The Little Prince (1974)

          Although I managed to pass through childhood without any exposure to the story, I’ve learned that French author/aviator Antoine de Saint-Exupéry’s fantastical novella The Little Prince is one of the most successful and widely read children’s stories of the 20th century. I mention this by way of stating that I approached this film adaptation without any feelings toward the source material, so others can hold forth on whether the picture does justice to de Saint-Exupéry’s writing. Watching the film of The Little Prince as its own entity, I found little to like despite the imaginative narrative and worthwhile themes. Director Stanley Donen, a giant of studio-era musical films whose career was winding down when he made The Little Prince, brings a fair amount of style in the form of clever fisheye-lens photography and general exuberance, but the combination of coldly professional acting by the leading players and distractingly artificial settings for many scenes makes the piece feel perfunctory rather than passionate.

          It’s also not a good sign that when famed choreographer-director Bob Fosse shows up in a rare acting role, he completely takes over the film for several minutes with his signature brand of cinematic and physical movement; although merely credited as choreographer for his own sequence, Fosse likely had a hand in the design of camera shots and editing, as well, and his bit is the liveliest stretch of the movie.

          Anyway, the story of The Little Prince must lose something in translation, because as presented onscreen, it’s insipid. When a character known only as the Pilot (Richard Kiley) lands his plane in the Sahara after experiencing engine trouble, he meets a strange young boy, the Little Prince (Steven Warner), who claims to have come from an asteroid in outer space. The Little Prince regales the Pilot with tales of his encounters with strange characters, including a friendly Fox (Gene Wilder), a demanding Rose (Donna McKechnie), and a pernicious Snake (Fosse). Each encounter taught the Little Prince a lesson, and so does his friendship with the Pilot.

          As communicated through twee songs by the famed duo of Alan Jay Lerner (who also wrote the screenplay) and Frederick Loewe (who also composed the score), the Little Prince’s adventure says something about the importance of retaining a child’s innocence even in adult life. Yet while the content is admirable, the execution is blah. Exterior daytime scenes in the desert are visually dull, nighttime exterior scenes shot on a soundstage are phony-looking, and the tricks Donen uses to simulate outer-space environments are gimmicky. Yet it’s ultimately the performances that keep The Little Prince from achieving liftoff. Kiley, a lovely actor with a resonant voice, is too theatrical, and young Steven Warner comes across as an automaton doing what he’s told. So, even with Fosse’s dynamic dance sequence and Wilder’s touchy-feely extended cameo, there’s little heart in what should be a deeply moving parable.

The Little Prince: FUNKY

Looking for Mr. Goodbar (1977)

          A dark meditation on the Sexual Revolution that caroms wildly between sensitive vignettes and overwrought climaxes, Looking for Mr. Goodbar divided audiences during its original release but has since attained cult-movie notoriety, especially because, as of this writing, it has yet to be released on DVD or Blu-Ray. (Falling into obscurity often boosts a once-popular film’s reputation.) Adapted from a best-selling novel by Judith Rossner and written and directed by uncompromising auteur Richard Brooks, the movie is a cautionary tale, but it’s not entirely clear what Brooks wants to caution viewers against. Sometimes, it seems as if he’s castigating his lead character, a young professional woman with a wild sex life, for the sin of seeking physical fulfillment. At other times, it seems as if the villain of the piece is the lead character’s recklessness. And thanks to a gruesome narrative turn during the story’s third act, an implication is communicated that homosexuality is a malignant societal force. Suffice to say, the sexual politics of the movie have not aged well.

        Yet certain elements of the picture probably seemed damned weird right from the get-go—consider the awkward device of grown-up star Diane Keaton playing her character during college scenes, or such surrealistic flourishes as the trippy visual effect that’s featured during the final shots of the movie. In fact, Brooks takes a gonzo storytelling approach from start to finish simply by pitching the intensity level of key scenes absurdly high. Were it not for the supple textures of Keaton’s performance, Looking for Mr. Goodbar would feel like a cartoon, albeit a nihilistic one.

