Steve Cody Movies
- 2006
Filmmaker Paul Mazursky was having his annual eye checkup when his ophthalmologist told him about an annual religious celebration in the Ukrainian village of Uman, where twenty-five thousand Hassidic Jews from around the world come to observe Rosh Hashanah in the town that is the final resting place of the celebrated teacher and spiritual leader Rabbi Nachman (1772-1810). While raised in a Jewish household, Mazursky by his own word has little interest in religion; however, the more he heard about the yearly gathering, in which spiritual fellowship is accompanied by ecstatic singing, dancing and chanting, the more fascinated he became, and he decided to not only travel to Uman to witness the celebration, he brought along a small camera crew to capture it on film. Yippee: A Journey to Jewish Joy is a documentary -- Mazursky's first -- in which he offers a glimpse of the religious festival and the men who take part in it, as well as sharing stories of Rabbi Nachman's life and teachings, interviewing the non-Jewish residents of Uman as they observe the proceedings, and sharing his own thoughts as a "cultural" Jew. Yippee: A Journey to Jewish Joy received its North American debut at the 2007 Palm Springs International Film Festival. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
Paul Mazursky directed this comedy, which blends a broad satire of the film industry with a thoughtful tale of a middle-aged man looking back on his life's failures. Harry Stone (Danny Aiello) is a film director who desperately needs a hit -- so desperately that he gets talked into directing an inane sci-fi film about a group of farm kids (led by Ally Sheedy) who grow an enormous pickle that they turn into a spaceship, allowing them to visit the planet Cleveland (ruled by Little Richard and his right hand man, Griffin Dunne) where everyone eats nothing but meat. Convinced that the film will flop, Harry is in a state of panic as he returns to New York with his Parisian girlfriend Francoise (Clotilde Courau), a mere 20 years his junior, and visits his ex-wife Ellen (Dyan Cannon); his mother Yetta (Shelley Winters); and his son Gregory (Chris Penn). Meanwhile Harry flashes back on his childhood and the film he could have made of it, and pitches his dream film (a historical epic about the life of Montezuma) to studio executives, who instead want him to make a movie kids can relate to. The Pickle was filmed in 1991, but only received a token theatrical release two years later. Actually, the sci-fi story with Little Richard as the undisputed ruler of Cleveland looks like it might have been an ideal vehicle for Edward D. Wood Jr.. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Danny Aiello, Dyan Cannon, (more)
Unhappy with her job and her loser boyfriend, Melanie Griffith takes a secretarial post at a major Wall Street firm. Her boss is Sigourney Weaver, an outwardly affable yuppie whose grinning visage hides a wicked and larcenous propensity for exploiting the ideas of her employees. While Weaver is incapacitated, Griffith is compelled by circumstances to pose as her boss. Her inborn business acumen and common sense enable Griffith to rise to the top of New York's financial circles, and along the way she wins the love of executive (Harrison Ford). Things threaten to take a sorry turn when Weaver returns, but it is she who suffers from the consequences of her own past duplicity. Working Girl was Melanie Griffith's breakthrough film, proving than she was more than just the off-and-on "significant other" of Don Johnson. The film was later adapted into a brief TV series, starring a pre-Speed Sandra Bullock. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Melanie Griffith, Harrison Ford, (more)
