Beloved starring Oprah (1998)

Well-acted, but, one of those books that just doesn't translate well to film. Despite it's serious subject matter, it's occasionally unintentionally funny (in one scene , Oprah pisses/breaks water like a race horse).

Jonathan Demme was so much better with comedy or comedy-drama or concert movies. I love Melvin & Howard, Citizens' Band, Something Wild, and Stop Making Sense.

It was rivaled only by Lucy/Mame in terms of a star’s guaranteed expectation of success only to be met with sneering derision and humiliation. Oprah did not make another movie for years afterward.

Is this the one where Oprah ate a large deep dish pizza in one sitting after it flopped?

Brilliant novel. Maybe in the hands of an American Bergman it could work as a film.

It was macaroni and cheese, R4.

I think the movie generally got good reviews. But audiences stayed away. I ought to watch it at some point.

A flop. Does she still talk to Toni Morrison?

Worst fucking movie I ever paid to watch.

I didn't like it, and I didn't understand it.

Not to mention that it was creepy and weird.

That's when I realized that Oprah was full of shit.

Oh that's bad!

Oprah's wave had begun to crest by the late 90s.

I think its failure was a big blow to Oprah's ego. By that point, she had her book club, and it seemed whenever she recommended a book, it instantly became a bestseller. If you were an author, you wanted Oprah to suggest your book. Anyway, in her hubris, she thought it would translate to movie ticket sales, as well, but alas most people stayed away. It only grossed $33 million on an $80 million budget.

^I meant $22 million.

People can smell someone getting too big for their britches. I think its also the reason “A Wrinkle in Time” bombed. Oprah, Reese and Mindy Kaling are wildly successful beyond what they’re truly worth. And that SJW publicist and pretend filmmakt Ava DuVernay bugs.

Now that you mention Melvin & Howard, the real-life Melvin Dummar just passed away a couple of days ago and it was in the news. In his final years he tried to sell real estate. I spoke with him one time when I was looking for a house. He never did get any money from the Hughes estate.

Toni Morrison's books, much like Kurt Vonnegut's and Thomas Pynchon's, doesn't translate that well to film because their expertmentations only work in book form. Jonathan Demme, while a talented director, simply wasn't the right choice for that type of material; he wasn't avant-garde enough to make Morrison cinematic. He simply filmed it as Stephen King ghost story/melodrama with slavery as the backdrop.

Did Melvin ever mention Lynda?

Oprah suffers from over exposure - she's everywhere, television, magazine covers, etc. Who wants to go pay to see her in a movie when she's free everywhere else?

Slave movies fatigue is real.

A couple of years before she made the movie, Oprah's talk show did an episode about the meat industry, and Oprah said, "I will never eat another hamburger again." (I wonder how long that lasted.) Some farmer's association publicly criticized Oprah and sued her. There were racial overtones to the scenario because all the farmers were white. Oprah won the court case.

She would later declare that during that trial, she WAS Sethe. And so that's why she cast herself in the lead role of the film. Conveniently, the hardest scenes were performed by another actress who played "Young Sethe". It was yet another actress, though, who won most of the accolades: Kimberly Elise. Oprah came off as wooden and as...well, Oprah. I don't think she's a great actress; her performance in The Color Purple was a fluke.

This was also around the time she declared her talk show too good for the topics featured by Ricki Lake and Jerry Springer...even though Oprah had delivered her fair share of the same types of topics in the preceding years. Then she launched all that "Live your best life" crap, and she was pimping her marathon trainer and weight loss guru Bob Greene. This is when she became insufferable.

[quote]This was also around the time she declared her talk show too good for the topics featured by Ricki Lake and Jerry Springer...even though Oprah had delivered her fair share of the same types of topics in the preceding years.

Oprah's talk show was considered so trashy that it was Peggy Bundy's favorite program. LOL

R16, No, I never got to that subject with Melvin; it was really just a business call. My impression was that he was never very bright. The information he gave me turned out to be inaccurate. But he tried to be a realtor all the way to the end of his life. I didn't want him to be my real estate agent. I did end up buying a house, not through him, but I live only 15 miles from the spot he claimed to have picked up Howard Hughes at. It's also near the Cottontail Ranch, a now-defunct brothel that Hughes was rumored to be a regular visitor of. (And the airstrip is still there.)

She must have drank a lot of water before this scene:

I liked the film quite a lot. Needless to say, the book was better. And Oprah can be a fine actor, which I thought she was in this as well as The Colour Purple. As usual with mega-celebrities, expectations made it hard for the film to be given fair critiques. Plus it was long, and most people can’t deal with that.

I audited a graduate level class when I was an undergrad. The entire class was on the novel Beloved. Taught by Toni Morrison. I campaigned hard to her to let me audit it. I am glad I did because she left for Princeton the next semester.

I didn't enjoy the movie but maybe should revisit it.

Did anyone here LIKE the movie?

Oh, hi r23. You must've snuck in behind me.

This was supposed to be Oprah's big moment as an actress; to show off her acting chops, but instead, it showed her limitations as an actress. She is a decent actress, but she's not great.

The other thing is this film came out in 1998. 1997 saw the Star Wars films released to a new generation of fans (and old fans went to see them again) and, of course, Titanic. Here in Toronto, new, bigger multiplexes emerged in light of Titanic. Beloved was plunked into these same multiplexes and audiences just weren't interested. It was too weird, too depressing. It was basically an art house film playing in multiplexes only because it had Oprah and Jonathan Demme's names attached.

Having said that, there is much to admire about this film. It reminds me a little of Heaven's Gate. It ultimately fails, but the film has its merits. The actress who played the younger version of Oprah's character was very good. In fact, the entire supporting cast was excellent and outshone Oprah. The cinematography was striking and evocative. And the score by Rachel Portman was beautiful and haunting and remains underrated. It should have been nominated for an Oscar.

