23 of 25 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Lange and Jones are Acting Tour de Forces Here!, February 11, 2001
When Jessica Lange won the Best Actress Oscar for this film, few people in the USA had even seen it. For one, its release had been held up for several years and it sat gathering dust in its film cans in the studio. Her Oscar win though finally made many scurry to the theaters to see it. Lange plays a military wife to Tommy Lee Jones' career military man. They have 2 children and have followed him from base to base. What absolutely defines Lange's character though is a combination of constant sensuality with a personality that totters on the edge of breakdown. She is hot for her husband, Jones, but she also acts like a sexual lodestar to other men. Her very presence on a military base can cause incredible unrest among the other husbands and wives. I wish Lange and Jones always had screenplays this good to devote their talents. Often, their talents are wasted on less well written and directed works. If you have overlooked this character-driven masterpiece of acting, don't overlook it any longer.
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16 of 18 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Tennessee Williams meets Oliver Stone, February 8, 2005
This movie is bizarre and out of whack, because it tries to fit a fascinating, Tennessee Williams-style character study into a tired, cliched paranoid conspiracy story. But the movie is worth watching for its first half, when the focus is on the sexy, needy and dysfunctional marriage between the stolid, ambitious military engineer played by Tommy Lee Jones, and his attention-getting, Marilyn Monroe-like wife, played by Jessica Lange.
Both Jones and Lange are excellent. Their characters have many responsibilities: their children, their reputations at the military base, the protection of the Free World. But the actors convince you that they would throw all of that over, temporarily, for each others' hot love. But once you understand that, the filmmakers insert these great characters into a predictable, hackneyed plot that draws on "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest," "Silkwood" and the entirity of Oliver Stone's career.
The hinge for all this is a very unwise sexual encounter between Lange's character and Jones' Evil Boss. The Evil Boss, played by Powers Boothe, is a real Snidely Whiplash. From the first moment you see him, you know he's just a dastardly fellow without a conscience. Boo! Hiss! By having sex with this Bad Man, and then believing another obvious lie he tells her, Lange unwittingly aids in the coverup of a nuclear accident, which she then must go to preposterous lengths to expose in order to save her husband from having his mind stolen from him by the Evil Boss.
Some have wondered why this movie sat on the shelf for several years before being released, given that it won Lange an Academy Award. The answer's obvious; the plot is an embarrassing joke. But we should be glad it got released. Lange's performance is stunning, and Jones' is not far behind her. It's hard work to suspend disbelief through this story's many dumb moments (do you really think a lifelong army brat would pull the pin on a grenade and then casually toss it to her boyfriend?), but it's worth trying to, just to appreciate Jones and Lange's acting.
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6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Jessica Lange -the greatest actress of the 20th century, May 28, 2000
By A Customer
Jessica Lange shows us again in Blue Sky why she is the greatest actress of our time. Taking home the Oscar for Best Actress for this film was long overdue. Her star turn in Frances was also oscar worthy but she was overlooked by the overrated Meryl Streep for Sophies Choice. Blue Sky is a must see for fans of truly great acting.
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