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| Directed by Antonio Banderas; Starring Lucas Black, Melanie Griffith, David Morse, Meat Loaf Aday, John Beasley, Richard Schiff, Cathy Moriarty, Rod Steiger, John Beasley, and Robert Wagner |
Crazy in Alabama is one of those crowd-pleasers that I cannot stand. The whole feel and look of the film is reminiscent of October Sky and Patch Adams, my two favorite films to pick on as crowd-pleasers. The film is exactly what the normal viewing audience might like and also what the normal film critic would dislike.
Admittedly it is not near as sappy as the other two I named, but Crazy in Alabama might have been if it had been just a little more convoluted. The struggle that the film goes through to work three interlocking stories with the same amount of importance is impossible with how director Banderas treats it. Trying to tell the story of (1) a woman’s struggle to become a famous actress after killing her husband, (2) a young man’s realization of life in the South without parents, and (3) the civil rights struggle in a small Alabama town is just too complicated. The three stories all are linked by Peejoe (Black), the nephew of the wannabe actress Lucille (Griffith), young man learning life from his Uncle Dove (Morse), and witness to local Sheriff Doggett’s (Aday) murder of a young black boy trying to get a chance to swim in the local pool.
Banderas was not a good choice to direct this film with his unknowing campy angles and slow-motion shots that leave the viewer appalled. I shall admit that if given a little more practice, Banderas might be able to make up an ability in the field, but one must remember that practice has not helped his acting ability lately.
The cast is hit and miss with Morse and Aday both giving very able performances (the best form Aday besides Fight Club), while Black and Griffith prove why I’ve never called them acting powerhouses (though I did give Griffith kudos a long time ago with Working Girl). In fact Black is easily one of the lesser child actors in films right now. Let’s face it, he’s no Mason Gamble. In a cameo, Stieger once again takes the chance to chew the scenery with the hammiest acting known to man (as much as I make fun of his acting, Steiger is still fun to watch; much like the pleasure of watching Charleton Heston overact).
The screenplay has its moments, mostly occurring in the scenes in which Lucille is on the run from the police, talking to the head of her dead husband, and finding a career in television. Still the film is nothing special. Maybe if they had made it a ninety minute film on just the Lucille story, I might have liked the film much more.
