Martin Scorsese's famous cocaine fuelled misfire killed Liza Minnelli's career as a movie star (along with Lucky Lady and A Matter of Time) and left a magnificent title song. It starts bold and brassy with credits then has a cringy meet cute with Robert de Niro being a sex pest trying to get Minnelli's phone number.
De Niro's character is really revolting - I think in part because the film was improvised so much, he's experienced at it and she isn't, so he overpowers her in the scenes. When she can sing it's even.
Scorsese says this is a film about creatives. It's not, not really - it's about a possessive, controlling man. He stalks her, love bombs her, is possessive, controlling, abusive.
It's really, really unpleasant. It gets better in the last third when de Niro leaves and the movie becomes essentially a series of production numbers, including the famous 'Happy Endings' which was removed. It's a whole film within a film like they would do in Singin in the Rain. Why did they cut that out and not those terrible abuse scenes which hit the same beat (he's possessive/jealous/mean). They could have trimmed that right back and put in more songs.
I'll say this for Scorsese - he doesn't glamourise domestic violence. But he shoves it down our throats.
Liza flashes her big eyes and can sing the hell out of anything but doesn't have much of a character to play. De Niro is possessive. The film needed a second lead. It has cameo turns from people like Lionel Stander and Dick Miller - it should have merged these.
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