Word: melodrama
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...dwells in a tone of wistful resignation. The problem again is Rafelson's self-conscious world-weariness. He shows Nicholson improvising in the bathroom. "The form of the tragic autobiography is dead. I have chosen radio...because my life is hopefully, comically unworthy." If this is a snub at melodrama, it is hardly less sentimental. Rafelson has merely traded in emotional pathos for grotesque wihimsy David's jadedness is supposed to be glamorous, but David is drugged by his own disillusion; and this is irresponsible escapism...
Neither good intention nor Prince's talented direction are enough to support the crushing weight of O'Neill's foolish aspirations. Instead of settling for good melodrama. O'Neill has dug up actors masks from their classical graveyard and with them hopes not only to represent his characters' divided souls but also to express the "mystery" that is the meaning of any event...
...imprisonment, rape, unhappy love affairs: the elements of Billie Holiday's life sound like a soap-opera maker's dream and any serious film based on it would have to be handled carefully so as not to result in a tear-jerker. However, while the Berry Gordy production avoids melodrama and the extravaganza often used in filming the life of a legend, some inconsistencies exist that are so extreme as to be incongruous...
Five Easy Pieces, Bob Rafelson's previous film, was a good, sharply observed melodrama. The King of Marvin Gardens shows the same restrained, rhythmic editing and unemphatic camera movement, the same scrupulous care for dramatic nuance. Marvin Gardens may not be as successful as Five Easy Pieces; yet in many ways it is more interesting and certainly more daring -the work of a talented director trying to extend himself...
...freshest-elements to their most complex conclusions throughout his unheralded career. From Having a Wild Weekend to Point Blank to Hell in the Pacific to Leo the Last he has made poignant romance from rock group fantasy, existential comedy gangster shoot-em-up, psychological examination from World War II melodrama, revolutionary parable from absurdist fantasy. His record is not consistently successful. But each of his films is interesting, and Deliverance is his most accomplished film...