Bad Manners (1998) Rating: 3.5 stars out of 5.0 stars
Cast: David Strathairn, Bonnie Bedelia, Saul Rubinek, Caroleen Feeney, Julie Harris Written by: David Gilman Directed by: Jonathan Kaufer Running Time: 88 minutes
Solid performances and some well plotted story elements make this filmed version of a stage play worthwhile. Wes and Nancy (David Strathairn and Bonnie Bedelia) are a long married but "romantically challenged" couple whose lives are interrupted by the appearance of Nancy's old flame Matt (Saul Rubinek) and his young, outspoken girlfriend Kim (Caroleen Feeney).
Matt and Kim stay with Wes and Nancy while Matt delivers a musicology lecture at Harvard. Matt believes that he has found God's influence in a piece of computer generated music, and Wes obsesses that Kim has stolen 50 dollars from his wallet. What follows is an unpredictable series of events that rivals David Mamet's Oleanna in the whole "no matter which side you take... you're wrong" area. You won't see events coming, and even when the film's over you'll still be wondering about what you saw. The more I think about this film, the more I like about it.
Note: Bad Manners is based on a Steppenwolf Theater play called Ghost in the Machine. I'm guessing that the title was changed to Bad Manners to avoid confusion with the 1993 Karen Allen movie called Ghost in the Machine that no one ever saw. Although won't people now confuse it with the 1984 Karen Black movie called Bad Manners that no one ever saw?
Bad Manners is available on DVD from Bell Canyon Entertainment. It contains the film in its original widescreen theatrical aspect ratio, a full length audio commentary track featuring director Jonathan Kaufer and cast member Saul Rubinek, a behind the scenes documentary featuring interviews with the cast and crew that runs about 20 minutes, and the usual cast biographies and filmographies.
Director Jonathan Kaufer has tried an interesting experiment with the commentary track on the DVD of Bad Manners. During the track, several guest stars (Marcia Strassman, Penny Marshall, Carrie Fisher, Peter Riegert) appear, thinking that the director and Saul Rubinek are recording a commentary track for their 1982 film Soup For One. The main problem with this though is that these gimmicky guest stars tend to barge in when Kaufer and Rubinek are saying something INTERESTING about the film's production. After the pre-scripted "spontaneous" interruptions are over, the two rarely go back to their previous train of thought. Good idea, bad execution.
The DVD is very nice despite that one complaint though, and it's one of the few discs that actually made me take note of its menu screens. The disc's menus are done in a blue-white "wintery" style mixed with images from the film and scored by the Tori Amos song "Putting the Damage On" which appears in the film's closing credits (a song which is impossible to get out of your head once you hear it). Even the DVD credits selection is entertaining. My hats off to the folks responsible for this disc. [R]
Reviewed by Chuck Dowling - chuckd21@fdn.com AOL Instant Messenger: FilmJax The Jacksonville Film Journal - http://www.jaxfilmjournal.com/
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