empathielabs/imbd_dataset_v0 huggingface dataset:
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In a not totally successful attempt to be taken seriously, and move into 'adult' films, Mr. Hughes gives us this film about a young married couple. True, it's got every cliche in the book in it, silly fantasy stuff and all that, but more importantly- it's got Elizabeth McGovern.
Clearly the best actress to have ever appeared in a John Hughes film, she lends a weight to it that elevates the sometimes silly material. Kevin Bacon (and his hair) is pretty good as her husband, but McGovern steals the movie with her quiet true moments of honesty. The 'teen film' fun that worked so well in other Hughes films falls flat here- like a favorite uncle whose jokes made you laugh when you were 9, but keeps telling them when you are 15 and you wish he'd find some new material. But I keep going back to McGoverns performance, because it's truly moving. Mr. Hughes most interesting films to me have real actors in them (Some Kind of Wonderful, Breakfast Club) and when his material bumps up against a true talent, some wonderful things can happen. If only he'd trust that it doesn't have to be tarted up with the silly fantasy stuff.


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In order to enjoy 'Fur - An imaginary portrait of Diane Arbus,' Stephen Shainberg needs the viewer to suspend all reality and prior knowledge of the American photographer, Diane Arbus. Paradoxically, it's the very use of Diane Arbus' name and knowledge to her life and work, that sets this film up to fail on a grand scale.
What becomes apparent quite early on with the casting of the beautiful WASPish and glamorous Nicole Kidman as the anti-glamorous Jewish Diane Arbus, is that Shainberg didn't get Arbus or what her work was about (unsentimental realism) and seems only attracted to Arbus on a superficial level through her photographs of circus freaks.
What follows is a kind of pretty and trivial Beauty & the Beast fantasy biopic with Robert Downey JR as Kidman's hairy fictional love interest. However, it's not the banality of the story that is the main flaw in this film, but the director's misogynistic stance that Diane Arbus, one of the art world's most singular and original woman photographers, was incapable of forming her own ideas about her work. While his previous film 'Secretary' was a study of female masochism, his continued portrayal of the female as submissive spoils this film completely - and flys in the face of the real life Diane Arbus' courage, tenacity and fearlessness in single-handedly exploring the often shady world of outsiders.
Imagine an imaginary biopic on pop star Madonna's life with Guy Richie as her Svengali, the man behind her career, and you'll get a feel of how seriously flawed and imaginary this film is: It can only work if you have absolutely no knowledge of the subject, or just choose to ignore all the facts.
It's a shame because once you remove all reference to Diane Arbus, this film could have stood up on its own as an interesting study on fetishism and a good companion piece to Secretary. 4/10


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For anyone who cares to know something about the real Diane Arbus, or who values psychological veracity, this film is abysmal. Arbus was a brilliant, talented, restless, and troubled person, but this film depicts her as completely self-involved, and truly bizarre in her taste and judgment. Kidman portrays her as wan and vague, whereas she was someone who knocked people over with her charisma. The totally fictional relationship that is central to the film is quite unbelievable, and Robert Downey is truly annoying in his smirking portrayal of someone who seems to think he's superior to the rest of the world simply because of his affliction. The film depicts this encounter as being the source of Arbus's interest in "freaks," which is a truly banal explanation for the inspiration behind some of the greatest photographs of the 20th century. The mystery to me is why people of some talent and intelligence chose to be involved with this film in any way.


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Hadn't really heard too much about this movie so I went and saw it. I realized that this movie only appeals to someone who has not lived in the real world. And even those people would think this movie moved too slowly.
When the movie opens up, you see Nicole Kidman going to a nudist camp. Whoa. Shock. That scene, the dialouge, were all great. And then the movie went downhill.
While I respect the vision the filmmaker must have, this movie sucked. It was too slow, too predictable, and not moving enough. Robert Downey Jr. is great, as usual, but this movie is not good enough to sit through. It tries to be shocking and abnormal but makes poor use of the talents of all the actors.
Don't waste your money, even the sex scenes were boring.


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What were they thinking when they made this truly TERRIBLE film?
Arbus, one of the most important photographers and women of the Twentieth Century, had a fascinating and dramatic life. What possessed anyone to make this film, which explains her unique artistic vision, as being the result of an (imaginary) affair with a grotesque, yet charismatic hairy freak (played by Downey)?
In real life, Arbus broke out of a traditional marriage and woman's role to express herself. In this movie, Arbus is an ultra-dreary Nicole Kidman whose inspiration is all attributed to a "Beauty and The Beast" devotion to an interesting man.
For this reinvention, the film is truly shameful. Independent of that, it is also just dopey and dull.


