Piano Bars

Rating: 6/10 (8 June 2013)

Take away the givens - the courage of the two leading actors to accept roles that at the very least attract controversy and then play them to the hilt (sorry about that) the Award-worthy performances etc - and we're left with one serious flaw that makes the writing appear sloppy and amateurish when in fact it is as good as may be expected given the subject matter. At the beginning of the film Liberace and Scott Thorson inhabit worlds that are polar opposites and need to be brought together. We know they were together for six years because Thorson wrote a book to that effect and though I haven't read it and have no desire to do so it's reasonable to assume he gave a plausible account of how the two worlds collided. In the movie Scott goes with a friend who knows Liberace to one of his performances. Afterwards they go backstage and chat in the star's dressing room and are invited to lunch the following day at Lee's mansion. There Lee is fawning over a poodle with a serious eye condition. I can help with that says Scott and sure enough the very next day he telephones Lee and says he is putting the medication in the mail. Don't do that, says Lee, I don't want Baby to suffer a moment longer than she has to. Take a plane at my expense. I'll fly you straight back. So he takes a plane and stays six years. Here's what the writers are asking us to accept: A millionaire performer who dotes on a pet has NOT explored every avenue to find a cure for the pet's eye condition and is SURPRISED when an ordinary man who works with animals suggests basic medication. MORE IMPORTANT, once Scott has arrived - supposedly with the medication - we never see or hear about the dog AGAIN. Surely any writer who knows that it's 'I' before 'E' except after 'C' should be able to do better than this and because it comes, of course, at the beginning of the film it makes everything that follows suspect. Yes, the two leads ARE outstanding and YES, they should be at least nominated but a Doris Day movie it's not