Wer ist Harry Kellerman?

I just watched this last night. I bought it because Barbara Harris received an Oscar nomination for it. I happen to think that she is a very underrated actress.....and was I right!

This movie started out very strange. From the opening scene where Hoffman falls of the top of a building, it just got stranger. I realize that this is one of those independent films that try to make a point about life in a different way than we're use to in mainstream films, but please! I knew this film was bad when I kept thinking to myself, "When does Barbara Harris come into this?!"

My husband had come home, watched a little and said, "What is this? Turn it off!" Just then Barbara Harris came on. We both sat there in awe. She made that audition scene into brilliant showcase of her talent. When Dustin Hoffman left her, you really missed her. The film really missed her. SHE is what makes this film worth seeing, well the last half at least. Dustin gives his typical performance here, nothing special. Barbara Harris is fantastic and deserved an Oscar for making it worth the torture of watching the first half of this @$%#^%, so you can see HER in the second half.

Potentially brilliant character study misses the mark as Hoffman plays a successful singer/songwriter who ends up badly tormented. Excessive smugness permeates a otherwise well crafted, well mounted production. Clearly the filmmakers thought they had a important "statement" picture. Unfortunately the statement becomes evasive and eventually muddled. Worth seeing just for Hoffman, who gives one of his best performances

Sometimes I am just sooooooo out of step with conventional movie wisdom. This is one of those movies that gets trounced every time it is mentioned by a critic or reviewer. But why??? It is funny, well-acted, moving, bizarre and the music kicks ass. Dustin Hoffman plays Georgie Solloway, a super-successful Bob Dylan-ish rock star who is going thru something of a mid-life crisis. A mysterious figure known as Harry Kellerman is spreading false rumours about him, sabotaging his personal and professional life. Solloway has no friends to talk to... just a shrink and, when he gets really desperate, his accountant (great scene with Dom DeLuise!) Okay, so maybe you hate Dustin Hoffman... or Bob Dylan... or movies about the problems of rich, successful people in general... how can you not love the heartbreaking performance by Barbara Harris? She was nominated for an Oscar for crying out loud (and it was a crime she didn't win, I tell ya). Don't listen to the nay-sayers... check out this wild and wonderful film!

If there were an award for "best opening credits," this movie would be my pick to win, with its quirky fantasy scene accompanied by Dr. Hook & the Medicine Show's marvelous "Last Morning."

The mix of fantasy and flashback without explanation may turn off some viewers, as may the slow pace. It is not plot-driven, but is rather a character study. It also presents a picture of an period in America when modernity began to overtake traditional ways and values.

As a whole, I do not find the film to be one of Dustin Hoffman's best, but I would not have missed the haunting performance of Barbara Harris for the world. The rest of the supporting cast is also extraordinary, even including an unusual dramatic performance by Dom DeLuise, nicely done. Overall, worth seeing.

Harry Kellerman was a most unfulfilling film for me, as unfulfilling as Dustin Hoffman found his life to be in this movie. Hoffman plays a successful rock composer who is going through a mid life crisis and finds all of a sudden in his middle Thirties he's not a really happy guy despite all the money in the world and the toys that money can buy. His best time is flying his private plane, talk about toys.

For some reason I couldn't get into this film or feel any kind of sympathy for Hoffman's character of George Soloway. Hoffman's best friend seems to be his analyst Jack Warden, hamming it up in his best Viennese accent. Dustin has more real and imagined time with Warden than anyone else in the film. In fact Warden functions as an alter ego for him, more inside his head than in real life on the couch.

The last straw for Hoffman seems to be some mysterious dude named Harry Kellerman who for some reason is calling up all of Hoffman's friends of both sexes and badmouthing him all over the place. As his relationships crumble all around him, Hoffman goes on a frantic manhunt for Kellerman.

With all the imaginary sequences in this film, if you can't figure out who Harry Kellerman is before a quarter of the film is over you haven't seen too many films at all. Think a kinder, gentler Fight Club.

Hoffman does the best he can to make some coherent sense out of his character, but in the end he's not someone I care terribly about. Rose Gregorio as his ex-wife, David Burns as his father, and Gabriel Dell as his cheerfully hedonistic songwriting partner are the best in the film.

Barbara Harris as a woman who seems to have as much angst as Hoffman got an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress, she lost in the Oscar sweepstakes to Cloris Leachman for The Last Picture Show, an infinitely better film. Harris's character is interesting, she represents a last chance for Hoffman at love. She has her problems, but without as much money, she seems to be coping a lot better. Another reason for me to not care about Hoffman's George Soloway.

The ambiance of the early Seventies rock scene is captured well. Would that George Soloway in Harry Kellerman be someone you could actually get worked up over.