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I don't know how this movie has received so many positive comments. One can call it "artistic" and "beautifully filmed", but those things don't make up for the empty plot that was filled with sexual innuendos. I wish I had not wasted my time to watch this movie. Rather than being biographical, it was a poor excuse for promoting strange and lewd behavior. It was just another Hollywood attempt to convince us that that kind of life is normal and OK. From the very beginning I asked my self what was the point of this movie,and I continued watching, hoping that it would change and was quite disappointed that it continued in the same vein. I am so glad I did not spend the money to see this in a theater!


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As an early representation of the turmoil of the 1960's that followed, Diane Arbus (Nicole Kidman) can be excused as an early flower child. The film itself deserves no such latitude. The lack of character development, motivation and justification for the character's behavior makes the movie very disappointing. I sat watching and waiting for some explanation of the bizarre actions only to find that Shainberg was letting me peek into a story that must have been someones inside joke. That the few facts presented did not match Diane Arbus' life very much did not help to clarify things either.
The washed out Art Direction in Diane's 'normal' life was nicely contrasted with the brilliant colors in her 'awakening' life with Lionel. And the trap door stairway was a nice demonstration of Diane's attempt to inject her new life into her existing family (However, I don't see how that trap door in the ceiling of her dining room could directly connect to Lionel's apartment which was two flights of stairs up from her's).
Maybe my analysis is a little too literal in looking for some character development and relationship understanding that goes beyond one sentence or one comment. I also would have liked to see at least one of Diane's photos as well. I won't wait for the sequel.


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I could have liked this if I didn't like Diane Arbus.
Didn't really capture Arbus unique visual aesthetic(as Stanley Kubrick did in "The Shinning", with the twin girls in the hallway, a direct homage to one of Arbus most famous photos, and one with haunting qualities none of this movies images have), and certainly none of her character(outgoing), likeness(thin and Jewish, not wasp Queen Kidman), or life, save some very superficial similarities, she was a fashion who later photographed "freaks" and "outsiders", among many things. This film focused on the "freak", as her symbol for artistic and personal empowerment, in a really shallow and predictable fashion. Outside of that, it might have been an interesting movie about middle class fetish, but I was too annoyed to care.
Perhaps if Arbus name had been left off, this might have been less annoying, but had it not had her name in the title there would have been nothing to make me interested in seeing in this in the first place. A letdown from "Secretary".


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Bizarre. This movie is supposed to be based on a famous photographer, but everything that happens in this movie is fiction. I guess it tries to explain why Diane Arbus had a fascination with oddities and made it her primary photography focus. In the movie, wolfman moves into the apartment above hers. She seemingly becomes obsessed with him and falls for him. She puts her kids and husband second over the wolfman, and even tries to incorporate him into her family gatherings. Some of the wolfman's freak show side kicks come over to visit and she mingles with them. The whole thing is very bizarre.
FINAL VERDICT: Nothing memorable. There is just something weird about a woman who gets her jollies from shaving the wolfman. I think you can find better films out there.


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Poor Diane Arbus (whoever she was). Not only was she (according to this movie) a spoiled-but-sweet-acting upper East Side brat, she was a bad wife, bad mother, awful business partner; plus there is no evidence in this picture that she was any kind of an artist -- except in the bold statement in the prologue.
Nicole Kidman, who incredibly is more attractive today than 25 years ago and actually looks younger, indeed gives an excellent performance; but what can an actress do with a wife and mom who seeks out and falls for an incredibly weird werewolf-looking guy living in the apartment upstairs? Set in the early 1970's, Manhattan was a virtual magnet for freaks and weirdo's of all sizes and shapes, most not looking like human hairballs; so why is this affair worthy of a 122 minute movie?
Robert Downey Jr used to be one of my favorites, but I'd say his well known and prolonged use of drugs has taken its toll. One might think he'd be disinclined to be in a movie that treats drug use as casually as it does smoking cigarettes.
FUR has already taken a beating at the box office, but in view of those who input a score of 10 for this misbegotten slice of trash, I'd like to say, 'taint so, McGee.


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This was an abysmal show. In short it was about this kid called Doug who guilt-tripped a lot. Seriously he could feel guilty over killing a fly then feeling guilty over feeling guilty for killing the fly and so forth. The animation was grating and unpleasant and the jokes cheap.
It aired here in Sweden as a part of the "Disney time" show and i remember liking it some what but then i turned 13.
I never got why some of the characters were green and purple too. What was up with that?
Truly a horrible show. Appareantly it spawned a movie which i've never seen but i don't have any great expectations for that one either.


