I'LL DO ANYTHING
A film review by Steve Rhodes
Copyright 1995 Steve Rhodes
RATING (0 TO ****): ** 1/2
I'LL DO ANYTHING is UNIQUE in movie history, but I'll save the reason for the end of the review. The story is about a washed up actor (Nick Nolte) and his daughter, (newcomer Whittni Wright), played as the classic child from hell type, who turns into a successful child acting star. Albert Brooks plays the producer. Nolte is usually good and he is here, but nothing special. In every movie, I have ever seen Albert Brooks in, especially BROADCAST NEWS, he has been nothing less than terrific. In this movie he is okay, but nothing more. To be honest, his part was not well written - too timid or something - so I think he did good as he could. The best part is the child's. She is really cute, and I hope to see her again.
The worst part was the script by James L. Brooks. It just does not make you care enough about the characters yet all are potentially quite interesting. There were a few good one liners, especially in the small part of the mom played by Tracy Ullman. The directing was also by James L. Brooks who did BROADCAST NEWS and TERMS OF ENDEARMENT. Here he is too timid with his cast as if he is afraid to open up and take a few risks.
What is unique about this movie? It was originally a musical but at the screenings, people hated the songs, but liked the movie. They reedited it to take out all of the songs, and released it anyway. I did find myself unsuccessfully looking for where the musical numbers must have been.
I'LL DO ANYTHING runs too long at 1:56. With the missing songs this movie would have gone on forever. It is rated PG-13, but is pretty harmless show. Some movies are great in places and awful in others. I'LL DO ANYTHING on the other hand is extremely uniform albeit highly forgettable. I rated at a constant ** 1/2 and give it a thumbs up if you are looking for a pleasant movie that never taxes your brain.
**** = One of the top few films of this or any year. A must see film. *** = Excellent show. Look for it. ** = Average movie. Kind of enjoyable. * = Poor show. Don't waste your money. 0 = One of the worst films of this or any year. Totally unbearable.
REVIEW WRITTEN ON: February 14, 1994
Opinions expressed are mine and not meant to reflect my employer's.
The review above was posted to the
rec.arts.movies.reviews newsgroup (de.rec.film.kritiken for German reviews).
The Internet Movie Database accepts no responsibility for the contents of the
review and has no editorial control. Unless stated otherwise, the copyright
belongs to the author.
Please direct comments/criticisms of the review to relevant newsgroups.
Broken URLs inthe reviews are the responsibility of the author.
The formatting of the review is likely to differ from the original due
to ASCII to HTML conversion.
Related links: index of all rec.arts.movies.reviews reviews