input: It's always nice to see Angela Bassett getting to do a role that she can really sink her teeth into. She is at times intense, funny and even sexy in her role as Lena, a "colored" woman forced to make a home on a desolate mudbank just outside of Cape Town, South Africa. Danny Glover is also good in a not entirely sympathetic role as her partner, Boesman. Willie Jonah gives a finely nuanced performance as the stranger that discovers Boesman and Lena's new living area. It's not often that you get a chance to see an intelligent film dealing with mature themes. Although it is based on a play, the late director John Berry (who also directed Claudine) opens the material up by having the film shot in the widescreen Cinemascope format. He also keeps things visually interesting through the creative blocking of actors and by showing us things only mentioned in the play. Just like Diahann Carroll in Claudine, John Berry may have directed Angela Bassett into an Academy Award nomination. This is definitely a film worth searching for.

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input: Unfortunately the movie is more concerned with making lame social commentary on a real event, but doesnt have the balls to legitimately document what happened. The constant rhetoric of how violent video games are not to blame (I get the impression Ben Coccio is an avid gamer), or how media and music is completely devoid of influence is the obvious message (we even get a laughable scene of the two boys burning ALL their cd's, talk about subtlety!), but the movie only gets away with it because its 'fiction'. Nice try. Yes its a great idea to relieve media of influence, but how do we know the kids that have actually planned and executed a school shooting werent influenced by media? or video games? We dont, and we wont with this movie because once again these kids are smart enough to completely relinquish the media, yet dumb enough to scorch a nazi symbol on the ground? haha I somehow dont think so.

The movie bats you over the head with its portrayal of the normalcy of the families, its almost doing a disservice to think that there wasn't a serious flaw in the family dynamic of kids that have actually gone out and shot their fellow schoolmates. Why is everyone so concerned with making killers seem "normal", when they are so obviously not? A completely false and phony depiction.

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input: Something to Sing About was produced at Grand National Studios where James Cagney was working while under a contract dispute with the brothers Warner. He did two films for this B studio, neither of which rank high in the Cagney credits.

One of the great losses to cinema is the fact that Jimmy Cagney did so few films that utilized his terrific dancing abilities. The two that come to mind immediately are Yankee Doodle Dandy and Footlight Parade. Two lesser films are The West Point Story and Never Steal Anything Small. Cagney himself said he never used to watch anything but his musicals in retirement. So why did he make so few of them?

Well this one was all wrong. The plot of Something to Sing About concerns a hoofer who fronts for a band who's discovered and given a movie contract. There are the usual complications of a conniving studio boss and a conniving press agent played respectively and well by Gene Lockhart and William Frawley. His contract calls for a no- marriage clause, so Cagney and band girl singer lady Evelyn Daw marry in secret. Then we get the complication of a publicity driven studio romance with screen leading lady Mona Barrie. I think you can figure where this is going.

The most disappointing thing about Something to Sing About is the lack of dance numbers for Cagney. He dances briefly at the beginning and the end of the film and nothing in the middle. Evelyn Daw had a nice singing voice and the charisma of a ham sandwich. She got the musical numbers such as they were. I'm sure the movie-going public was paying their tickets to see Cagney dance.

Also in addition to giving him some dance numbers a female dance partner would have been nice. He danced well with Ruby Keeler in Footlight Parade and with Virginia Mayo and Doris Day in The West Point Story. Weren't Ginger Rogers, Eleanor Powell or Ruby Keeler available?

No memorable songs came out of this. And Daw's voice is waisted as well. She has a Jeanette MacDonald soprano voice which was so out of place with a swing band.

No wonder Cagney went running back to Warner Brothers. But they should have given him some decent musicals.

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input: Anyone who is a sucker for 1920s jazz, 1920s dress, the Charleston, and ultra-swanky yachts (e.g. me, on all counts) will want to like this movie. But the sad fact is that that's all there is. The plot is banal and obvious, the acting mostly either awful or playing to the farcical side of the goings-on, and when the whole thing's over there is not much left but the impression of mirrors and smoke. This is a beautifully made bad movie.

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negative