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| Cinerama Releasing Corporation | Release Date: December 10, 1969 |
Starring:
Al Lewis, Bonnie Bedelia, Bruce Dern, Gig Young, Jane Fonda, Michael Conrad, Michael Sarrazin, Red Buttons, Robert Fields, Susannah York
Summary:
The lives of a disparate group of contestants intertwine in an inhumanely grueling dance marathon.
The movie is so unrelievedly pessimistic that only the most dedicated misanthrope could love it. But there’s something oddly bracing—noble, even—about a Hollywood picture that’s willing to say, without even a hint of soft-pedaling, that life isn’t worth living, and that it’s squalid, unfair, and disappointing.
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The director, Sydney Pollack, isn't particularly inventive, but he has tight control of the actors. They work well for him, and he keeps the grisly central situation going with energy and drive.
The acting is strident and overblown, the narrative technique gimmicky and obvious, and the implication that the competitors' situation is a microcosm of a wider-reaching American malaise (though safely distanced by the period and the flash-back-and-forth narrative technique) rather pretentious.
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Jul 13, 2020
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