A failed effort to revive the big-budget movie musical, Newsies attempted to create toe-tapping, song-and-dance excitement out of the true story of an 1899 strike by newspaper boys against publishing magnate Joseph Pulitzer. The "newsies" band together to protest a pay cut by Pulitzer (Robert Duvall), organizing a union to protect their rights and ...
This Stephen Sondheim/Jules Styne/Arthur Laurents musical comedy Gypsy had been a Broadway smash with Ethel Merman in the lead. Based on the autobiography of striptease artist Gypsy Rose Lee, it centers on the antics of Mama Rose (here played by Rosalind Russell), the Stage Mother from Hell who prods and pushes her daughters June and Louise into a ...
This film adaptation of the Broadway musical based loosely on Puccini's opera La Bohème features many members of the original cast. It follows a year in the lives of seven friends living the disappearing Bohemian lifestyle in New York's East Village. AIDS and both its physical and emotional complications pervade the lives of Roger (Adam Pascal), ...
This biography of Ludwig von Beethoven (played here by Gary Oldman) builds its narrative around an actual letter found after his death, addressed only to the composer's "immortal beloved." The responsibility of discovering this mysterious person's identity falls to Beethoven's friend and secretary (Jeroen Krabbé), who sets out on an investigation ...
Evita is based on the musical by Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice. Actually, the film is more of an opera, with only short moments devoted to dialogue. "Evita" is the friendly, family version of the proper name "Eva," and this film tells the story of Eva Peron (1921-52), a woman whose name evokes powerful feelings in her native Argentina. ...
Inspired by Pink Floyd's album of the same name, Pink Floyd: The Wall is a dark, expressionistic musical, told from the point of view of Pink, a depressed rock musician. The film is structured around Pink's reflections on his life, all of which center on the building of "the wall." This wall is a metaphor for psychological isolation, a barrier ...
Directed by Taylor Hackford, this biopic profiles the life of legendary musician Ray Charles. Despite humble beginnings and the loss of his eyesight due to glaucoma at the age of six, Charles, depicted by Jamie Foxx, would nonetheless become an icon in both the music industry and the civil rights era. While the film delves into his problems with ...
The third remake of the 1932 drama What Price Hollywood?, this adaptation of A Star Is Born moved the story into the mid-1970's and changed the milieu from the movie business to pop music. John Norman Howard (Kris Kristofferson) is a rock star whose career has peaked; he is numbed by booze and cocaine, his music has lost its edge, and his ...
This sequel to the rock & roll mystery Eddie and the Cruisers explains many of the questions concerning the mysterious death of 1960s rocker Eddie Wilson, who with his Cruisers was celebrating the success of their first album when he got in a terrible car wreck, from which his body was never recovered. Also missing were the masters from the group ...
Loretta Lynn was one of the first female superstars in country music and remains a defining presence within the genre; with her strong, clear, hard-country voice and tough, no-nonsense songs about husbands who cheat and wives who weren't about to be pushed around, Lynn introduced a feminist mindset to Nashville years before the phrase "women's ...
Selena Quintanilla was a major figure in Tejano music, a Grammy-winning recording artist, a beloved star in the American Southwest and Mexico, and seemed poised to cross over into mainstream popularity on the U.S. pop charts when she was murdered on March 31, 1995 by the president of her fan club. Written and directed by Gregory Nava, this biopic ...
Hoping to recapture the success of its 1945 Frederic Chopin biopic A Song to Remember, Columbia Pictures concocted the 1960 Technicolor costume drama Song Without End. Dirk Bogarde is cast as musical genius Franz Liszt. Bogarde's piano scenes are dubbed with another's singing voice, but this hardly matters in that the film is preoccupied with ...
Experience one of the most compelling stories of The Bible in a whole new light as Val Kilmer steps into the sandals of famed prophet Moses for a compelling stage musical directed by Robert Iscove and composed by Patrick Leonard. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide
The second Biblical epic to be turned into a musical by composer Andrew Lloyd Webber and lyricist Tim Rice, this box-office disappointment recounts the last week in the life of Jesus Christ in rock-opera format and from the surprising point of view of Christ's betrayer, Judas Iscariot. Carl Anderson stars as Judas, who has begun to believe that ...
Milos Forman's adaptation of the tribal rock musical Hair stars John Savage as Claude, a quiet young man from the Midwest who becomes friendly with a group of New York hippies on his way to begin basic training in the military. The repressed Claude is quite taken with Berger (Treat Williams) and the group of freedom seekers who reside in Central ...
For Me and My Gal, a leisurely period musical, represents the first on-screen dancing of MGM's new star Gene Kelly. Judy Garland plays a member of a vaudeville troupe consisting of herself, George Murphy, Ben Blue and Lucille Norman. She leaves the act to join up with Kelly, who promises to propel her to the big time. Two unsuccessful years later, ...
Pop singer Neil Diamond stars in this ill-begotten second remake of Al Jolson's seminal 1927 musical The Jazz Singer. The moth-eaten story concerns a cantor's son who desires success as a pop singer, despite the wishes of his imperious father. The film takes place in the present day with Yussel Rabinowitz (Neil Diamond) playing a young (though ...
The film traces Naples-born Caruso's ascension from adolescent choir singer to the uppermost ranks of the opera world. Caruso is brought to America, getting off to a bad start by inadvertently insulting the impresario (Carl Benton Reid) responsible for his Metropolitan debut. This complication has a happy outcome when Caruso marries his benefactor ...
Steve Allen makes his dramatic film debut in The Benny Goodman Story. Outside of Goodman's conflicts with his parents over his career choice, and his early frustration over not being able to play his kind of music, the film tends to be more a series of musical highlights than a biography. The film features guest appearances by Gene Krupa, Lionel ...
Barbra Streisand's directorial debut, Yentl, is a musical adaptation of a story by the beloved Jewish writer Isaac Bashevis Singer. Yentl (Streisand) is a young woman who wants nothing more than to study religious scripture. She is denied that possibility because she is a woman. She moves, passes herself off as a male named Anshel, and then begins ...
From the time he was a high-school student in Lubbock, Texas until his tragic death at age 22 in 1959, Buddy Holly ignored the condemnation by townspeople and his conservative relatives and dedicated his life to the new music he became famous for performing: rock 'n roll. Gary Busey stars as Buddy Holly in this widely acclaimed big-screen ...
In 1939 Hamburg, Germany, a group of teenagers express their rebellion against Adolph Hitler's Nazi regime through their affection for American swing music, British fashion, and Harlem slang. American and British big-band jazz records are among those banned by the Fuhrer, but the young men secretly get together with their friends to listen and ...
In this emotional drama, a team of young dancers are competing for places in a prestigious dance troupe. The dancers have to deal with the ups and downs of trying to find their place in the world, even as their profession also places an enormous physical and psychological challenge before them. They train with the rigor of championship athletes, ...
Loosely inspired by the true story of the heavy metal band Judas Priest, this music industry fable from director Stephen Herek is based on a script by actor-turned-writer/director John Stockwell. Mark Wahlberg stars as Chris Cole, a wannabe rock star who works by day as a copy machine repairman and by night as the lead singer of Blood Pollution, a ...
Directors David Greene and John-Michael Tebelak collaborate with composer Stephen Schwartz to bring his wildly successful Broadway musical, Godspell, to the big screen. Told almost entirely in song, Godspell presents the gospel of St. Matthew updated to New York City of the late '60s/early '70s, featuring Jesus Christ as a wandering minstrel ...
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