La statue en or massif

This expose of a Hollywood heel plays like a bush-league attempt at the baroque language of SWEET SMELL OF SUCCESS, but man, does it work. Stephen Boyd is the absurdly mannered amoral punk who'd screw over his mother and steal her shoes to make it to the top. Among those with his shoeprints on their neck are Milton Berle (horny, melancholy, used-up agent), Jill St. John (tragic "roundheels broad"), Tony Bennett (as Hymie Kelly, the tragic Jewish-Irish second banana) and Elke Sommer (Swedish zaftig-bomb with a conscience). As directed by Russell Rouse, THE OSCAR has the feel of Sam Fuller doing overbright TV. The movie is way beyond "campy" or "good-bad;" nearly every scene is a diamond-plated jaw-dropper.

There is no other way to concieve of this film getting made other than being the by-product of extraterrestrials intercepting tv signals of DYNASTY, MELROSE PLACE and the like and recreating them as a realistic depiction of the way Earthlings behave. This gets my vote as the most unintentionally fall-on-your-ass hilarious movie ever made; you simply can't write comedy this good! The dialogue must have turned John Waters chartreuse with envy, and the performance by Steven Boyd is akin to what if one of the THUNDERBIRDS marionettes had been cast in WHO'S AFRAID OF VIRGINIA WOOLFE?. His body language is quite like some poor puppet being randomly jerked around while the puppeteer tries to shake off LSD-conjured spiders. And the incredibly strange dialogue from a knife-wielding strip joint owner:(attempting to be intimidating, with a crazy gleam in his eye and tossing his switchblade between both of his hands) "Pretty? Pretty?" No one in the history of civilization has ever talked like any of the characters in this film. If you are fortunate enough to have this unjustly out-of-print film at your local video store, not only should you rent it immediately, but you should invite over all of your friends and let them stare at this mess in slack-jawed amazement. A solid 10 on the laughs scale! And you will pee your pants at Tony Bennet's narration/ performance!!! RENT IT RIGHT NOW, FOR GOD'S SAKE!

... and a film that would never win an Oscar nor do I think its makers imagined that it would.

In the same vein as "Valley of the Dolls", it's a camp classic about Hollywood. It paints Hollywood as full of vicious amoral people, but the worst of them is Frankie Fane (Stephen Boyd). The film starts at the Academy Awards where Frankie Fane is expecting to win the Best Actor Oscar, which he needs to get back on top. The film then traces his rise in Hollywood, a rise that is full of him stepping on other people. There are tons of Hollywood stereotypes and situations in the process.

But along the way he meets an actor who has aged out of leading parts and has suddenly been labeled box office poison and has to take a job as head waiter where his old Hollywood pals eat because he has also ran through all of his money. Frankie is terrified of becoming that guy, and yet he oddly does everything he can to become just that guy. He uses people and discards them, and he also spends like there is no tomorrow. And then tomorrow comes. Complications ensue.

It's too bad Boyd isn't better remembered today for roles other than that of Messala in Ben Hur, because he really was a very good actor. He takes a part that could have been quite two dimensional and breathes some life into it so that his character is a very believable and hissable villain.

It starts with some really bad chunks of dialogue - and it gets worse! However, it is weirdly watchable and by the end I was quite enjoying it. A larger collection of ott performances you probably won't find. Some review I read called it 'The Bad and the Beautiful crossed with Harold Robbins'. Approach it as a kind of weird comedy and you'll have fun. It doesn't really deserve to be out-of-print - it's an interesting cast (set of misfires), and has a kind of odd historical value ...

I also love this movie. I first saw it about 12-15 years ago on a short-lived series on TNT called "Bad movies we love" or something like that. For many years I traditionally watched it right before the Oscar broadcast. The "Airplane" of bad movies, the hilarious dialogue just keeps coming. I taped it from a pay TV source many years ago, but would also buy a pristine VHS or DVD copy. Jill St. John's finest hour. Struggling young actor,impatient for stardom, steps on everyone he meets on his way to an Oscar nomination. Terrible overacting by nearly everyone involved, and ridiculous,riotous dialogue make this a classic guilty pleasure. Made at a time when Hollywood was not yet consciously making "bad" movies. Great fun.