A Mudança

This comedy about a Manhattan couple's logistically hobbled move from one apartment to another was based on a now-obscure 1968 comic novel that probably would seem very datedly hip now. Like most such, did not translate well to the screen. So what we get is yet another attempt at something cool and offbeat that the mainstream Hollywood talent turns into a badly off-key sitcom. Even the novel aspect of Elliott Gould's protagonist being a dogwalker is stupidly handled for dumb yoks--if he's a professional, why does he act as if he has no idea how to control his canine charges?

Stuart Rosenberg, a TV veteran turned wildly uneven movie director (who was briefly mistaken for an important one when "Cool Hand Luke" hit big), was clearly the wrong person for this idiosyncratic material. it's hard to imagine who would have been the right person--maybe the Robert Downey of "Putney Swope"? But certainly few could have handled the potentially capable cast more awkwardly, or made the actress' frequent toplessness seem less "liberated" and more gratuitously labored. (You can practically hear the studio technicians' not-so-whispered comments about that broad's rack and this one's can.) The dream sequences and fantasies are puerile, and coarsely integrated; the "wild mod party" sequence is possibly the worst of that type ever, which is really saying something.

This is one of those movies that is mostly interesting in illustrating the haplessness of the period, in which so many adventurous and memorable movies were made, albeit amidst so many more little disasters like this one that flopped at the time and have been justifiably forgotten since. The industry was floundering, with the old formulas no longer working and no idea yet why some stabs at the "new" would be DOA and others click. Elliott Gould became the poster child for that waywardness, as the career heat he generated with "MASH" dissipated in a string of flops like this one. He works so hard here to pull the mess together, but he's not given a real character to play, or even a consistent tone. We don't know why his hero's marriage to Paula Prentiss is in semi-trouble at the start, or why it's apparently better again at the end; nor do we understand why on a whim he sleeps with Genevieve Waite as (what else but) a "kooky" English model met in the park. I guess it's all meant to be, you know, whimsical and free-spirited, but those are not things Rosenberg can manage. Instead, "Move" strains even to function as something more like a basic sex farce.

This movie is like a bad, limply semi-"counterculture" cross between Neil Simon-ish "Oy life in Manhattan is such a headache" comedies and the wilder satire of something like "Little Murders"--another Gould-starring flop from the next year, though an infinitely better film. It satisfies my curiosity to have finally seen "Move," but yeah, it's pretty much as bad as its reputation suggests.

After so many years I have at last watched "Move" again, and my first impression that it is a weird funny comedy has not changed. Released on DVD (although not in its original wide-screen format) in 2015, the package includes its trailer and it is quite obvious that in 1970 20th Century Fox did not know how to promote it. Far from the 1960s romantic comedy formula, Fox did not come up with an original campaign to handle the eccentricity and strangeness of many of the scenes and images the plot describes. "Move" is an absurdist comedy that makes irreverent jokes on social stratification, authorities and married life. Though a crazy product of its times (from the company that brought that same year "Myra Breckinridge" and "Beyond the Valley of the Dolls") it is not a harsh confrontational story, but a gentle tale, treating its points in a light and comic way. Based on a tight script that never loses its cohesion, the plot follows New York writer Hiram Jaffe (Elliott Gould) through situations as he tries to move from one apartment to another, an action that also can be interpreted as his attempt at moving up a level, pressured by his wife Dolly (Paula Prentiss). He has to face his creative crisis, his sex life and his paranoia. He is about to leave behind his old quarter and most probably his usual activities, as walking out other people's dogs to make ends meet, and he is definitely afraid of "moving", imagining (or not) all kinds of difficulties and obstacles. The production had an inspired casting, pairing Gould and Prentiss, an ideal couple for the 1970s that surely would have developed into a fine act in other comedies: there's good chemistry between them, they handle the comedy aspects very well, and Prentiss even adds a touch of humor in her single dramatic moment, that fits the whole concept of absurdity by novelist-scriptwriter Joel Lieber. If I have any complaint (apart from Prentiss' excessive make-up) it is Stuart Rosenberg's direction, who maybe was not the best choice to film a screenplay that easily changes from slapstick to verbal comedy, from Brechtian estrangement to a chase on horseback. Although I sometimes felt a too heavy handling of a few scenes (as Prentiss' dramatic monologue), Rosenberg was a professional and did a good job.

Harried dogwalker in New York City can't seem to get out of his small apartment: the movers keep putting him off and the office receptionist is a flibbertigibbet. Unfunny comedy starring Elliott Gould does have an amusingly absurdist introduction (the city traffic moves around Gould backwards while he walks forwards), which director Stuart Rosenberg then fritters away. Working from a gross, would-be existential screenplay by Stanley Hart and Joel Lieber (via Lieber's novel), Rosenberg tries goosing the action with arty shots (such as filming through lattice work) and fantasy snippets, thus affording Gould the opportunity to "get loose". What Gould really needed was a stronger script and tighter direction. The blooming star made a number of films back-to-back in the early 1970s--most of them pop-crack quickies like "Move"--oversaturating the film market with his anarchic "personality" and causing him to fall out of favor with US audiences. *1/2 from ****

Move is a treat. At the time of its release Elliot Gould was just reaching a his first cycle of over exposure and most people missed this movie completely. It is in the same tradition of self conscious movies as "You're a Big Boy Now" and others that came out during the late 60s. The difference is this movie is intelligently written and directed and it gets better as it progresses as opposed to falling apart and resorting to slapstick like most zany movies do at the three quarters mark. Gould perfectly captures the o.c.d. craziness of his character and Paula Prentiss as usual is terrific. The only flaw in this film is I would have loved to see at least one more scene with her. All the supporting characters are scarily great. I do not want to give the whole story away. See it!

I read someone once say that "films like _Move_ destroyed Gould's career in 1 and a half years." Maybe, maybe not, but _Move_ is really not a bad film at all: a bit counter-culture, but not obnoxiously so.

Gould is an intellectual New Yorker whose fortunes have led him to walk dogs in central park, and to author pornographic literature to make a living--a self-described "scatological existence." Prentiss (in a straight role) is his long-suffering wife, who watches as he suffers a mental breakdown. This film is of interest to Prentiss fans as it was her first big role in 5 years of eschewing Hollywood. Genevive Waite is the ditzy model Gould meets in the park.

Perhaps the film's greatest drawback (to us men, at least), is Gould's penchant for dropping his trousers to reveal an inordinately hirsute physique.

When all is said, its a film with its own charms, and the ending sweetly closes the story.