More Movies You Never Heard of

Last time, I took a look at five forgotten movies that we like and wanted to share with you. This week we have eight more. This was originally written for our now-gone site, Blue Collar-Black Tie, but I have dutifully gone back and re-watched them and updated my commentary to reflect my current feelings about them. Enjoy!

Reuben, Reuben
This little gem came out in 1983, was nominated for two Oscars (Best Actor and Best Adapted Screenplay), then disappeared in the mists of time. Today it’s largely notable for being the first film role for Kelly McGillis. Tom Conti plays Gowan MacGland, a drunken poet who hasn’t written anything in a decade, who now ekes out a living speaking to “friends of the library” groups throughout New England, seducing society matrons, stealing tips at restaurants, and contemplating suicide. Then he meets beautiful college student Geneva Spofford and his world turns upside down.

For a hot minute in the mid-1980s, it looked like Tom Conti was going to be a major star, turning in acclaimed performances in several popular films over the course of about five years before largely disappearing into mostly supporting roles in various TV series; he was in two episodes of Friends, for instance. Conti is still working—he was Albert Einstein in Oppenheimer—and he remains one of my favorite actors. That said, my favorite character in Reuben, Reuben is Spofford, the sardonic chicken framer played by Roberts Blossom. His speech about suburbia is golden.

A few years ago, I read both the novel that the film is based on and Spofford, the play adapted from the book; the film really only covers about a third of the book, and it has a very late-’60s feel; interestingly, Gowan MacGland is actually a fairly minor character in the book, someone the three narrators interact with and play off of. It’s a good book, but I like the film a lot more.

I wasn’t able to rewatch this film, as it is currently not streaming anywhere and I can’t find my DVD. But I watch it about every five years or so, and always enjoy it.

Garbo Talks
I’ve written about this one before; here, and here, here, and also here. Anne Bancroft, one of the finest actresses America ever produced, stars as Estelle Rolfe, a 67-year-old divorcee who has never kept silent in the face of injustice. Apart from fighting for her many causes, Estelle’s two greatest joys in life are her son Gilbert (named for John Gilbert) and the films of Greta Garbo. When she is diagnosed with an inoperable brain tumor and given only a few months to live, her wish (“it’s not a last wish! I got a lot of wishes; I’m short on time.”) is to meet the reclusive Garbo, and dutiful-but-wimpy son Gilbert (Ron Silver) goes to insane lengths to try to fulfill this request. A parade of great actors show up in supporting roles, including Howard Da Silva, Dorothy Loudon, Harvey Fierstein, Hermione Gingold, Carrie Fisher and Catherine Hicks. The beautiful opening animation by Tessa David gives us a lyrical ballet retelling of Estelle’s life story to set the stage for this tour de force performance. Playwright Betty Comden plays Garbo.

Estelle Rolfe (Anne Bancroft) berates catcalling construction workers:

This one holds up beautifully. About the only time you’re really aware that it’s an ‘80s movie is when we see the technology in Gilbert’s office; the gigantic electric typewriter, push-button telephone, and cumbersome “desktop” computer with tiny monochrome CRT screen are state-of-the-art for 1986, but the emotional issues and personality types are timeless. Steven Hill, playing Estelle’s ex-husband, reminisces about the early days of their marriage in a beautifully low-key monologue. Toward the end, Estelle has an amazing four-minute monologue, shot in one take with no cuts, that I think ranks among the finest performances ever filmed. Anne Bancroft was and is a national treasure.

Miracles
Speaking of National Treasures… Long before he wrote National Treasure or TV’s Grimm, Jim Kouf wrote and directed this little film that never saw a nationwide release before moving to video in 1986. (I also mentioned this one in several of the posts tagged in the Garbo Talks section.) Tom Conti plays a recently-divorced surgeon, with Teri Garr as his ex-wife. When a drunken Medicine Man in Central America cries out to the gods to save the life of the Chief’s ailing daughter, a long string of remarkable coincidences are set in motion, beginning with a bungled jewelry store robbery attempted by dim-witted criminals Christopher Lloyd and Paul Rodriguez, which causes a car accident involving the battling ex-spouses, who are promptly taken hostage. The “coincidences” continue to pile up, throwing the couple together and dragging them into the jungle. Miracles has finally been officially released on DVD Blu-Ray, but copies are somewhat scarce; the film is currently owned by MGM since they acquired Orion Pictures, and MGM is now owned by Amazon. The film does occasionally show up on Netflix and Amazon’s streaming services. It also gets posted on YouTube, but those posts vanish without warning.

I forgot how clever this film is; almost every miraculous event that happens in the film includes a few ancillary miracles; for example, when the police have a shoot-out with would-be bank robbers, a stray bullet causes the ATM to spray a shower of money onto a sleeping homeless person. There are dozens of these little moments, and nobody in the film is ever aware of the Rube Goldberg-like strings of coincidences that result in unexpected blessings or punishments. It’s all very charming, especially since there’s never any preaching about who God is or what He wants; all we see are the outcomes along the way as many people’s prayers are answered while circumstances conspire to respond to one man’s desperate plea. Terri Garr and Tom Conti’s relationship as they go from venomous bickering to learning to care about each other again is a treat to watch.

People Like Us
A fairly recent film (at least in comparison to the others in this list), it had the misfortune of opening on the same day as Seth MacFarlane’s lowbrow comedy Ted in 2012; the masses went to see the foul-mouthed teddy bear, leaving People Like Us to play to empty theaters. Adding insult to injury, Dreamworks decided not to submit the film or any of its cast for consideration in any awards in order to increase the chances of a sweep for Lincoln. Elizabeth Banks and Michelle Pfeiffer both deserved nominations. The story is about a wheeler-dealer (Chris Pine) who has to go home after his estranged father’s death, only to discover family secrets that he has to deal with.