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I just don't understand why anytime someone does a show about one of the largest metro areas in the country (Houston, Dallas, Austin/San Antonio etc.), they portray the average person as someone who wears wranglers/cowboy hat , talks with a drawl, has zero fashion sense, and drives a truck on his way to either the "saloon" or his next hunting trip, rodeo, skeet shooting or country music concert. I have never even seen a small town cop driving a police-truck...anywhere in Texas.
The funny thing is this is not done for artistic reasons or comedy...they are actually serious and I guess believe the average person is too stupid to know the difference. The bad scripts and equally bad acting give that away. This show makes goofy shows in the past like Knightrider look like high-brow entertainment. At least Knightrider had the talking car.


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First of all, no one with any law enforcement experience (Not ER or EMT, but real law enforcement) takes this show seriously. Walker would be drummed out of any police force in the US for his illegal and totally unprofessional tactics. On top of that, he is a comic book character---no acting ability, incredibly trite lines, no character development. The fact that Alex Cahill loves him shows just how dumb blondes really are. And Trivett is the ultimate clown in black-face. Come on---if you think Walker is a heartfelt show without bias, then explain why JT is treated as a dolt, always is the subject of Walker's jokes, never is allowed to be the one to solve the crime, and never rescues Walker, who should be dead 50 times over for the stupid things he does. While it may be true that many criminals are even dumber than the detectives who go after them (and believe me, most cops are dumber than dirt), the smart ones Walker comes up against never seem to get the point that once Walker is captured, the jerk needs to be put of his misery. But then again, Norris produced the show as well as starred in it, so how could he willingly get rid of himself or even show how stupid his tactics are. As if six guys are going to wait around to take him one at a time. What a terrible series! It is more demeaning than any of the hokey westerns like The Lone Ranger, Roy Rogers, The Cisco Kid, and Wild Bill Hickock, though I would imagine that most of you on here are far too young to remember those shows. But like those shows, in the same way as those shows, Walker TR is just as insulting and just plain silly.


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The fact that this cruddy series could elicit dozens of comments (much less hundreds of 'votes') speaks volumes as to the decline of Western (or at least American) civilization.
Read Proust, you morons!! Or at least Dave Barry or Calvin and Hobbes anthologies.
Chuck Norris. Wrap your brains around the fact that in order to rate or write about this series you'd have to have spent minutes..nay, HOURS...viewing this poor sod treading the boards and spewing lines with less emotional impact than the gal who used to call off the correct time on your local service.
PLEASE DON'T WATCH THIS SHOW!! SPARE YOUR FEW REMAINING BRAIN CELLS!


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This show is the worst show ever! Norris and his family write it, produce it, direct it, etc etc. The only reason I ever see it is because my goofy wife likes it. How many times can Norris fly though the air from plain sight to land a kick on an obviously blind villain? No trees, no building, just whoosh.....thin air. He ALWAYS solves the case or is the best at whatever skill there is. No co star ever gets the glory. Its all Norris. Its truly apparent that Norris is awful stuck on himself and will not allow anyone to one up him in any scene no matter what the content. Terrible acting, terrible script, terrible series.


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This TV show is possibly the most pathetic display of crap on TV today. Horribly predictable, obscene usage of slow motion photography, cheesy story lines. Chuck Norris is an abomination who should never have been allowed to be filmed in anything. The way he chooses to make each episode into a public service announcement is really annoying. His acting sucks so bad that it makes a person cringe with embarrassment. I will give the series some credit though...it does get entertaining at times, but not enough for it make any difference. With all the negative points this series has, i still prefer it over reality TV, it can't really get any more worthless than that.


