Come Back to the 5 & Dime Jimmy Dean, Jimmy Dean

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Alec B Very theatrical but Altman finds ways to make it work. It doesn't hurt that the cast all did the play right before filming Rated 3.5/5 Stars •  Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars 01/10/24 Full Review Audience Member All I can say is... I loved & I wish it was shown on streaming device for free soon. Great Movie Rated 5/5 Stars •  Rated 5 out of 5 stars 02/11/23 Full Review Audience Member It's a mix of nostalgia and rottenness. As one longs a past and simultaneously loathes it. Likewise for people. I found the beginning hard to follow because the story goes back and forth in time without any noticeable changes in the actors or in the setting. It was first a theater play, and the movie preserves a lot of its theatrical qualities. The movie still unfolds in a single act, a single setting. This can be a bit tedious and monotonous but the characters are rich and the acting is very good. Characters enter and walk in and times goes back and forth. Mona is the camera's favorite perhaps because she's the one almost always at the verge of a nervous breakdown. The premise eventually becomes clear: a reunion of the disciples of jimmy dean - a fan club with very special fans. The reunion uncovers a lot of their past. There's something about the journey to the past that immediately brings up some nostalgia. Not all beautiful, not all rotten, but all is wrapped with some nostalgia. People and memories that we simultaneously want close and apart. Moreover, people not things tell stories. Without those people, that store would be just an empty store. Besides these existential notes, the story obvious touches masculinity, and the effects of toxic masculinity, and femininity. All those women's lives were changed by men who one way or the other fail them. Finally the dialogue is beautiful, and alive. Again a combination of drama and comedy. Rated 4/5 Stars •  Rated 4 out of 5 stars 02/03/23 Full Review Audience Member Very theatrical but Altman finds ways to make it work. It doesn't hurt that the cast all did the play right before filming Rated 3.5/5 Stars •  Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars 02/13/23 Full Review Audience Member Robert Altman's first Broadway production, based on Ed Graczyk's play, lasted 52 performances but despite bad critical notices, I'm so glad he decided to immortalize it on 16mm film for our viewing pleasure. Deliberately retaining its theatricality by staging it entirely in one double-set separated by two-way mirrors, the narrative unfolds in two different time-frames 20 years apart. The main story is set in 1975 as a group of superfans reunites for the 20th anniversary of the death of James Dean in a small fictitious Texan town that's slowly fading away. Cher's Sissy still works in the same Woolworth's with her ultra-religious boss Juanita (a typically wisecracking supporting turn by Sudie Bond) while Sandy Dennis's Mona has brought up a son she claims she conceived with James Dean. The arrival of Karen Black's stranger then forces the group to unearth and confront home truths and secrets that's been long ignored and hidden away. Going into this film blind, I was pleasantly surprised by the sensitive and progressive handling of controversial subject matters that would've shocked its audience then. The small cast boasts a fresh-faced Kathy Bates and Cher, in one of her first dramatic roles, who looks almost natural and believable as the gregarious waitress struggling quietly with her own domestic strives. However, it's a frumpily-dressed Sandy Dennis who takes the spotlight with a heart-breaking performance as a determined woman who'd rather dwell on one moment of past glory she had in her life than face reality. Undoubtedly, this works better as theatre but with a screenplay brimming with tears and laughter, I'm glad to have this introduction before it gets its long overdue revival on stage which I think will work beautifully as the issues it tackles couldn't be more relevant and contemporary if it tries. Rated 3.5/5 Stars •  Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars 01/27/23 Full Review the s I feel like this movie gets a lot of unwarranted criticism. Given that it was adapted from a play, they did a pretty incredible job. There's no denying the caliber of acting in it and the story is unique and interesting enough to be kind of strange and almost like an odd dream. I think the problem comes from the way the story is presented partially in flashbacks and how that part is handled technically. Some of the women look younger at the reunion than they do in the flashbacks that are supposed to be 20 years earlier...so that becomes a problem of continuity as far as the movie presentation goes. Aside from those issues, it's a pretty incredible slice of movie history. The film typically gets panned by critics or at the very least doesn't get the credit it deserves. But the truth is that it addressed issues such as homosexuality, homophobia, alcoholism, gender identity, among others at a time when it wasn't acceptable to write those topics into a movie, let alone build a plot around them. So a little ahead of its time in that respect but very timely in 2020 Rated 4/5 Stars •  Rated 4 out of 5 stars 03/30/23 Full Review Read all reviews

Come Back to the 5 & Dime Jimmy Dean, Jimmy Dean

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