This one holds up exceptionally well. The kid who plays Josh, Michael Hall D’Addario, is one of the most natural child actors I’ve ever seen, completely believable and real in every scene. Today, he plays drums in The Lemon Twigs, the band he started with his brother Brian. The other interesting thing here is who made the film; Alex Kurtzman and Roberto Orci co-wrote it, Kurtzman directed and Orci produced.They are best known for big effects-heavy sci-fi stuff; Together they wrote a lot of films in the Transformers, Mission: Impossible, and Star Trek franchises and Cowboys & Aliens, among others. They also created the TV show Fringe. When given the opportunity to make a film of their own, they came up with this quiet little family drama with scarcely a special effect to be found (unless you happen to know Southern California geography, in which case you know it takes movie magic to go from downtown to Toluca Lake to Claremont and Malibu in the short drives we see.)

An Everlasting Piece
Set in 1980s Belfast during “The Troubles,” Barry Levinson’s 2000 film tells the story of two barbers, one Catholic, the other Protestant, who work together cutting hair in an insane asylum; when they learn that one of the patients (Billy Connolly) was formerly the owner of the only wig shop in Northern Ireland, they conspire to get his customer list and go into the wig biz.

Like many of Barry Levinson’s films (Good Morning, Vietnam; Rain Man; Wag the Dog; Diner), the real focus of An Everlasting Piece is the characters, how they behave and interact with each other, and how the story affects them. There is a lot of quiet business going on as these two men from different backgrounds and with different political allegiances figure out how to work together. Almost immediately, the question arises as to whether the partners are each willing to sell to the more strident members of the other partner’s community; will the Protestant sell toupees to members of the IRA? Will the Catholic sell them to the British military? and will they successfully outsell the competing company that has recently opened its doors? Barry McEvoy (who also wrote the script) and Brian F. O’Byrne are a great comedic pair as Colm and George, with great support from Anna Friel (Pushing Daisies) as Colm’s girlfriend Bronagh.

This is another film that Dreamworks threw under the bus; it was due to be released in 800 theaters nationwide, but when it was announced that Steven Spielberg was to receive the OBE from Queen Elizabeth the same week, the film’s release was suddenly reduced to only eight theaters, after which it disappeared.

Re-watching this film reminded me what a good and under-appreciated director Barry Levinson is; we followed it up with a re-watch of Diner. He does idiosyncratic character-driven films like nobody else. I was also surprised to lee Anna Friel in it, and doubly surprised to find out that her American accent in Pushing Daisies is completely fake.

84 Charing Cross Road
Anne Bancroft is at the top of her form here as New York-based writer Helene Hanff in an autobiographical portrait of her decades-long penpal relationship with the staff of a London bookstore from the late 1940s into the ’60s. Anthony Hopkins as the ever-proper proprietor answers her humorously conversational letters with dry British reserve. The recreation of mid-century New York and London is beautiful, and the two leads fully inhabit these interesting and very opposite people. A quiet film that rewards those who pay attention to dialog, this film is proof that not every love story has to be a romance.

Again, Anne Bancroft was a national treasure. In this film, made four years after Garbo Talks, Bancroft plays Hanff from age 35 to 55; she was 56 at the time. In Garbo Talks, she convinced us she was a 67-year-old retiree. In both films, she owns every moment she is on the screen.

Mona Lisa
Bob Hoskins plays George, a small-time crook recently released from prison, who reluctantly accepts a job as driver and bodyguard to Simone (Cathy Tyson), a high-priced callgirl, and even more reluctantly begins to fall in love with her. Michael Caine plays the most menacing and ruthless crime lord you ever saw, who has given George this job so that he can dig up information on one of Simone’s clients. Simone wants George to help her locate a friend from her past. The plot threads intertwine into a violent resolution in London’s seedy underbelly. Written and directed by Neil Jordan (The Crying Game), the film depends greatly on the performers to make it the memorable film that it is.

Made in Heaven
In 1957, a young musician named Mike Shea (Timothy Hutton) dies while trying to rescue a family in an accident; when he gets to heaven, he meets and falls in love with a heavenly guide named Annie (Kelly McGillis) who has not yet spent time living as a human on Earth. Before too long, the two are deeply in love, but then Annie is called up to go be born. Desperately, Mike begs the Heavenly powers to allow him to be reincarnated at the same time; God, in the form of “Emmett,” a chain-smoking guy with an orange crew-cut, agrees to let him go, with one catch; Mike and Annie will not remember each other, and they only have 30 years to find each other again. Debra Winger (who was then married to Hutton), dresses in male drag to play God.

Unfortunately, this film was a lot better in my memory than in the rewatch. It’s a great concept, particularly the way Mike’s experiences in Heaven have resonances in his new life, and the way people and events from his previous life have impact on his new life even though he doesn’t recognize them. But ultimately, it’s a little too slow, a little too underplayed, and a little too gloomy in both its cinematography and performances, as if everyone involved was grimly determined to prevent it from being the romance film it clearly wanted to be. Kelly McGillis remains not only incredibly beautiful, but also absolutely authentic in her performance, as always, and Tim Hutton remains underappreciated for his simple and honest performance, as always, but the whole thing doesn’t quite gel for me the way I remembered it. Or maybe I”m just too old and jaded now, or maybe the film’s style is just out of fashion now. I dunno. I just didn’t enjoy it as much as I did 30-odd years ago. But you might like it.