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Walker Texas Ranger is one of the worst shows produced in the past 10 years. The script for James 'Jimmy' Trivette, Walker's sidekick, is about as pathetically written of a part as Wesley Crusher on Star Trek TNG, and is played with about as much conviction.
On this show, people don't respond the way people respond to things in real life--everyone is polarized--everyone is either a completely good guy or a completely bad guy (unless Walker himself has a 2 minute talk with them and then they change instantly). That's not how life works, that's not how people are. This show doesn't take place in this reality.
The plot lines are about as realistic as Murder She Wrote, a show where an arrogant old lady can just walk into people's houses without them getting angry, and she can demand that police officers do what she wants and they bend over backwards for her. With Walker, everyone on the show, including the "bad guys", act like he's the sort of hero that myths and fairy tales are made of, and time itself bends to his whim. The lines that sometimes come out of people's mouths on this show are beyond ridiculous. It's as if the scriptwriter for the part of Wesley Crusher (for the "serious" parts) and the scriptwriter for Bob Saget's funniest home videos (for the "humor" parts) got together and wrote all the scripts for this show.
This show is for people who think that good always prevails over evil. It's for the elderly. It's for wishful thinkers. It's for people who want to be guaranteed to always have a happy ending. It's for people who want to drift away into oblivion. It's for people whose drug of choice is their television.
I cringe every time I see even a commercial for this show. My opinion is that it is THE worst show to be on television in the last 10 years.
I used to like Chuck Norris, but this show has forever tainted him in my mind. I can't even watch his older movies without thinking of this show.


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This series is formulaic and boring. The episodes are the same thing every week, simply with slightly varied settings. Some purely evil character does some dastardly deed, Walker goes after him, and it ends in a Karate match. The villains are super-cliché super-stereotypical evil villains, the good guys are all pure, honest and saintly, and the story lines are simplistic and unrealistic. After about 2 episodes, the show becomes totally unwatchable by all but the least discerning fans. Certainly not Norris's best work. His other work may be cliché but it usually does not drag on for weeks. If you enjoy formulaic,boring, repetitive clichéd snooze-fests, then this is for you.


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I'd never thought that I would be caught saying this: But I think "Dog the Bounty Hunter" is more entertaining than this 90's era cop drama. Walker is very melodramatic and actually set a standard of the genre of "High Octane" cop shows such as CSI, CSI: Miami, and so forth. I'm not saying all these shows are bad, but they aren't good either. I like the karate chop action that Walker dispenses on the enemies of justice, and the diverse cast of characters as much as the science tech of the CSI series. But there are some elements that I hate in a show like this. Stereotypes/Countertypes! That's right, Stereotypes/Countertypes! Unfortunately, this is a show for the moderates of Red State America who refuse to part with the old prejudices of yore especially when it comes to crime. For example, there was an episode in which a kid with psychic powers ventures into Dallas where he encounters group of kids in Goth/Punk clothing and they start harassing him. Now! This is exactly what Middle America perceives the Goth/Punk culture. I mean come on, how often do people that dress like that rob and steal from people just minding there own business. Whenever there are Blacks and Latinos in the plot it's always about gangs in some impoverished neighborhood. Okay! Not everyone who's a minority is a desperate recruit of a gang surrounded by crime, drugs, poverty. Again, this is what Middle Red State America sees of these people. Finally, Why is the Trivette the bumbling sidekick, can't you make the sidekick an equal ass-kicker?


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This has got to be the worst show I have ever seen. I always liked Chuck Norris in Films, but why do we need to make these shows politically correct by adding a black side kick who is as threatening as Shirley Temple in Little Miss Marker. I also thought the show was limited because how many times can you kick a guy in the face and make it interesting. I know an African American who looks like this Trivette guy and he gets his butt kicked about once a week he is all attitude.
Chuck Norris is the man and he deserves all the kudos he gets, I think this show started great but lost steam as time went on
They should have dumped Chucks side kick


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As a true Canadian, I always avoid Canadian movies. However now and then I get trapped into watching one. This one is better than most, which is to say mediocre. It has many of the usual flaws of Canadian films...self-conscious acting...an excess of cinematic gimmicks and, above all, the self-effacing Canadian habit of using Canadian cities as stand-ins for American ones. I mean using the historic metropolis of Montreal as a stand in for Harrisburg Pennsylvania is just short of obscene. I was in a generous mood. I gave it a 4.



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*SPOILERS!* When I first saw the preview for this, it looked like a good old fashioned hallmark movie. I love bluegrass music, so I couldn't wait to see it. When we rented the movie, we read the back and it sounded even better. The film was pretty boring for the first half, every now and then a song would be played. Then (i'm embarrassed typing this)a lesbian love seen came in. I that ther was something more then friendship between the teachers but I certainly didn't expect nudity and prolonged make out sessions. I was watching this with my mother and I was quite embarrassed, because I picked this movie. But besides that, it was an okay movie. The acting was fine, the actress who played Deladis was great. To be honest, the soundtrack was the best part of the movie. I don't care to see the movie again but i bought the soundtrack the day after I saw the movie. And there are continuation discs that follow. If I were you, I would skip the movie and just get the music.


