When Will I Be Loved

Sexual being Vera Barrie (Neve Campbell) is hired by African studies Professor Hassan Al-Ibrahim Ben Rabinowitz (James Toback) as his assistant. Hustler Ford Welles (Frederick Weller) is working for wealthy Italian Count Tommaso Lupo (Dominic Chianese). He convinces sex partner Vera to spend time with the count for $100k.

I remember the main selling point for this was Neve getting naked. With the recent revelations about James Toback, it's impossible to separate the man from his work. Luckily, his work here isn't good and I'm not conflicted about crapping on this. I only feel bad for Neve Campbell. She was obviously trying to do an art indie as she searched for her place in Hollywood. The other notable is a cameo from pre-tattoo Mike Tyson. It may be one of his last appearance before his tattoo. All the cameo starting with Toback himself are disconnected. They make this guerrilla indie fractured like a student film. The central premise holds some problems mainly with the money. Surely, Vera would want a 50/50 split before the meeting. After getting paid, she could try to buy him off. The conflict could still happen after he finds out the secret but in a different way. The money part lacks credibility. Sadly, Neve's nudity is all that's left. Through it all, she somehow maintains her dignity which is far more than can be hoped for. Toback probably spent more time lining up cameo rather than writing a compelling script. Toback is unable to advance beyond his sad experience.

What a real bummer. I have to lay most of the rap on Mr. Toback. First, inserting himself into an already short movie (that must run 81 minutes with opening AND closing credits) appeared both self-aggrandizing, unnecessary, and a near complete digression (as was the lengthy cameo by former boxing great Mike Tyson). I would elaborate but I don't want to ruin some questions that might arise should you be paying attention (Picture Michael Moore on the Atkins diet, wearing a dashiki).

Neve Campbell is thoroughly charming and totally wasted as the lost, passionate rich girl. Bottom line, is that there will be thousands make off of her nudity in this flick. The nudity only consists of a shower scene. The sex scenes are little more than bumping and grinding and contrived, and I can only wonder if the talent were as uncomforable making those scenes as I was watching them.

But back to the erstwhile Mr. Toback, if you listen carefully to his voice early on, then you'll likely hear it in the other characters as well. His New York chatterbox cadence becomes tiresome.

I had hoped for better. Ms. Campbell is a major talent is one or two films away from breaking out super huge. Mr. Toback is also talented though this certainly isn't the work to pin his fame on. I wish them well in their future endeavors, and mourn for the eighty-one minutes I can never get back.

I watched this movie to look at Neve Campbell.....possibly the reason the movie makers made it. She is beautiful and a fine actress. A lot of the dialog was interesting,seemed to be a lot of ad libbing. What the heck was Lori Singer doing in the movie? Neve's character meets her in the park and says "Hi Lori" and they talk a few minutes about movies. Mike Tyson also makes an appearance as himself and seems to have some acting talent. The film starts and ends with Neve Campbell in a shower. The rest is a waste of eyes and ears. I usually agree with Roger Ebert,but he was one of the very few critics that liked the film. He gave it a top rating. Maybe he loves Neve more than me.

James Toback's When Will Be Loved has a very, loose, ramshackle quality that it is ill-suited for. As the film opens, it cuts back and forth, jarringly, between Fred Weller rambling on his cell phone, and Neve Campbell taking a shower. The music even changes between each cut..and it's just so sloppily done, and unfortunately, the rest of the film, for the most part, is just as sloppy. Between the music being way too damn loud (whoever mixed the sound on this film did a lousy-ass job!), or certain scenes being more or less pointless, the film is a just a ramshackle, sloppy mess. Does the scene where Neve runs into Lori Singer in the park add anything? Other than perhaps killing time...no. Is the scene with Mike Tyson necessary? No, again it adds nothing, wastes time. And the threesome in the park scene? Not needed either...as we already know Weller is a small-time bum, out for his own gratification. Why is Chianese's character a Count? That's just ridiculous..and it seriously undercuts the believability of his character...and yet his sequence with Campbell is the only one in the film that really works. The rest of it......not so much. This is primarily because of the tired,tired stereotypical small time hustler character that Weller is given to play. Weller does what he can, and is occasionally amusing, but on the whole, we've seen this character too many damn times...we know right away that he has no connections, is a liar, a loser, etc. Knowing that, watching this character is quite irritating, as it offers no surprises, but plenty o' stale crap we have to sit through. This movie is just a mess. Not completely bad, but mostly, a ramshackle mess.

I found Toback's earlier film Black and White mildly diverting, so gave this one a whirl. The scuttlebutt was that this was Neve Campbell's best (and sexiest) performance so far. Well, that much may be true-ish, but the rest of this film is, in places, almost unwatchably bad.

Most of the characters (or should I say caricatures - take the Italian mogul: did anybody find this man even remotely believable?) are without a shred of originality, and in the case of Ford, bear virtually no resemblance to human beings of the sort you or I might actually meet. It may be that his relentless hustling is *intended* to show him as a pathetic individual - but there is a fine line between depicting characters we may not like but in whom we can invest some interest as to their fate; and, as happens in this film, showing people who are irredeemably ghastly, and about whose fate we don't give a toss.

In Black and White, Mike Tyson had a very funny cameo, in which Robert Downey Junior's character tries to seduce him. Here, it looks as if Toback has simply raided his address book and shoehorned as many celebrity cameos as he could into what passes for the plot. Ooh, look, there's Lori Singer! Wow, there's Mike Tyson (again). Ooh, that really is Damon Dash! Toback's own performance as the "hilariously" named cross-cultural enabler is pure smugness in a bottle. The only honest moment is when he confesses to wanting to get into Neve Campbell's knickers. We can only speculate as to whether that is a case of art imitating life.

And Neve Campbell? Yes, she is good in this. She gets some decent dialogue to get her teeth into and delivers it with aplomb. I still think Wild Things is a better showcase for her talent.

The incident towards the end of the film was certainly unexpected; but then again, any idiot can make unexpected things happen in a film. The trick is to work up to it in *some* way. Toback is either incapable of doing this, or simply can't be bothered. The dénouement left me shrugging: so what? Who cares about these cardboard cut-outs?