At Close Range 1986 film

Trailer

[quote] Any fans here?

Who lived to tell.

Sean Penn was at his hottest in this film.

I never saw it. But I loved Madge's song.

Theme song and video Live To Tell by Madonna

I saw it in college. The pretentious USC film majors laughed when Madonna's name came up. When the director came out to speak he asked why?

People said it was because her name in the credits was so much larger than the rest of the words.

According to Patrick Leonard, Madonna never intended to sing the song. He asked her to write lyrics and add to the melody in hopes that he could sell the song to a big name male artist who would want to sing it as she thought it was too low for her to sing.

It received great reviews, but was a box office failure. It has gained cult status, though.

It's worst Madonna song I've heard.

I liked The Falcon and the Snowman better.

R9 You’re in the minority there.

Both ACR and FALCON were terrific. Penn was really at the top of his game.

r8 Meanwhile, Sean Penn gained cunt status.

Who acted better in it: Sean Penn or Christopher Walken?

"Live to Tell" went to #1 on the Billboard Top 100, so why didn't it get an Oscar nomination? The 1986 Best Song nominees were:

- "Glory of Love" from THE KARATE KID PART II (went to #1)

- "Life in a Looking Glass" from THAT'S LIFE!

- "Mean Green Mother from Outer Space" from LITTLE SHOP OF HORRORS

- "Somewhere Out There" from AN AMERICAN TAIL (went to #2)

- "Take My Breath Away" from TOP GUN (went to #1)

TOP GUN was the winner.

Mary Stuart Masterson reminded me of Kristen Stewart.

R15 It was ridiculous it didn’t win the Oscar much less not even earn a nomination. GOL is hokey as fuck.

Patrick Leonard tells the story of how Warner fought Madonna hard on releasing LTT first, or at all. As he said, there was nothing like it on radio, and it was a long song, with stops in the middle. Her voice was very low, and it was a huge departure for her. Madonna said if they didn’t release it first she wouldn’t do any videos for TB singles. Pat said the execs at Warner were beyond angry at this power move and felt the song would flop hard. Madonna said it would be a hit. This cemented her control over her career.

For those who don’t know, long songs rarely went #1 or go top 5 because airplay was a huge factor in chart position then. The longer the song the less likely radio would play it much, or the less they could play it as often. Its sales got it over the less radio play and into #1.

It's a great song.

Pat talking about the crazy day LTT was written. It is a wild story. VERY Hollywood.

For those who said Pat wrote the song and not Madonna, he sets the record very straight. He only wrote a few bars of the score. She wrote all lyrics, and wrote part of the melody plus the entire bridge. He asked her to write lyrics. She wrote it for a male singer.

I wonder why the movie bombed. Great reviews, great popular song, great story. Everyone I know who has seen it really likes it. Was it too dark to release in spring of 1986? Would a fall/winter release have been better?

Mary Masterson was box office poison.

1986. was a dark year: The Hitcher; Aliens; 9 1/2 Weeks; River's Edge; Blue Velvet; Witchboard; Extremities...

The 80s with the synth music. I actually forgot how bad and prevalent it was in movies and shows. How could we stand it?

[quote] Was it too dark to release in spring of 1986? Would a fall/winter release have been better?

I think the movie is dark and the father-son discord is a hard watch. Walker was genuinely terrifying.

I’ve written this before, but the scene with an injured Sean Penn confronting Christopher Walken at his home is a master class in acting from Walken. Fear, bravado, nuance, resignation all in one scene. Brilliant.

I vaguely remember this movie as being at the height of the Madonna/Penn affair/murder-suicide pact. God it's hard to believe now that those two used to be considered the cool kids.

How many different versions are there of this movie?

Uncut versions, etc?

[quote]The 80s with the synth music. I actually forgot how bad and prevalent it was in movies and shows. How could we stand it?

Last year, I watched EDUCATING RITA for the first time and the synth score was godawful!

The film was fine, but the synth music was like a below-average Giorgio Moroder score, so if you were just listening to the soundtrack, it's got its charms.

However, it is SO out-of-place and wrong for the plot and images of the movie.

The music is unbelievably jarring and not at all matching the tone and mood of EDUCATING RITA.

R30 I love Educating Rita (I always wanted to turn it into a musical called “Educating Chita”) and played Frank in a production at the college where I taught. I think it is one of Caine’s best performances and it was my first glimpse of the wonderful Julie Walter’s. All that said, I agree that the score for the soundtrack is awful, not only because of the artificial sound of the synth, but because it repeated that melodramatic and derivative theme about every ten minutes, seemingly because the director (and editor) did not know how to build and end a scene. It began to feel like the soap opera music Carol Burnett parodied in “As the Stomach Turns.” The handful of secondary characters were also not well cast nor well directed. It would have worked better as a filmed play with Caine and Walters growing with and on each other over the 90 or so minutes.

It was Duvall’s and MacLaine’s year (and in Caine’s case, he was probably hurt by the fact that all four nominees other than Duvall were British). Ironically, “Tender Mercies” may be one of Duvall’s least interesting performances. Courtney and Finney probably canceled each other out and Conti, while wonderful, was in one of those bittersweet comedies that probably looks easier than it is. All the women were strong—you know it’s a touch year when Streep’s Silkwood, fine on its own terms, feels less compelling than the other four.

If you like synth scores please revisit Against All Odds. Lots of zhooms and wooshes.

The synth score felt so wrong in the 1920s period piece "Chariots of Fire."

I meant sounded so wrong.

I thought the Chariots Of Fire music was a bit naff at the time in my childhood, but now I think it makes the movie and elevates it to a kind of timelessness. It makes it sort of avant-garde.