1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
POPs, May 24, 2001
This review is from: Memphis [VHS] (VHS Tape)
I love this movie for several reasons: I enjoyed the setting and the mood, the old cars and their attire. It was great when Cybil began to care about the kidnapped little boy and began to regret that she was a part of the kidnapping. I also enjoyed it because two people played in the movie from Memphis Tenn., Cybil herself and my father, Oliver Harris. He was the old Black man sitting on the grocery store porch, smoking a cigarette, when Cybil and her male friends drove up to purchase a newspaper, at the very beginning of the picture. That was the highlight of my father's life, making the movie and meeting Cybil and the other cast members. So of course this is the greatest movie I will ever watch, no matter what.
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2.0 out of 5 stars
Five stars?!? No way on Earth..., May 10, 2004
By A Customer
This review is from: Memphis [VHS] (VHS Tape)
I see that a couple of other reviewers gave this movie five stars. Are you people afflicted? No way on Earth is this movie a five-star production.
Now, the reason I bought a copy of it is that I'm a big fan of co-writer Larry McMurtry, who has penned some of the great novels of the past forty years. He co-wrote the teleplay for this movie along with co-star Shepherd; it's based on a Shelby Foote novel called "September September." I haven't read that novel, so I can't make any judgments as to how closely the script follows it.
Speaking of the script, it's not terrible; McMurtry's penchant for writing witty dialogue is in evidence throughout. On the other hand, we don't really get to know the characters well enough to have much interest in them. Not helping this is the fact that most of the performances are terrible. Cybill Shepherd does decently enough, but the two male leads are pretty lousy. Moses Gunn appears to be reading his lines off of cue cards, and the gentleman who portrays the underworld boss who comes to the family's aid is simply laughable; it's an attempt to be memorable through oddball casting, and boy, does it NOT work. The child performances are as bad as child performances get. That leaves Richard Brooks, who plays the father of the kidnapped child; he's a good actor, and he does as well as he can with a poorly developed role.
Perhaps a better director could have made something of all this, but Yves Simoneau (possibly due to budgetary constraints, who knows for sure) stages almost every scene so flatly that it's literally difficult to keep paying attention at times.
Five stars? Uh-uh. It's worth seeing if you're a big Cybill Shepherd fan, I guess, or if you are (like me) determined to track down everything McMurtry has written. Otherwise, I'd advise a liberal distance be kept.
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5.0 out of 5 stars
A Great-Great Movie!!!, February 23, 1999
By A Customer
This review is from: Memphis [VHS] (VHS Tape)
This movie is wonderful!Among a lot of things show a short relationship between The kidnapper and the kidnapped. that for me was the most interesting part of the movie.After kidnap the kid,Reeny starts to like him and she regret,to have kidnaped the child but don't throw away the chance to get a good money. I have always liked Cybill Shepherd and i think that on that movie she shows that she is a wonderful ,the best,the greatest.she is good!and is also the movie!
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