          The story follows Teresa (Keaton), a good girl from a religious New York City-area family, as she matures professionally and sexually. Following an eye-opening dalliance with her college professor, Teresa takes a job as a teacher at a school for deaf children, so right from the beginning of this young woman’s journey, her intellectual and physical lives are intertwined. Teresa’s older sister, Katherine (Tuesday Weld), is a high-strung swinger who gets in too deep with a sexually adventurous man, but instead of being frightened by Katherine’s experiences, Teresa is titillated.
          Soon, Teresa enters the swinger world and gets involved with men including Tony (Richard Gere), a small-time crook who introduces Teresa to cocaine. (One memorably campy scene features Tony, jacked up on blow, doing push-ups in Teresa’s apartment while wearing nothing but a jockstrap.) Teresa also becomes involved with James (William Atherton), a social worker who represents a “safe” choice of romantic partner. However, she shuns his old-fashioned normalcy in favor of freakier delights. Eventually, Teresa’s sexual wanderlust lands her in bed with Gary (Tom Berenger), a sexually confused young man with a prison record, which instigates the movie’s infamous final scene.

          Looking for Mr. Goodbar is strange on many levels, but the most noteworthy cinematic disharmony is the rift between the story Brooks is telling and the one Keaton is telling. Brooks delivers every narrative assertion with an exclamation point, eschewing subtlety for hand-wringing histrionics. Meanwhile, Keaton does extraordinary work, imbuing her performance with naturalism and spontaneity. In essence, Brooks tries to make a Grand Statement while Keaton sketches a character study. This has the effect of making Keaton feel separate from the rest of the movie, especially when Gere over-acts his way through a ridiculous performance that Brooks should have restrained. And while supporting players including Atherton, Richard Kiley, and Priscilla Pointer all deliver competent work, the only actor who achieves the same level of nuance as Keaton is Weld, a perpetually underutilized daredevil of a performer who is capable of incandescence in the right context. (Her work in this movie earned a Best Supporting Actress Oscar nomination.) Ultimately, Looking for Mr. Goodbar is a uniquely disjointed movie—part melodrama, part tragedy, and part oh-so-’70s bummer phantasmagoria.

Looking for Mr. Goodbar: FREAKY

a.k.a. Cassius Clay (1970)

The beginning of the ’70s was an ideal time to make a documentary about heavyweight champion Muhammad Ali, who by that point had discarded his “slave name” Cassius Clay and become a controversial activist. When a.k.a. Cassius Clay was made, the fighter was in the midst of battles with sports authorities and the U.S. government to get his boxing license reinstated and to have his refusal to serve in the military on religious grounds validated. He was also pursuing so many alternate income sources that the documentary opens with footage of Ali’s failed attempt to star in a race-themed Broadway musical. Yet while the subject matter is fascinating and the timing is great, the film itself is a bore. In addition to being padded with clips of Ali’s legendary ’60s fights, the rambling a.k.a. Cassius Clay stumbles through such contrived episodes as Ali chatting with famed boxing trainer Cus D’Amato while they review newsreels of past fighting legends, such as Joe Louis, and discuss whether Ali could have beaten these fighters had their careers coincided. (Predictably, Ali claims he could beat any heavyweight who ever lived.) Easily half of the film’s running time comprises recycled footage, and the fresh stuff is weak. Worse, the whole picture is scored with cheesy funk music straight out of a ’70s porno, and narrator Richard Kiley (who periodically appears onscreen, speaking directly to the camera), repeatedly refers to Ali as “boy” (as in, “the promoters knew they had their boy”), which makes the project feel like a relic from a racially insensitive era. Plus, anyone even slightly familiar with Ali already knows every major fact this documentary presents. So, while a.k.a. Cassius Clay is not awful, per se—it’s basically accurate and basically coherent—the film is among the least inspired recitations of a great American tale.

a.k.a. Cassius Clay: LAME