All That Jazz - Music Edition
Starring: Roy Scheider, Jessica Lange, Leland Palmer, Ann Reinking, Cliff GormanDirector: Bob Fosse
Studio: 20th Century Fox
MPAA Rating: R (Restricted)
Format: Color, Dubbed, DVD-Video, Special Edition, Subtitled, Widescreen, NTSC
Running Time: 123 minutes
DVD Release: January 22nd 2008
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DVD Review
Choreographer-turned-director Bob Fosse (Cabaret, Lenny) turns the camera on himself in this nervy, sometimes unnerving 1979 feature, a nakedly autobiographical piece that veers from gritty drama to razzle-dazzle musical, allegory to satire. It's an indication of his bravura, and possibly his self-absorption, that Fosse (who also cowrote the script) literally opens alter ego Joe Gideon's heart in a key scene--an unflinching glimpse of cardiac surgery, shot during an actual open-heart procedure.
Roy Scheider makes a brave and largely successful leap out of his usual romantic lead roles to step into Gideon's dancing pumps, and supplies a plausible sketch of an extravagant, self-destructive, self-loathing creative dynamo, while Jessica Lange serves as a largely allegorical Muse, one of the various women that the philandering Gideon pursues (and usually abandons). Gideon's other romantic partners include Fosse's own protégé (and a major keeper of his choreographic style since his death), Ann Reinking, whose leggy grace is seductive both "onstage" and off.
Fosse/Gideon's collision course with mortality, as well as his priapic obsession with the opposite sex, may offer clues into the libidinal core of the choreographer's dynamic, sexualized style of dance, but musical aficionados will be forgiven for fast-forwarding to cut out the self-analysis and focus on the music, period. At its best--as in the knockout opening, scored to George Benson's strutting version of "On Broadway," which fuses music, dance, and dazzling camera work into a paean to Fosse's hoofer nation--All That Jazz offers a sequence of classic Fosse numbers, hard-edged, caustic, and joyously physical. --Sam Sutherland
User Reviews
fosse's best - Rating: 5/5
bob fosse is regarded as a genius. although he won oscars for directing caberet and his movie on lenny bruce, his genius is universally acknowledged to lie primarily in the field of choreography. All that Jazz contains his best choreography on film, no argument. what else needs to be said?
Love his warts - Rating: 4/5
I have to admit the title of the DVD, All That Jazz--The Music Edition, puzzled me. Did the last version of the DVD have the music cut out??? Was this just a DVD of the songs, without any movie? Fortunately the naming of the DVD, like so many other things studios do and applaud themselves for, is just a meaningless gimmick. You get the whole movie just as before, in a transfer that looks very good to me. Some reviews called it a "soft print," but I think they're just seeing the photography the way it was intended, with fog filters being used extensively, especially in the scenes with Jessica Lange. Razor-sharp high-contrast cinematography where you can see every pour on the actors' face is a relatively recent phenomenon.
The movie itself harkens back to a different age, one where filmmaking was more personal and more daring. Fosse proves he's as brilliant a film director as he is a stage director. Sound fades in and out and overlap and go echoey. Some of the most dramatic moments are silent. There's rapid cross-cutting and temporal jumps. But none of it is gimmicky, it's all in the service of the story.
Some have criticized that story for being too sympathetic to the Fosse character, played by Roy Scheider in a career-defining performance. (No Oscar?!? Typical.) It's true the script is subtlety very sympathetic to Joe Gideon--despite all his failings, we are offered excuses, not the least of which is his genius. It's true that the screenplay isn't as hard on Gideon as it superficially comes across--this is *not* the hard-hitting, uncompromising, unflinching film that reviewer John Remington thinks it is. He's been "fooled," exactly the way the filmmakers intended. (He's also apparently never seen Fellini's 8 1/2.) Still, it must have been a brave portrait in 1979 to show a main character with an ex-wife and a small daughter popping pills and having open and free sex with every woman who crosses his casting couch. Casting Scheider was a triumph. He has a natural warmth that adds a lot to Gideon's likeability. I cannot imagine the original choice--Richard Dreyfuss--in the role.
The others in the cast are also very effective, from the ex-wife, played by Leland Palmer to the current main girlfriend, played by Ann Reinking. However, you'll note both female characters put pressure on poor Joe Gideon--one to choreography a lame musical solely as her comeback vehicle, one for fidelity only to go to the arms of another man as soon as Gideon takes ill. The other men in his life, mostly annoying producers, managers, agents and competing directors, are portrayed as small and narrow people. Never having worked in his profession, I can't say if this is accurate or not, but again, it *is* designed to make Gideon, for all his faults, look so good. Self-critical All That Jazz is not.
