Welcome to Los Angeles

A gauzy, perfume advertisement-styled depiction of Los Angeles as a carousel of lonely, emotionally needy people has a great cast of actors, yet is so self-conscious about its theme that it leaves everyone wilting in a sterile vacuum. Debuting director Alan Rudolph, who also penned the screenplay, is so narcissistic over these hapless characters that self-absorption is just a starting point--does he think these people are reflective of modern human lives? Keith Carradine plays a songwriter whom women want but can't get (he's mired in alienation); Geraldine Chaplin is an unloved housewife who roams the streets; Lauren Hutton (at her most attractive) is a photographer specializing in pictures of empty rooms, and so on. Rudolph and producer Robert Altman, trying--one assumes--for a West Coast "Nashville", take the edge off everything, so that the movie is a smoothly banal experience, passive and bland. Despite a minute or two of honest emotional despair, the film quickly becomes a pity party for the apathetic. *1/2 from ****

You can't help but compare it to the other big L.A. Statement Movies--Altman's SHORT CUTS, and P.T. Anderson's MAGNOLIA. I like Rudolph's way better than either of those: it's gentler, humbler, more observant, truer. Limiting himself to a dozen or so L.A. habitues, Rudolph starts with one funny, correct move: no movie people. The dances of disconnection, attempted connection, failed connection, and--stunning!--connection accomplished are as tender and as finely, thinly observed as Rudolph has ever pulled off. So many beautiful moments here: the best comes when Keith Carradine, as a dupe of his sleepy-stud character from NASHVILLE, breaks up a romance to go on a healing mission with a half-crazy housewife (Geraldine Chaplin). When his philandering with her rescues her marriage during a tense phone call in his apartment, Carradine's face spreads with gladness and relief. The rightness and the unexpectedness of the moment is fantastic. Even more than the goofy, enjoyably romantic CHOOSE ME, this is the one where Rudolph got it all right. And no other movie captures L.A.'s peculiar loneliness like this one: he doesn't hype anything or play to the tourist mentality--something that could not always be said for his mentor, and the movie's producer, Robert Altman.

The minute the singer uttered "City of one night stands", I should have stopped watching this but I soldiered on. I was hoping for a storyline with Laurel Canyon scene in it since it was a "musical" of that period and about LA. Nope. Welcome To LA has a great cast that is totally wasted. I'm pretty sure the cast completely trusted Alan Rudolph on this mess and signed their respective contracts and have to suck it up.

Sissy Spacek, Sally Kellerman and Geraldine Chaplin were were good all things considered. Is the whole movie a flashback? I waited and waited for a narrative but the writer hid it with the Easter eggs. Scenes like a minute of Geraldine walking on an alley emoting, then cut to an unrelated scene. Cut and paste is a bad way. Rudolph trying to be a 1970s Alain Resnais, he is not by a long shot.

Being an Angeleno who loves movies about LA, I say avoid this movie at all costs.

Ps I looked up the singer Richard Baskin on Discogs and I am happy to tell everyone that his contribution to the soundtrack was the last of his recording career.

Despite a fabulous cast led by Alan Rudolph regular Keith Carradine, this vacant, flat movie with virtually no plot is easy to classify as a lesser "Nashville" set on the West Coast. I mean, what are the major happenings, Denver Pyle makes Harvey Keitel a partner? Uh . . . that was about it, there's a party.

So, why the heck do I like this so much? I've seen it maybe 30 times, even though it's unavailable on any media, at the moment, at least, and every time I watch it all the way through to the last shot of Carridine looking sideways at the camera. I saw it when it first came out, and it stayed in my mind for decades until it started to show up on the movie channels. I can't explain it, the music is nice (particularly "One Night Stands" and "Welcome to L.A."), but the conversation isn't particularly clever (compare "Choose Me" for example). I can't really defend the film, how could I? There's no message, no plot, no outstanding performances to champion . . . I don't know, I just enjoy watching it. Beats me.

Twenty-three years after seeing this movie for the first time, my initial impressions still remain. What really sinks the movie is the TRULY AWFUL vocal delivery of Richard Baskin on the soundtrack. Had to go for the mute button every time. The only reason I even checked it out again was for Sissy, one of our best actresses. She's good, but her next Altman film 3 Women is more provocative. Welcome to L.A. -- Nashville it ain't!