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This was a fabulous premise based on lots of factual history. But the serious lack of character development left us not really liking or caring about any of the characters, especially the musicologist! She did not get any sympathy; she seems like she deserved his own black cloud. The songs were great to a point, but became repetitive after a while.


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Visually beautiful with some fine music, this film otherwise has a fairly trite made-for-TV quality. The romance between two characters, which spans a cultural and educational divide, is simply NOT plausible. Of course, from early on we knew our persnickety heroine would lighten up, win over the locals, and find true love, but that doesn't make it any less woeful that the movie had to take such completely expected turns. This film had lots of promise, which makes it more of a shame that the promise was unrealized. Perhaps a nice under-the-blanket on a cold night freebie on cable, but I certainly wouldn't recommend paid rental or purchase. I'm sure the soundtrack is wonderful, though.


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Weak tale of an evil warlock who is searching for a centuries old satanic Bible so that he can do Lucifer's bidding by undoing creation. Hot in pursuit all the way is a 17th Centruy bounty hunter named Redfern and his reluctant sidekick Kassandra. Sound like a load of bunkum? It is.
This drivel from writer D.T. Twohy gets the superficial treatment it deserves from director Steve Miner (who helmed that romantic nonsense "Forever Young"). Twohy obviously knows nothing about true evil.
Julian Sands just flies around and cackles, trying to look evil, while Richard E. Grant succeeds only in wasting his rich talent. Lori Singer's career also took a nosedive with this one.
Special effects crew has some fun, and Jerry Goldsmith provides a score superior to its subject matter.


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You've got to watch this movie! It is so bad it actually is great.
You've got your crazy but gutsy captain who of course is having an affair with his worn out used to be gorgeous copilot. And of course the mid air collision occurs when the captain's enemy and rivalis along for the ride to geYou've got your ex Vietnam Vet who is can't handle the pressure of another mid air collision and crash landing. Then you've got your old crazy Army Air corp buddy who is flying the chase plane and trying to well I can't tell you what he's trying to do. The plane keeps going up, up and well and then you've got your greedy and immoral corporate engineer and then you've got your Ice Station Zebra cold and then Lucky saves the bad guy from drowing so they can land the plane! aND IT DOESN'T END --- IT JUST GOES ON AND ON! You've got to watch this. It's great! YOU'VE GOT TO BE KIDDING! DID THEY ACTUALLY SHOW THIS ON COMMERCIAL TELEVISION AND HOW IT WAS EVER SHOWN ON CABLE.


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Although I have rarely flown myself, I am keenly interested in aviation... and this film has added to the precious laughing stock in aviation cinema.
1. Why is the captain doing the ground checks? Why does he even measure the oil levels in the engines? With turnaround times as low as 15 minutes in commercial aviation this is not a typical pre-flight check.
2. WHY does the captain KICK against the aircraft tire? Strange kind of pressure check. Or anger management :-)
3. The cockpit has a crew of 3. All large, western, two-engined jets built since the 1980ies have a crew of 2 people. Now try a guess at how old the movie script is.
4. A helicopter manages to fly alongside the crippled airliner. Must be a fast one... and the captain's words to explain the "maneuver" to the passengers are indeed hilarious ones!
5. With arrested elevator rudders it is always possible to lower the nose of the aircraft. It happens, for example, when any aircraft moves slower than the stall speed.
6. The elevator rudders have hydraulic actuators. After the collision with the business plane it would, most probably, have severed the hydraulic lines and thus make them useless for steering, but it would NOT fix them in certain position.
7. The fire in the aft galley was a stupid idea. It was designed to show that only gentlemen ask for the extinguisher and fight the fire, regardless of who was actually trained to do that  the flight attendant.
8. At the time of collision, the aircraft's elevators would have been in a neutral position. The film could have ended here...
9. The flight engineer (the third person in the cockpit) has three bars on his uniform. In reality, flight engineers have two.
10. Why does the captain slash the cabin casing with an axe to examine the damage behind? I thought it would have been the flight engineer's duty, as he is already supposed to perform technical checks before and after flight.
11. In any aircraft, there is no unused space. At least commercial airplanes cannot afford the luxury of a compartment that can be filled with tons of water.
I could go on and on... but at last I laughed hysterically about how the screenwriters imagine aircraft disasters! Woooohooo! Most aircraft disasters happen in such a short time span that you simply cannot make 90-minute flicks out of them. But you can always fill 90 minutes with mind-boggling and insane crap, irrespective of the genre.