The movie, however, is well-written, directed and paced--until the ending. The last 20 minutes should have been 10. Once Gideon ends up in the hospital the pace starts to drag, and while the final set piece is brilliant and deliciously satirical, it goes on for too long. Still, all that jazz is a very good motion picture and one of the more important films of the 70s. But with a little tweaking, it could have been even better, a masterpiece.
This is Fox's second DVD of the film, and the extras are even more lame than those in the first. So lame they're not worth mentioning, or even checking out by the viewer. A lengthy interview with Schneider would have been nice. If you love this movie this DVD is worth owning, but not for the goodies. I wish Criterion would get its hands on this.
Life and Death On The Great White Way - Rating: 5/5
Bob Fosse's 1979 ALL THAT JAZZ is perhaps most famous for the extreme reaction it provokes: you either love it or you hate it. There is no middle ground.
Joe Gideon (Roy Scheider) is a celebrated stage and film director famous for creating dance numbers with a super sexy style--and truly chaotic professional and personal life. Even as he edits a film he has recently directed, he begins rehearsals for a new Broadway show. Even as he duels with his acidic show-biz ex-wife over the needs of their daughter, he cheats on his girl friend with any lovely chorus girl who wants to fall across his bed. He goes from crisis to crisis in a round of late nights fueled by nicotine, caffine, alcohol, and drugs--and he loves every ego-gratifying moment of it. What he does not love is the heart attack he has in the middle of it all.
What divides viewers is not so much the plot as the overall style of the film. Like Joe Gideon, Bob Fosse (1927-1987) was most famous for his musicals, which were often akin to beautiful but distinctly dark hallucinations of super-stylized motion showing lots of skin. With ALL THAT JAZZ, Fosse takes his unique, highly surrealistic musical style and combines it with the similarly surrealistic approach of such master directors as Fellini. The result is a film that shifts between past, present, and future with glittering musical numbers that leap from the mind of Gideon himself to make wry comment on his egocentric madness--and in which beautiful show girls become the personification of death.
As Joe Gideon, Roy Scheider (perhaps best known for his tough-cop role in THE FRENCH CONNECTION) truly gives the performance of his career; he is amazing in the role of the driven, egocentric director/choreographer who will stop at nothing to pursue his desires, professional or otherwise. The film also gives us two performers who rarely appear on screen: Leland Palmer as Gideon's ex-wife Audrey Paris (a role based on Gwen Verdon) and Ann Rhineking as Gideon's long-suffering dancer-girlfried Kate Jagger (a role, ironically, based on herself.) Both prove extremely memorable--as does Ben Vereen, a performer I do not usually like, appearing here in as the emcee of Gideon's final and most memorable hallucination.
The cinematography by Giuseppe Rotunno is sharp, clean, disquieting, and manages to convey the New York of the late 1970s in remarkable detail; the editing by Alan Heim (who also worked on such memorable films as NETWORK and STAR 80) is also memorable. Indeed, be it lighting, costumes, casting, or overall art design it is virtually impossible to fault the film at any level. Even so--ALL THAT JAZZ remains as likely to divide viewers today as it did in 1979. Movie musicals have changed a great deal over the past decade or so, but ALL THAT JAZZ remains a unique offering. You either get it or you don't; you either like it or you hate it.
There are at least two DVDs on the market. One is a no-frills edition with a good transfer; the other offers several bells and whistles that fans of the film will enjoy. Recommended in either version.
GFT, Amazon Reviewer
Fantastic! - Rating: 5/5
A Fosse lovers must see. I was up for the main group of dancers for this movie oh so many years ago. I remember what I wore to the audition. We all showed up at the St. James theatre in NYC even though there was no audition notice in the trades and no announcement. I remember Fosse coming on the stage and laughing saying "how the hell did you all know about this...?" Well, word of mouth among the gypsies, that's how! He had already chosen his dancers but he liked to see what was around just in case. I was always called back and got to the last call back. Too bad right! Well the rest is history...get this dvd, it is a piece of history and a kind of dance, director, choreographer and discipline that no longer exists. SO sad!
Well executed, entertaining, musical - Rating: 4/5
The film is appearantly a loose auto-biographical account of the film's director Bob Fosse (Cabaret, Chicago, Star 80). A scrutinizing look at obsession leading to self destruction and finally the transference of pain to others. The film has too many technical high points to mention. Choreography goes without mention and has been mimicked by modern artists, sometimes blatantly. The screenplay is complex enough to be interesting but remains in the realm of 'easily digestible.'
