Revisiting "Crimes of the Heart"

In honor of Diane Keaton’s AFI Lifetime Achievement Award tomorrow, here’s Eric Blume with a look back at Crimes of the Heart (1986)

Beth Henley won a Pulitzer Prize in 1981 for her play Crimes of the Heart, and five years later it was retooled by Henley herself in a film version directed by Bruce Beresford.  The film teamed three of the biggest actresses of the 80’s:  Diane Keaton as the oldest spinster sister Lenny, Jessica Lange as saucy middle child Meg, and Sissy Spacek as spacey youngest Babe.   

Keaton is forced to carry the film for the first ten minutes out of the gate, and she’s strapped with some clunky exposition.  She feels tentative, which is partly aligned with her character, but in a way where she feels not fully assured, like she’s finding her way into the role.  Her Southern accent doesn’t come easily to her, and it takes her a while to learn how to make the accent soar to funny dimensions. 

But then ten minutes in, she has her first scene with Lange, and the film starts to find its groove...

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A Head for Broadway, and a Bod for Singing

Working gal Robert here! Broadway has been absolutely inundated with musicals based on famous movies in the past few years to the point where a friend told me he was going to see Groundhog's Day: The Musical and I thought it was a sick joke. What is not a sick joke is that there is one upcoming production that has turned my opinion right around on that subject: a musical version of the 1988 Melanie Griffith vehicle Working Girl with music by pop-genius Cyndi Lauper and book by renowned playwright Kim Rosenstock. Let the river run after the jump!

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Soundtracking: "Best Worst Thing..."

Soundtracking is our newest wekly series, with Chris Feil talking music in the movies! The Tony Awards are this weekend, so here is a documentary on a Broadway flop...

Best Worst Thing That Ever Could Have Happened charts the making and failing of Stephen Sondheim / Hal Prince collaboration Merrily We Roll Along. The musical charts the decades-spanning friendship of three showbiz types, but told in reverse and with teenagers playing the roles. It was high concept and it was a notorious bomb - but with one brilliant and emotionally involving score.

If you’re unfamiliar with the musical and its complicated backwards plotting, Best Worst Thing does a pretty snappy job of quickly explaining the show’s concept before focusing on the cast left out in the cold by Merrily’s failure. What sounds rather niche for a documentary subject is actually quite moving and emotionally accessible, and still touches on some hefty themes. The film, directed by original cast member Lonny Price, is personal but not cloying. It’s a documentary about the hard truths of growing up into a world that isn’t all you were promised, - and it consistently finds deeper context for the music.

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Everyone Joins "The Papers"

by Ben Miller

Steven Spielberg made news a few months back with word that his next film about the Pentagon Papers would bring together two American treasures in Tom Hanks and Meryl Streep.  The film, originally referred to as The Post and now titled The Papers, chronicles the Washington Post’s Vietnam War expose’ with Hanks and Streep as the Post’s editor and publisher, respectively. 

The big news is who else has been cast in the supporting roles.  Rather, who hasn’t been cast...

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The Dramas of Diane Keaton

“It’s not a good idea to be identifiable, though it’s reassuring. It feels safe in most ways, and that’s bad, because it means that you’re accepted, and once that happens that’s where you stay. You have to watch yourself. I’d like a life like Katharine Hepburn’s in terms of work. She matured. She made the changes. Like Martha Graham.”

Diane Keaton,  New Yorker, 1978

Diane Keaton is to receive the American Film Institure Lifetime Achievement award on June 8th. We should be pleased, not only deserved because Keaton is a true legend, but also because highly accomplished comic actors are so often overlooked by awards bodies. Think of Keaton and Annie Hall comes immediately to mind along with other Woody Allen films, as well as comedies like The First Wives Club, Father of the Bride and Something's Gotta Give. But few actresses have a dramatic filmography that can match Keaton's. For all her fluffy breeziness, her dramatic skill is equally sharp and coldly acerbic, with films like Shoot the Moon, Looking for Mr. Goodbar and Reds capturing this dichotomy. And we can't forget the entire Godfather trilogy.

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