“My God, that Helen Mirren is one sexy dame” I thought to myself after getting my first good look at Britain’s 64-year-old queen of the cinema in Love Ranch, her new film. Considering that the movie is set in 1976 with Mirren saddled in a batch of tarty clothes of processed fabrics, the unflattering beehive wigs of the period and a cane, to boot, that’s really saying something. The picture itself, based on the true story of Grace and Charlie Bontempo—the couple that opened Nevada’s first legal brothel in Reno—works familiar territory, is only fitfully entertaining and is helped enormously by Mirren’s presence.
Mirren has made good on a lot of really offbeat casting choices regarding her male co-stars and, in Love Ranch, she has her work cut out for her with Joe Pesci as husband Charlie and newcomer Sergio Peris-Mencheta (a beefier Raul Julia look-alike) as Armando, a hulking boxer she takes as a lover after Charlie insists that she become his manager. That she doesn’t quite succeed has more to do with Mark Jacobson’s script, which skimps on character depth in favor of situations and the movie’s all-too-familiar settings.
As the film begins Grace and Charlie have made their brothel—thanks to payoffs by Charlie, two sets of books and Grace’s tough management style—a shaky success. It’s clear that the place, which is literally surrounded by an electrified fence and sports a guard tower to protect the flesh peddlers from the conservative protestors and other miscreants outside, has become a literal prison for Grace and that her marriage to the pugnacious Charlie is one of convenience. The arrival of Armando, whose contract Charlie has purchased, awakens Grace to the possibility of another life—especially when the gentle giant with the goofy grin takes her to bed. But Grace hasn’t counted on Charlie’s unfettered jealousy, and a love triangle takes up the last third of the movie.
The prizefighter-and-the-lady stuff is highly reminiscent of many other not-very-good movies, and there’s not much real chemistry between Mirren and Peris-Mencheta, either. (He’s one unsexy lunk.) One longs for a scene with the tender sexiness Mirren and costar Christopher Plummer shared in last year’s The Last Station, just out on DVD. Part of the problem is that neither Pesci, who returns to the screen after a retirement of 11 years, nor Peris-Mencheta has nearly Mirren’s effortless ability to draw the camera to her. Pesci yells “f**k” about 500 times and plays a milder variation on one of his Scorcese Mob roles without a hint of freshness while Peris-Mencheta is simply way out of his league. On the other hand, by merely shrugging her shoulders or using the aforesaid cane to break up a catfight between two of her girls, Mirren commands the screen with seemingly the simplest effort. None of them, however, plays a character we really care much about.
The movie—produced and directed by Mirren’s real-life husband, Taylor Hackford—has great elements, a great set-up and a great cast (including gay audience faves Gina Gershon and Leslie Jordan) but doesn’t seem to know what to do with any of them. It never really catches hold and the bulk of the fault, again, goes back to the thin screenplay, which piles on the subplots until they’re nearly as high as Mirren’s wigs. A movie like Love Ranch is also at least a decade past its freshness date.
But then again, every time The Mirren walks into view…
“Grease is the word, have you heard?” For those who haven’t and for those who haven’t in a while, John Travolta, Olivia Newton-John et al are back in movie theatres in the seminal 1978 movie musical in a long overdue sing-along version that is a terrific alternative to this year’s blah blockbuster season. Though ostensibly a squeaky clean homage to the 1950s high school culture which pits the goodie-two-shoes cheerleaders and the jocks against the greasers and their “fast” chicks, out director Randal Kleiser and the late, caftan-wearing, outrageous producer Allan Carr, managed to add plenty of queer subtext to the proceedings along with a raft of supporting players (including the miraculous Eve Arden) to what is, to be kind, an extremely slight premise.
The students of Rydell High are perhaps the oldest “teens” you’ll ever see on screen (with Stockard Channing, as the head of the bad girls, the longest in the tooth) but when they start belting out the infectious, hit-filled score who can resist? There will be some summer lovin’ alright—courtesy of Grease Sing-A-Long, which is in select Chicago area theatres beginning Thursday, July 8. Patrons are encouraged to dress up as their favorite characters so expect to see a lot of drag queen pink ladies, beauty school drop outs, and tough bikers—of all persuasions. www.greasemovie.com
Film notes:
—Audrey Hepburn fans (like moi) will be happy to bask in the Music Box’s two month-long, weekend matinee tribute to the eternally chic Oscar-winning actress. The Films of Audrey Hepburn series kicks off Saturday-Sunday, July 3-4 with her Academy Award-winning role in William Wyler’s 1953 classic Roman Holiday, in which Audrey plays a princess who momentarily escapes from her royal duties while touring Rome, finding love (with dreamy Gregory Peck) and adventure in the process. Many of the other Hepburn film classics—Sabrina, Love in the Afternoon, Breakfast at Tiffany’s, the lesbian-themed The Children’s Hour, Charade and Wait Until Dark (these last two particular favorites of mine) —are also in the line-up, which continues through Aug. 22. www.musicboxtheatre.com
Check out my archived reviews at www.windycitytimes.com or www.knightatthemovies.com. Readers can leave feedback at the latter website.