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one of the worst films I have EVER seen, but extremely funny (not on purpose though). Every scene that contains anything to do with; aircraft, romance, script or acting is badly messed up.
I recommend this film for all pilots, it´s so bad that you should burst into laughter at some point in the film (also see Airport 79:the Concorde, for the same reason).
Anyone else, avoid this film like the plague (except for fans of B-movies, of course)
enjoy


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What a script, what a story, what a mess!


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I actually saw this movie at a cinema. At the time, I was working shifts and went there during a matinée on a hot summer day when I couldn't sleep. The cinema was air-conditioned.
It was an early multi-screen complex and I somehow got into the wrong venue. I had intended to doze through something else. But as things transpired, there would be no sleeping. Shortly after the wrong movie began, I was additionally disconcerted by a group of female cleaners who came in and used it as their social club. I was the only other person there, and it is a measure of the movie's appeal that they habitually expected the place to be empty and asked me if I minded their presence. I didn't.
Within about half an hour, the cleaners' conversation proved to be more interesting than the entertainment I had paid for.
This movie oozed out of the screen with the cheesiness of very stale mayonnaise. The kind that has little dark, hairy, tufts growing on the surface. I particularly remember my senses being assaulted by strident cords of music that would blare out with very little warning, and even less meaning. The cleaners provided an anticipatory cue by putting their fingers in their ears.
It was about some city bird going to live in the sticks amongst a load a backwood folk, putting them straight but at the same time being taught a moral lesson or two herself. Like you do. A sort of 'journey of discovery'. There was a sententious smugness about the whole production. In particular, the leading actress had an irritating habit of staring at every hick with a kind of intense beatific compassion, as if she herself were the patron-saint of thickies.
And I believe at some stage she wrote a book.
Long before the end, I had become fascinated by one of the cleaner's hushed and breathy tails of sexual impropriety.
One suspects that there are some to whom sitting quietly for a couple of hours and not having to think, constitutes a meditation. The best that I can say is that I would not want to share their salad.
I have never seen this movie advertised as showing on television, which surprises me. It is just the sort of pap that is screened in the afternoon to punish the unemployed for not having jobs.
If you ever work shifts, be sure to get into the right theatre. Or hope for some cleaning ladies.


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This was an appallingly bad film! Ashley Rose Orr was horrible, she had none of Shirley Temple's charm AT ALL! Those ghastly smiles she would do when she scrunched up her piggy little eyes in a way that I think was 'supposed' to be cute and make the audience go - "aahhhh bless!" It just made me want to slap her. She must have simpered "oh my goodneth!" about a hundred times throughout the film. Also she could barely utter a sentence without accompanying it with a fake giggle. Horrible HORRIBLE film .. If I could rate it minus 10, I would. Don't waste your money on this piece of rubbish, go out and buy a genuine Shirley Temple film!


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I am a huge Shirley Temple fan. When I saw this movie, it made me appreciate what a talented child Shirley actually was. Ashley Rose Orr made possibly the worst on-screen Shirley. Imagine an 11 year old playing Shirley Temple from the age of 5. That in itself is wrong. But getting her to 'mimick' Shirley's voice? And her singing is woeful. The dancing was good, I'll say that. As previous users have said, there was little dramatic scenes, nothing to make the story interesting. Not even Amelia Earhart... I would have liked to have seen more of the world wide phenomenon that Shirley Temple created. There was too much focus on the Wizard of Oz, when in reality, Shirley was just considered for Dorothy. The film portrays it as though it is the end of the world when she does not get the role. Shirley herself said that she is glad Judy Garland got to play her. For me the star of the show was the lady who played Gertrude Temple. Otherwise, stay away! For great Shirley Temple films, watch Heidi, Poor Little Rich Girl and Little Miss Broadway.


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Did we all see the same movie??? I can't believe the raves some of the others are giving this really awful bio which, believe or not, was authorized by Shirley Temple herself, based on her book CHILD STAR. Gives me the feeling that some are awfully easy to please.
First of all, ASHLEY ROSE ORR, whatever her modest talents are, in no way, shape or form even resembles Shirley Temple enough to be cast as her in this sort of straightforward biography of the world's most famous child star. She gives no indication of why or how this child was so revered except for trying her hardest to do a Shirley impersonation which never clicks on any level. None whatsoever.
And that is the major handicap of the whole piece. But as if that isn't bad enough, any drama inherent in Shirley's story of her climb to almost overnight stardom has been completely white-washed with insipid writing peppered with occasional song and dance moments that don't even approximate what Shirley did (as for example, "The Codfish Ball" with Buddy Ebsen which was probably the high point of Shirley's choreographed dance routines).
Simply putting a girl in a polka dot dress doesn't make her Shirley Temple. None of Shirley's own brand of charm, warmth and appeal is even remotely suggested. All we see on display is a pale imitation of the original proving, once and for all, that there was only one Shirley Temple.
It's worthless to write anything further about this mess. None of the others are more than ordinary in lifeless roles. My advice for Shirley's fans is to read her book--or better still--watch her movies.
This is the pits.


