Boogie Nights A Film Review By Michael Redman Copyright 1997 Michael Redman
*** (out of ****)
"Everyone's blessed with one special thing," explains Eddie Adams. Eddie's blessing is his extraordinarily endowed "special thing".
Set in the seventies and eighties, Adams' (Mark Wahlberg of Marky Mark fame) journey into the porn industry is the center point for this comedic yet dark film. Reminiscent of Robert Altman's "Nashville", the movie also follows a gaggle of other characters, each more damaged than the next.
Adult film auteur Jack Horner (Burt Reynolds) notices Eddie in a nightclub and recognizes the possibilities that the young man possesses when he tells him "I have the feeling that behind those jeans is something wonderful just waiting to get out." Fresh from being kicked out of his parent's house because he will never amount to anything, Eddie accepts the invitation into Horner's film production dysfunctional family.
It looks like the good life. Full-tilt partying, easy sex, drugs, platform shoes, the chance to be a movie star: what more could a kid in the seventies want? As you might expect, no good time goes unpunished. As the eighties start off with a bang (in all meanings of the word), things fall apart. Hedonism turns to violence, crime and drug addiction. The good life isn't.
As with many current films, this one is long. Often the story is so engrossing that you won't notice the length, but occasionally the rambling plot makes you feel all two and a half hours. There are scenes that could have been exorcised and we wouldn't have lost a thing.
Invoking the seventies is one of the most successful aspects of the movie and also one of its most irritating. There are so many icons that bring to mind that time period and the film has all of them right. The problem is that it's shoved in our face. When porn star/stereo salesman Buck Swope (Don Cheadle) shoves an eight-track into a player, he has to _tell_ us it's an eight-track. "Seventies! Seventies! It's the seventies!" everyone screams. Yeah, we get the idea.
The hindsight of looking back 20 years provides some of the humor. When Eddie (now renamed Dirk Diggler) brags about his "authentic imported Italian nylon" shirt, we all know how comfortable plastic clothes turned out to be. Dancing in platform shoes in the disco doesn't look cool anymore, it looks ludicrous. Director Paul Thomas Anderson calls that decade "a wonderful period of music and fashion." Anderson is 26. His memories are those of a 6-year-old.
But the era is only the backdrop to the real drama. When Eddie is sucked into Horner's oxymoronic kindly and paternal sleazy clan, he finds the home that he needs. Along with numerous other hangers-on, they provide support for each other. Even when the gold turns to sludge, they still try to hold things together -- they just don't know how.
Wahlberg is the perfect combination of youth and determined naivete to play the up and coming stud. Like most of the characters, his Eddie is all drive and little skill. In their microcosm, the horrendous "Mod Squad" knockoff action-adventure porn series wins awards. Eddie's abortive rock and roll career is doomed from the start.
Burt Reynolds turns in his most successful role in years. His laid back director wants to produce "artistic" porn that will keep the audience in their seats after they have enjoyed the film in the traditional manner. His nemesis is video tape. As VCRs invade the American home and adult films are being produced by everyone who can pick up a camera, Horner attempts to hold out for quality. In the kingdom of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
The rest of the cast is equally capable. Julianne Moore as Amber Waves is an especially sympathetic character. Besides acting in the films, Waves is the substitute mother to the rest, compensating for her biological son who was taken away from her.
Rollergirl (Heather Graham), a teenage runaway, doesn't have much of a personality until the final half, but is amusing zooming through the scenes in her roller skates -- which she _never_ removes.
Little Bill (William H. Macy) is outstanding as the grim crew member whose wife cheats on him at the drop of a hat. At one party, he walks up to her as she is naked in the middle of a crowd entertaining a gentleman friend on the driveway. When he attempts to talk to her, she replies "Shut up Bill. You're embarrassing me." He is powerless to change his life and lets it build up until...
A film about the porn industry without any real porn? Although there is full frontal (and full backal) nudity, the sex scenes are mostly portrayed in facial expressions of the onlookers. Even Eddie's revelation of his famous gift (made possible with a prosthesis for Wahlberg, in case you're interested) is not played for thrills.
The message here will play well nowadays. Have too much fun and you'll trash yourself. There's some truth to that, but finding the middle road between the mundane and the extreme is a difficult one. Good luck.
(Michael Redman has written this column for over 22 years and is enjoying the crisp colorful southern Indiana autumn instead of staying inside watching adult videos. mredman@bvoice.com is the eaddress for recommendations of either activity.)
[This appeared in the 11/5/97 "Bloomington Voice", Bloomington, Indiana. Michael Redman can be reached at mredman@bvoice.com ] -- mailto:mredman@bvoice.com This week's film review at http://www.bvoice.com/ Film reviews archive at http://us.imdb.com/M/reviews_by?Michael%20Redman
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