups. Agnes and Tootie dress up in rags and “kill” the people who answer the door by throwing flour at them. Director Minnelli skillfully shows how spooky and at the same time thrilling it is for the girls to be out after dark. When Tootie is successful at “killing” the grouchy neighbor, she is heralded by the other kids, and blissfully announces, “I’m the most horrible! I’m the most horrible!”
This is one of the most loving of all movie families. Everyone in it treats all of the other members with trust and affection, even, when it comes to Tootie, indulgence. They are interested in each other and take each other’s concerns seriously, whether it is the seasoning of a sauce or choice of a future spouse. Only the poor father is rather left out. He is not told about the long distance call, and no one is pleased with his promotion. But in a way, that is just a reflection of the family’s devotion to him and to the life they have together in St. Louis. And the lovely duet he sings with his wife, “You and I,” shows that it is their relationship that is the foundation of the family.
Minnelli began as an art director and designer, and his use of color is always fresh and fun — there isn’t another director in history who would have thought to put Esther in purple gloves for the trolley ride, but once you see it, you can’t imagine any other color.