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I didn't think this movie was very good at all. Basically they took a bunch of one-liners from various Shirley Temple movies, threw them together, and had Orr act like Shirley Temple acted on-screen. "Oh my goodness!" was said quite a number of times. If you are familiar with Shirley Temple movies, you will recognize several lines direct from her movies. The trouble is they have Orr saying these in Shirley's everyday life. In the end, what we get is a hodgepodge of re-created Shirley Temple movies, instead of any sort of real look into Shirley Temple's life. Save yourself the trouble and rent Shirley Temple movies, it's a lot better than watching Orr try and recreate Shirley's acting style.


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This movie was awful! Ashley Rose Orr, while a talented tap dancer, and singer (actually a little better than Temple was in terms of the latter), is a terrible actress. She plays the character as the Shirley that we saw on screen in her movies whether she's playing her onscreen or offscreen persona. So what we get is an overly cutesy, and wholly unrealistic (not to mention uninteresting) portrait. If one wants to see that side of her, one can just rent one of her movies. The only bright light here is Connie Britton's portrayal of Gertrude Temple. I don't think it was terribly realistic, but at least it was well acted. Save yourself the trouble and rent The Poor Little Rich Girl.


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This movie could have been a lot better than it was, if hadn't been a Disney Film. I thought that the young girl playing Shirley was all right, you could tell that she was really trying to do the job right. The teenage Shirley Temple wasn't right at all. I think that they should have spent last time on her childhood, the first hour should have been about the young Shirley, then the last hour should have been about the older Shirley. This was a boring movie, and not a good Shirley Temple story.


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"Mame" is a disgrace to many things--to Lucille Ball, to a story which has been told better many times over, and to the musical genre altogether. Ms. Ball does not understand her character at all and she seems to be heavily sedated. Bea Arthur is good, but it is not enough. The production is very shoddy and cheap looking, the songs are sub-par, and nearly every joke misfires. Also, Lucy couldn't dance well, so the music had to be slowed down to a funerial pace. Avoid at all costs, but DO see the delightful "Auntie Mame."


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Lucille Ball's version of "Mame" in my opinion is one of the worst performances ever saved to film. After seeing Lucy in her various sitcoms more than an astronomical number of times, I can tell you that I really love Lucy, however, this movie is a fiasco of unbelievably bad casting, music and dancing. Robert Preston is the only saving grace with a part tiny enough to miss if you blink. I don't know what she was thinking, and I can't imagine how she was advised by the studio or director, but I actually cringed watching this embarrassing performance. I could be really cruel and suggest watching it for a laugh, but it's too pitiful even to qualify for that. Don't waste your money or your time.


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Up until around 1970 Lucille Ball was one great comedienne. She was such a perfect clown I only wish more people could have seen her with Bob Hope in "The Facts of Life" because she could do dry deadpan, too. as well as slapstick..
Yep, Lucille Ball was wonderful . . . until "Mame."
Trying to see Lucille Ball in "Mame" is physically impossible because there is so much Vaseline on the already filtered lenses that you'd need Windex to see Lucille Ball in some scenes. So even if you see Lucille Ball in "Mame," you can't really see Lucille Ball in "Mame". Which is a blessing.
That's about the nicest thing I can say about "Mame," the movie of the musical of the movie of the play (this could go on, but it started with a perfectly funny book called "Auntie Mame"). Giving this a bad rap is like beating a sponge. So it does not matter that the music is croaked rather than sung. Most of the songs weren't much, anyway. There isn't any difference in the first three. "It's Today," "Open a New Window," and "We Need a Little Christmas" are all the same song. Celene Dion should do an album with them, they're so big and dull. The killer ballad "If He Walked Into My Life Today" needs a confident gorgeous voice (Edyie Gorme won a Grammy for doing it in 1967) that poor Lucille Ball did not possess when she made this movie. (True, Elaine Stritch can't carry a tune in a bucket, either, but at least Stritch can put over a song.)
If you still feel your life is not going to be complete unless you see the movie musical "Mame," notice how there IS dancing in it, but whenever Lucy/Mame starts to do anything beyond a palsied shuffle the camera cuts away, returning right when the number is over and the star poses with the dancers. Again, it's just as well. Jane Connell got to reprise the role of pathetic Agnes Gooch after Lucille Ball had Madeline Kahn fired to ensure no comic originality would upstage the star. Connell is a stage performer who, like Carol Channing and Ethyl Merman, can't scale down her performances for films, so she joins Lucille Ball in being embarrassing, though for different reasons.
The lavish gowns are by Theadora Van Runkle (Van Wrinkle?) and they provide the color missing in all but one of the cast.
Bea Arthur as the actress Vera Charles, Mame's best friend, ignores everyone and does her own fun thing. If only she was in more scenes. She's too old for her role, too, but at least she didn't maim it.


