Pride Month Movie - Day Twenty Six: Victor/Victoria

Victor/Victoria (1982)

Directed by Blake Edwards

Screenplay by Blake Edwards

Based on the concept by Hans Hoemburg and earlier screenplay, "Viktor und Viktoria" by Reinhold Schünzel 

Stars: Julie Andrews, James Garner, Robert Preston, Lesley Ann Warren, Alex Karras, John Rhys-Davies, Graham Stark, and Peter Arne

With the fabulous Julie Andrews getting her AFI Lifetime Achievement Award recently, I wanted to see one of her Oscar nominated performances.

A down on her luck singer, Victoria Grant (Andrews) tries to audition for various nightclubs around Paris. She has a chance meeting with Toddy (Preston), an out of work lounge singer. Toddy comes up with a plan to have Victoria assume the identity of Victor, a famous female impersonator from Poland. Things get complicated with a nightclub owner, King Marchand (Garner) takes a liking to Victor.

This movie being the zeitgeist for the longest time; I thought I would have heard something about the plot. There was things in this movie that surprised me. I was glad that Blake Edwards did not make fun of gay men or drag queens. There was care with this screenplay. Treated the characters with respect for the most part.

The pacing of the movie dragged in the middle. Times I thought the movie was over and it kept going. I had a problem with Lesley Ann Warren's character, Norma Cassady. Was she trying to be annoying? Was that her acting choice or Blake's? Why was she nominated for an Oscar? I had the biggest problem with the voyeurism of the movie. It felt creepy. Lock that wardrobe. Let's leave it at that.

Rating: 8/10

Blade Runner - The Director's Cut

Blade Runner (1982)

Directed by Ridley Scott

Screenplay by Hampton Fancher and David Webb Peoples

Based on the novel, "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?" by Phillip K. Dick

Currently #125 of the Top 250 Films of All Time on IMDb (as of this posting)

Stars: Harrison Ford, Sean Young, Rutger Howard, Daryl Hannah, Brion James, Joe Turkel, William Sanderson, M. Emmet Walsh, Edward James Olmos and Joanna Cassidy

For the longest time, people were talking, comparing, remembering or call back to Ridley Scott's Blade Runner. People was saying that it was awesome. I kinda felt out of the loop that I didn't know what people were talking about with this movie. The film was nominated for two Oscars for Best Art Direction and Best Visual Effects. This is like the thinking man's action movie and I enjoyed it.

In the not too distant future -- roughly seven years from now -- Dr. Eldon Tyrell (Turkel) created robots known as "replicants" that were like humans with superior strength and agility that were used as slave labor for the colonization of other inhabitable planets. A revolt by the replicants has made them illegal aliens essentially to the planet Earth. Any replicants that were found on Earth would be killed on sight by blade runners. A police chief, Bryant (Walsh) is informed that four replicants have broken away from exile and come to Earth. He needs to find the best blade runner to "retire" them who is retired, Rick Deckard (Ford).

I will just get this out of the way. I felt that same way like I did with Total Recall. The original, not the remake. I felt that "future" the filmmakers portrayed looked very dated. I can understand that it was eighties and everything has to being dark and dirty with car that look like flying tin cans.

Now, that is out of the way. I can focus on the good things with this film. The replicants of the films are not the bad guys, per se. They are beings that are existing that want to have more life that limited four years lifespan that they have. The movie makes you question you own mortality. Robots should not be able to have emotions, but the replicants of the movie do. Harrison Ford has made a different kind of hero like he did with Hans Solo and Indiana Jones. Deckard felt like unlikely hero that wants to do his job and go home. There was a romance between Ford and Sean Young's character, Rachael that I thought was handled beautifully. It wasn't forced or tacked on. I like that.

My Rating