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Where's Poppa?Rating:
Release Date: 03 December, 2002 Retail Price: $14.98 OUR Price: $12.99 You SAVE: $1.99! Cast: Complete Cast (11 total) |
Where's Poppa? Reviews
The "Alternate" ending bit
I saw this movie in a theater (on a double bill with Harold and Maude). The "alternate" ending is the ending that I saw...so obviously it was not removed for theatrical release, but apparently to make the movie less shocking for television audiences or video buyers. Why you would continue to release the dumbed down happy ending version on tape and DVD with the original (and far superior, though far blacker)ending added as an "alternate" is beyond me. The happy ending looks rough and wrong-it is just too abrupt, since all they really did was chop off the last five minutes of the movie! I am confused as to how and why you would leave in the elaborate rape joke but demur on Gordon apparently doing Mamma at the end. It seems to me that if you can't take the original ending you should be horrified by the whole movie! SURELY this was never shown on TV-gorilla rape and all? Every other word is the F-bomb as well. If this was altered for TV, there must not have been much left when they were finished. It was still funny, after all these years-just didn't like the hacked off ending.
I'D LIKE MY COMEDY VERY, VERY BLACK, PLEASE. . .
How to describe Carl Reiner's film of Robert Klane's WHERE'S POPPA? How 'bout this: let's make a movie about senility, murder, rape, fear, loneliness, sex, True Love, hate, excrement, frustration and not getting enough sleep. And let's make it a comedy!
Surprisingly, it works. Now, WHERE'S POPPA? is not for all tastes, most assuredly. If the more demented Monty Python sketches or THE LOVED ONE (which will finally be available on DVD 06/20/06) have made you laugh, WHERE'S POPPA? might just tickle you. In fact, might just make you roar.
George Segal, really flexing his comedy muscles (in 1970) for the first time after many dramatic roles, brings lawyer Gordon Hocheiser to the brink of a breakdown trying to care for his way past senile and possibly into Alzheimer's mother, played giddily by the late Ruth Gordon. He has been tested so many times by her wacko behavior that he is seriously thinking of killing her, since he and his brother promised their father that they would never put her in a "home". He can't even say the word "home", he's so in fear of the promise. And his brother, Ron Liebman, is not much help, as he's in fear of having to take her himself. He so not wants her in his house that he runs through Central Park in the middle of the night whenever Gordon calls for help, despite having been mugged so many times that his muggers (very well-dressed muggers, featuring future Saturday Night Live star Garrett Morris) know him, and he knows them, by name.
Into this scenario comes Trish Van Devere (future wife of George C. Scott) as the vision of the perfect Florence Nightingale to help take care of Mama and possibly bring True Love to poor Gordon. At this point we see that perhaps Mama is not always as far gone as she appears, because there are a few moments of sly craftiness in trying to keep Gordon all to herself.
I won't spoil any of the gags for you, but rest assured, they are doozies, and way out of left field.
Vincent Gardenia as an out of control football coach, Barnard Hughes as a very offended (and offending) military type, Rob Reiner as a precursor to his Mike Stivic character in ALL IN THE FAMILY, and Paul Sorvino as the owner of a very, VERY bad retirement home all add to the madness and Political Incorrectness of the comedy.
Could this film be made today? Probably not. In the late Sixties and early Seventies there was a will in movies to try almost anything, and there were as many failures as successes. WHERE'S POPPA is one of the successes, a full-on exercise in seeing just how far you can go in comedy. And this from the director and creator of THE DICK VAN DYKE SHOW? Well, go back to Carl Reiner's work in YOUR SHOW OF SHOWS and with Mel Brooks in their 2000 YEAR OLD MAN sketches and you'll see how anarchic comedy is made. He might be a big ol' teddy bear on the outside, but there is a delightful subversive inside.
The transfer of picture and sound is crisp and clean, and the DVD includes the hilarious trailer and the original ending (which was wisely excised, as it brought the movie to a sad and somewhat depraved end. After all that Gordon goes through, you really want him to at least have a chance at happiness.)
So, WHERE'S POPPA? is not for all tastes, but if it sounds like it might be your cup of Nightshade Tea, I highly recommend it, with a big cereal bowl of Lucky Charms floating in Pepsi and an orange on the side.
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