And who knew Danny Glover had such a hot ass?

I liked the movie. It can't hold a candle to the novel, but, as others have posted, Morrison's hybrid of magical realism and novels of consciousness don't translate so well to a dramatic or visual medium--you need the words. Same with Virginia Woolf, James Joyce (though Huston made a fine film of The Dead) and William Faulkner (the only really good film adaptations of his novels are The Reivers, one of his least characteristic novels, and Intruder in the Dust, a pretty traditional murder mystery, albeit centered on race).

The movie was OK and well-acted. Thandie Newton and Kimberly Elise were fantastic and I'm glad their careers took off despite the film not doing well. It's a tough book to translate to film and it was a mistake to make it too literal a narrative. A director like Guillermo del Toro might have done a better job weaving in some of the fantastical elements of the story and bringing to life Morrison's writing style.

Another book of hers I'd love to see made into a film is Song of Solomon. Done right, that would be an amazing movie.

I'm surprised no one has filmed The Bluest Eye--it is, in general, a traditionally written narrative and would have been a great opportunity for Qwhatever Wallis right off of Beasts.

A self-hating Black child raped and impregnated by her father and who gives birth to a stillborn is pretty heavy even for the most ambitious filmmaker.

I agree the book is amazing and definitely worth reading but the movie is unintentionally hilarious at points. Like when beloved sound like she's mentally handicapped.

I remember watching her show the day after the movie came out. She walked out on stage, raised her arms like the pope about to grant absolution, and said "Hello my Beloveds". Little did she know it was going to tank.

R32, she's supposed to sound like a baby learning to talk. But one example of how a literal translation from the book was not done well.

I thought Thandie did a good job with a difficult role.

I hadn't heard that Melvin Dummar had died. Strange to find out on a thread about Beloved. Melvin & Howard is a great movie.

Was that actually Oprah peeing or was it a stunt pee er?

It was the ol’ cow herself

Thandie creeped the fuck out of me.

Kimberly Elise was magnificent in this film.

Agreed it’s a hard book to adapt to screen. I think that the steps they took to visually distinguish all the flashbacks and magic-realism scenes in the book from the actual sober, linear plot of the novel/movie ended up giving the whole film a Lifetime Orignal Movie aura. It’s likely the same reason there’s never been a major Joyce or Woolf or Garcia Marquez film adaptation.

I automatically think of the pee scene when this movie is mentioned.

When I went to see this movie with my mom at the cinema, the staff had misaligned the film, and as a result, the top edge of the reel was showing on the screen. So, when Oprah was peeing in the field, there were lots of cars on the highway in the background. Not just that scene, but it lots of outdoor scenes, asphalt streets could be seen in the upper background, with lots of cars.

R42 how do you mean? They kept in bloopers?

[quote]Jonathan Demme was so much better with comedy or comedy-drama or concert movies.

And yet his Oscar is for a film in the horror/drama genre.

R42 that seems odd.

One minute into the movie there is a scene of a dog with its eyeball hanging out of its head by a tendon.

Turned it off. Don't need that kind of thing in my head.

The feel good hit of the summer of 1997!

R40 While I agree with you in principle, I think Losey's Ulysses and Huston's The Dead are pretty major and seve Joyce well (though Ulysses is harder to film, if simply for the different style of each episode). Woolf is a harder nut to crack, as so little action happens--Clarissa buts flowers, the Ramsays finally get to the lighthouse (I love Woolf, btw). Orlando may have fared best because it is itself a pastiche. The author whose major works have fared least well, IMO, is Faulkner--even putting aside Franco's recent bad versions, the only earlier films based on his work that were reasonably good were The Reivers and Intruder in the Dust. It would be interesting to see someone tackle Absalom, Absalom--probably doomed to fail as a good adaptation, but could be interesting on its own terms.

Another unintentionally funny scene: Thandie Newton showing full bush while the church ladies are whooping and hollering.

Artsy Fartsy Oprah at her most pretentious.

R28, please recommend 3 novels, I will gladly read them.

Beloved is a tough read, worth it, but difficult. I don't know how anyone could read that novel and think, "this would be a great movie!" I just made the mistake of choosing "Paradise" by Toni Morrison as my book club selection. Another very difficult novel. Needless to say, my book club companions were very unhappy with me.

I enjoyed Paradise.

Paradise was so difficult for me to get into because of the non linear structure of the story/plot. I'm still not completely sure what the book was trying to accomplish. Compared to Beloved, Song of Solomon or the Bluest Eye it just didn't connect for me.

Why do all of Oprah's projects have to be fraught with angst and suffering? We get it. she's WOKE!!! Do something just for fun for a change.

Same for you Ange!in Jolie.

Really??? I loved Paradise. In fact, I think it’s one of the best I’ve ever read.

Still waiting on R28's recommendations.

Maybe I'm not as smart as I like to think, but for me Paradise was needlessly vague and pretentious. I mean, what was it even really about at the end?

Song of Solomon is really Morrison's masterwork. It's the book that proved The Bluest Eye wasn't a fluke. Most people say Beloved is her greatest novel, but I think Song of Solomon is more enjoyable to read. I'm still shocked no one in Hollywood has attempted to adapt that book. I guess because Beloved was a flop, Hollywood think that it's a lost cause to try and adapt other Morrison's books.

However, if there's any book of hers that is more adaptable to film than her other novels it's Song of Solomon.

For instance "they shot the white girl first..." But never reveal who the white girl was or why that was of significance. Paradise is just TM jerking herself off on how deep and thought provoking she finds herself. But if there is nothing of significance behind he admittingly beautiful prose, then what is the point? Just words for words sake.

Morrison is an overrated hack. Truth.