Back To Index All That Jazz
 Barnes & Noble All That Jazz is Bob Fosse’s answer to Federico Fellini’s 8 ½ -- an autobiographical portrait of the artist as a womanizing, pill-popping, chain-smoking Broadway director whose self-destructive habits land him in the hospital with a heart attack. The film is as messy and self-indulgent as its hero, yet compelling even today in its inventiveness, daring, and sheer chutzpah. Roy Scheider portrays Fosse stand-in Joe Gideon, a workaholic who struggles to finish a film and stage a new Broadway show while juggling an ex-wife (Leland Palmer), a girlfriend (Fosses real-life paramour, Ann Reinking), a daughter (Erzebet Foldi), and innumerable one-night stands. The only real happiness he derives is from his work, which he pursues with maniacal devotion. He cheats on, lies to, and genuinely disappoints all the women in his life, yet they remain by his side -- not only because he is a true creative genius but also because, as played by Scheider, Gideon has enough self-awareness, and self-loathing, to make him sympathetic. This notion of the tortured artist is hardly a new one; what makes All That Jazz original and fascinating is the way Fosse, the ultimate showman, deconstructs the musical, digging for the dirt beneath the showbiz glitter and brandishing his trademark razzle-dazzle in the service of something darker. He takes us inside Gideon’s tormented psyche as he is wooed by an ethereal and seductive Angel of Death (Jessica Lange, another Fosse girlfriend) and then onto the operating table, intercutting gruesomely realistic shots of Gideon’s open-heart surgery with glitzy song-and-dance routines addressing the failures of his life and his inevitable slide toward death. It’s hard to imagine a film with such a genuinely experimental approach and downbeat ending receiving recognition from the Academy today, but All That Jazz won seven Oscars. Like Martin Scorsese’s criminally underrated New York, New York, this flawed but ambitious work attempts to reimagine the feel-good musical for a more cynical and knowing era. Kryssa Schemmerling Interested in the song lyrics? - Check out themostlyrics.com! Looking For A DVD? - Check out dvd-a-rama.com! |
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