Did you ever see the 1980 version of The Jazz Singer?

** YOUR take on it

Far, we've been traveling far

Without a home

But not without a star.

Free

Only want to be free

We huddle close

to hang onto a dream.

On the boats and on the planes

They're coming to America.

Never looking back again

They're coming to America.

Home

to a new and shining place

Make our bed and we'll say our grace.

Freedom's light burning warm.

Everywhere around the world

They're coming to America.

Never makes me less than verklempt.

It's my "Mame."

I never miss a Laurence Olivier musical.

I HAFF no SON!!!

Back when I was trying to be str8, I had a girlfriend whom I planned to marry. She was Jewish and I was Catholic. Both sets of parents were dead set against our mixed marriage, but when her father's mother and my father's mother met and compared "How I got to America" stories, the religious objections, well, they didn't melt away, exactly, but they were a lot less intense.

Of course, I wanted to suck cock, but that's another, later story, at the end of which we didn't get married.

I like being a Euromutt.

Love on the rocks, ain't no surprise.

Pour me a drink, and I'll tell you some lies.

They should have just re-released the original.

Love of the cocks was no surprise.

When I was a kid, I saw it at the theater with my parents and my grandmother. My grandmother loved it, my mother loved the music. My father and I laughed at it, especially any scene with Laurence Olivier.

R11 = Homer Simpson

Thankfully, it started and ended Neil Diamond's acting career.

It's on You Tube!

Lucie Arnaz was robbed of a Supporting Actress Oscar nomination for her role. She did receive a Golden Globe nod however.

Love of the Lox

Between this thread and the one on "They're Playing Our Song," it's become Lucie Arnaz Day on DL.

r15

Lucille Ball speaks from the grave

[quote]She did receive a Golden Globe nod however.

HA HA

That's like ordering a Coca Cola and getting RC Cola

Roger Ebert from the Chicago Sun-Times, awarding it one star out of four, said that the remake "has so many things wrong with it that a review threatens to become a list"

Janet Maslin of The New York Times who stated: "Mr. Diamond, looking glum and seldom making eye contact with anyone, isn't enough of a focus for the outmoded story."

The only critic to give a positive review of the film was Dave Kehr of the Chicago Reader. He wrote that "Richard Fleischer's direction is appropriately close-in and small, and Diamond himself, while no actor, proves to be a commandingly intense, brooding presence."

It was the Hazel of its day.

Hazel?

Second Lucie deserving an Oscar nom.. She was the best thing in the movie.

SUCKED

I may watch this for laugh tonight.

I love the scene where he plays Rachel Dolezal's father while singing 'You Baby" and starts a race riot.

Was Olivier first choice for his role? Isn't Kirk Douglas Jewish?

R12, thanks for the laugh! It really was a bomb, and you couldn't help but laugh at Olivier. He was so corny and ridiculous. I had seen him in the Langella Dracula the year before(also with my father, since it was rated R), and I thought he was pretty good as Van Helsing, though he was no Peter Cushing. This was the "I'm just going to hold my nose and cash the paycheck" phase of his career.

contains the only blackface performance of Neil Diamond's career (so far)

Underrated gem.

Hard to believe, but Lucie Arnaz made an even worse movie before this one: "Billy Jack Goes to Washington," which barely got a theatrical release.

I've never seen it. Does it have blackface and Mammy?

When I was 11 years old, I won tickets for opening night in the Jewish part of town. It was quite a spectacle! I was pretty sheltered and didn’t know any Jewish people. I enjoyed the movie. I think my parents took me. Loved the music. When I saw that later as an adult I thought it was just OK.

I still love the song “Love on the Rocks”.

"That ain't no brother! That's a white boy! ". I liked the soundtrack though and Neil looked pretty good with a beard.

Never seen it. I think "Love on the Rocks" is one of Neil's best tunes, though.

How I wish Barbra, who sang with Neil in their high school choir, had played Molly, and they had managed to work "You Don't Bring Me Flowers" into the emotional plot.

I hate responding to these 2015 threads, but here goes anyway: I recently finished director Richard Fleischer’s memoir entitled Just Tell Me when to Cry, and he discussed at some length Olivier’s terrible performance in this film; apparently Olivier was so self-centered and obstinate that no one had the nerve to tell him his performance was stinking up the place. The director concluded that Olivier was only in it for the money at this point in his career.

I'll admit this is one of those shitty movies that I really love.

It wasn't that bad.

I know Diamond gets criticized for looking glum, but the movie improves the more glum he gets. There's a scene where he's touring honky tonks and he sees a young couple in love and you'd think he was about to open a vein right there in the parking lot.

If I recall, people quit after the director insisted on the blackface scene that ends up causing a race riot. Think it was a whole scandal that made the tabloids.

Which is worse, the '70s remake of The Jazz Singer or the '70s remake of A Star is Born?

"Love Me Some Cocks"

[quote]Which is worse, the '70s remake of The Jazz Singer or the '70s remake of A Star is Born?

"A Star Is Born" has more camp value, so it's more entertaining and therefore better.

I guess nobody even remembers my version.

I have a copy of that on my coffee table.

My mother and her bridge club adored that movie. I remember them seeing it in the theater multiple times.

They loved the soundtrack so much, they asked the woman who taught them aerobics at the community center to choreograph a routine to the ENTIRE record. Watching eight middle aged women jazzercise to "On the Robert E. Lee" was a highlight of my young gay life.

I do have the movie to thank for our house getting the first VCR anyone in our town had seen because my mom needed to watch it regularly. I don't want to think about why.

OF COURSE it's ridiculous. But believe me, I've seen worse.

I was 19 when it came out, and thought it was DREADFUL. Terrible, intolerable drek. My mother told me she was gong to walk out but fell asleep instead. Girls I knew made fun of it by acting scenes out for comedic effect. A song or two was okay, I didn't hate them.

"Boom Boom Boom! I want some more Boom Boom Boom!"

I was 10 when it came out, and my step mother had the album and played it non-stop, especially that "America" song, to which my nelly gayling self choreographed an entire ice skating routine.

"You ain't seen nothin' yet!"

Neil Diamond singing in BLACK FACE. And everybody thinks he's black - NOT!

Someone needs to do a cover of "Love On The Rocks".

[quote] my mom needed to watch it regularly. I don't want to think about why.

My partner and I have realized that both our mothers had the hots for Neil Diamond.

Doesn't some punk rocker actually DO a cover of Love on the Rocks in the movie?

I know the movie is terrible but I always thought Lucie Arnaz seemed like someone I'd love to hang around with.

Oh geez, I liked both the Streisand version of A Star is Born and this. However, they were before my time and I watched them years later. I thought the music was great and that superseded the storylines. I didn't realize both were bombs when they came out.

We loved it! No line to get into the picture, and plenty of seat room around us.

[quote]Oh geez, I liked both the Streisand version of A Star is Born and this. However, they were before my time and I watched them years later. I thought the music was great and that superseded the storylines. I didn't realize both were bombs when they came out.

Though critically a "bomb", ASIB made $80 million bucks in 1976 money. That's $360 million in 2020 money. So, it sure wasn't a financial bomb.

The Jazz Singer apparently only made money because they'd sold the TV rights to the edited version of it before it was even released in theaters.

R55 Who would do a good cover of “Love on the Rocks”? Maybe Robin Thicke?

R53, I'm pretty sure the quote is, "you ain't heard nothin' yet...". you know, because it was the first talking picture…?

Jennifer Nettles did an amazing "Hello Again" at the Kennedy Center Honors back in 2011.