And God Created Woman

Roger Vadim's 1956 film 'And God Created Woman' created the sensation that was Brigitte Bardot with its then shocking portrayal of a woman who would use her sexuality to get what she wanted or on a whim with equal abandon. Thirty years later, a parallel portrait of feminine caprice had little impact on movie-goers jaded by 70s excesses. The film itself is moreover less visually interesting than the earlier one, replacing the splendor of the Cote d'Azure with the drabness of the American southwest. In place of a woman as tropical orchid, we get a cactus flower. The plot moves forward in arbitrary jumps that make little sense. Somebody needs to remind Vadim that capriciousness and randomness are not synonyms. Add in that the male leads seem to be sleepwalking through the movie and there is little here to like. And the urban cool of Rebecca deMornay does nothing to evoke the energetic spunkiness of Bardot in the original. Avoid.

I sat down to watch "And God Created Woman" because I used to enjoy Rebecca De Monay's movies when I was younger, but I never got around to watching this movie from 1988 before late in 2016.

I must admit that I didn't have much expectations to it, as I had no idea what this movie was about, and it is a 1980s movie after all. And the movie didn't turn out to be anything extraordinary.

Sure, there were some good and fun enough moments throughout the course of the movie, but in overall, then this was just a less than mediocre movie in terms of entertainment value.

It was nice to see Frank Langella in the movie, but he could only do so much to salvage the movie, as there was very little to work with in terms of story and plot. As for Rebecca De Mornay, then this was nowhere near being her best movie performances. I am sure it might have been something back in the day, since there is a heap of nudity throughout the course of the movie.

What failed to work for me was the characters in the movie, because they just never took a hold. The characters in the story were little more than just cardboard cut-outs with very little characteristics, personality and depth. Which ultimately permeated a sense of shallowness to the movie.

The storyline was not really a plausible one either. I mean, a guy who marries a woman in jail that he doesn't even know so that she can get out, just doesn't really cut it. And to top things off, then things throughout the course of the story were so predictable that you saw it coming a mile away.

"And God Created Woman" had remained to stay unseen by me for 28 years, and I can't claim to have stumbled upon a hidden gem here. I have seen it now, and can honestly say that I am not going to return to watch it a second time around.

One thing I've always admired about 80's movies is that they all have that "Miami Vice look". The groundbreaking show featured hip clothing for the time as well as lots of music playing (hits or otherwise) when there was no dialogue. Today, we don't have that in films or T.V., but in the last great decade, it was everywhere. I've wondered if there ever was a true 90's movie?

And God Created Woman continues this trend. This film was made during the "hip" trend of the late 80's, when people gave up their feathered mullets and ugly tank-tops and started wearing the suits, hats, and skinny ties that were in style. The ladies would wear acid-wash jeans and what-not.

This story is a different version of the original Bardot film that made Roger Vadim a star. In this one, Rebecca De Mornay plays Robin Shea, a convict who wants to make it big as a rock 'n roll star. However, she is doing time for something and she has to wait for her parole. The story that unfolds is the kind of unbelievable pap that came out in the 50's but is set in the 80's. It's just a fairy tale. The story is too mundane to even explain, because you've seen it before.

I will say that the acting is mediocre at best. Only Vincent Spano, who plays a decent guy who ends up in cahoots with De Mornay delivers a good performance. Frank Langella sleepwalks his way through his role as a prospective candidate for the governship of New Mexico who also gets involved with De Mornay. De Mornay herself is very cute, but plays a rogue who nobody would approve of. Everyone else is just a cardboard extra. The soundtrack is decent (all movies came out with a soundtrack, it seemed). All in all, not good, but better than the crap coming out today, I guess.

I've been watching movies for over 50 years and I've been a member of IMDB for many years, but I've only written a handful of reviews because of IMDB's restrictions on review length. I don't suppose anyone will ever read this review as the movie is over 30 years old, but I've just watched it for the first time tonight so I'm going to write a review anyway.

The good: 1. It's Rebecca De Mornay.

2. It's directed by Roger Vadim who made the original movie of this title featuring the goddess Brigitte Bardot.

3. Did I mention that it stars Rebecca De Mornay?

The bad: 1. No one in this movie can act.

2. There is no discernible plot.

3. Everyone in the movie has a horrendous 80's haircut.

4. The point of the movie seems to be about Rebecca De Mornay being some sort of musical talent, but the music is awful.

To sum up; it's a terrible movie, but despite the mullet, it's still Rebecca De Mornay.

Roger Vadim's remake of his own film opens with a ridiculous jail break from what appears to be a soccer mum in a mullet and tracksuit and leads to a number of other embarrassing sequences that are at least saved with an early nude scene from Rebecca DeMornay. The moment is quickly ruined by a music sequence or however else Vadim over idealises his leading lady. It turns out this scene indicates DeMornay's desire to escape from prison and pursue her realistic dream of being a famous rock and roll star. The whole experience starts getting humorous when DeMornay is sent back to prison and arranges to marry a young carpenter to beat parole on the advice of Frank Langella, a candidate running for governor of New Mexico that ran into DeMornay during her failed escape from prison. Despite the obvious predictability of the love triangle that film will pursue the film is redeemed from plenty of comedic moments thanks to the strong performances from DeMornay and a whole cast of unknown actors. It turns out irresponsible screw ups are a great source of comedy. However, plenty of embarrassing moments continue to show up in the film including a cringe worthy disrobing of some random actress who rocked up to work in granny panties and a nauseating navel gazing Langella. It is pretty depressing seeing how easily the men in this film can be led just because someone is attractive regardless what a terrible human being said person is. I think the film is meant to be a farce, it's all very light hearted with some tacky New Romantic 80s pop thrown in.