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I love Lucy, but this movie is so wretchedly bad that I was squirming in embarrassment for all concerned within the first ten minutes . . . and it just got worse from there. Lucille Ball's "singing" is downright painful and the attempts to make her appear more youthful through the use of soft focus had me reaching for my reading glasses. It's bombs like this that give bombs a bad name.


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This is a terrible movie, and I'm not even sure why it's so terrible. It's ugly, for one, with that trendy 1970s visual style that maybe seemed like a good idea at the time but which now enables one to instantly recognize a film from that time period as being a 70s product. The film retains the story and songs that made the stage version of the musical such a hit, but the songs sound lifeless on screen. But mostly, the movie sucks because of the wan performance of Lucille Ball, who you'd think would be able to make something of this larger-than-life character if anyone could. She sleepwalks through the movie like a terrified actress choking on her opening night, and the film sinks with her. Even Bea Arthur, who I bet was hilarious in the best friend role onstage, can't breathe any life into this stinker.
Avoid at all costs.
Grade: D


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Lucille Ball was a mighty power in television throughout the 1950s and 1960s, but she still made an occasional film, most notably THE LONG, LONG TRAILER and THE FACTS OF LIFE. Although her television career remained strong, as the 1970s began her movie career seemed to be winding down--but Ball was determined to have one last big screen fling, and the project she selected was the 1966 musical MAME.
In many respects the role seemed tailor-made: based on the popular novel which gave rise to two different Broadway plays, Mame Dennis is a wacky, wildly uninhibited woman who "inherits" her orphaned nephew Patrick--and leads him on a wild tour of life's possibilities, bouncing from one comic spree to another. The music, which featured such songs as "Open a New Window" and "If He Walked Into My Life Today," was among Jerry Herman's best work. The supporting cast, which included Robert Preston and Bea Arthur, was the best of the best. Expectations were high; opening night fanfare was tremendous; the film was a disaster. Critics were aghast and audiences sat slack-jawed.
No matter what hardcore Lucy fans may say, MAME is a fiasco, so much so that it is hard to know where to start. It is badly directed, badly filmed, badly performed, and there Lucille Ball is at the center of it all, unable to dance, unable to sing, and grinning like a waxworks dummy while incredibly bad choreography swirls around her. But the disaster is hardly of her making alone; the supporting cast fares no better. Bea Arthur and Jane Connell recreate their stage roles of Vera Charles and Agnes Gooch; the former is stagey, the latter is dismal. Robert Preston manages to sing with a smile, but he's pretty much on his own and clearly none too happy about it.
The DVD brings the film from the VHS pan-and-scan release to widescreen, but that only means there's more awfulness to see. Everybody loves Lucy, but only the least critical fan could love Lucy's MAME; while I wouldn't say it's bad enough to make you want to gouge your eyes out, you may wish you had. Not recommended.
GFT, Amazon Reviewer


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Truly I Love Lucy as well...comedic genius yes.....MAME...NEVER...she was as ridiculous as Mame...as was the film adaptation of Divine Secrets of the Ya Ya sisterhood. Both just completely missed the point. Roslind Russell was, is and always will be the first and only Mame. Perhaps as a young starlet, Ball could have pulled off a role like this, where her inherent beauty and youth could have carried her through...but this seemed a desperate attempt from an aged star to show that she was still viable in the field. The reason there are sooo many more supporters of Russell's version (aside from the fact that you cant improve upon the original) is that Russell had presence, she absorbs every scene, whereas Lucille Ball might as well be a pattern on the wallpaper in Mame for all the attention she commands in the role.


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