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Butterfield 8Rating:
Release Date: 19 September, 2000 Retail Price: $19.98 OUR Price: $9.97 You SAVE: $10.01! Cast: Complete Cast (7 total) |
Butterfield 8 Reviews
Depressing Film About Depressed People
"Butterfield 8" pure and simple is overwrought soap opera. You would not care about these people if not for the strong performances by the two central actors who imbue their characters with qualities that are not present on the written page. Elizabeth Taylor as few actresses in history elevates otherwise mundane material into something other than. It's debatable whether she deserved the Oscar she won for playing Gloria Wondrous but there's no debating that she earned it. She had me won over in the film's opening scene where she awakens in another man's bed surveying the damage after another one night stand. Taylor outwardly was probably the most beautiful woman in the world. Her carriage in this scene suggests dissipation and internal decay and turmoil. Laurence Harvey's Weston Liggett is Wondrous' soulmate in the sense that he is a self-loathing Park Avenue type who married well and vents his angst through booze and indiscriminate affairs. It's inevitable when these two get together that sparks would fly but it's questionable whether you want to call it love. Like Taylor, Harvey imbues Liggett with enough pathos that you feel empathy for an unlikable character. I have mixed feelings about this film because it's not a pleasant viewing experience. If you do see it, watch two compelling actors at the top of their game.
Taylor at her sexiest
Writer Paul Monette refers to this film as being one in a 'trilogy' of bad girl roles for Elizabeth Taylor--the other two being "Cat on a Hot Tin Roof "(1958) and " Suddenly,Last Summer " (1959).These three films should be in every DVD collection. Certainly they present Taylor at her absolute peak, but they also show the dark side of her sexuality, which is quite riveting.Taylor loves to refer to this movie as "trash", even though she won an Oscar for the role. Maybe she felt she was being exploited by the studios with this film's content due to her highly publicized love affairs at the time. However, SEX SELLS, and as a beautiful, voluptuous, and amoral model, Taylor has never been better. She simply smoulders in this film,especially in the 'morning after' scenes in the beginning . She and Laurence Harvey make a VERY HOT team, SCORCHING, something we've never seen with Taylor and Richard Burton.The movie is really a STAR VECHICLE, it's all about Taylor and her leading man, with some excellent supporting players.And Taylor does do some good acting,very moving in the confession scene and in her last scene with Harvey as she tries to escape him. Also interesting is the fact that this may be the first film to link child molestation with promiscuity, or even talk about such subjects. Remember this was made in 1960.
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