[Mb-hair] My wife's first time watching the Hair movie

[Barbara Siomos]

I have NOT finished reading your email as yet Dauber but had to tell you I lived on 88th St. on the upper west side for about  10 years or so and out of my living room window on 89th St. is/was a stable that was very very busy and boarded horses for rental as well as horses for private use.

Guess you have never been to Central Park when the folks are riding their horses along the bridal paths as they were in the movie.

Get back to you later.

peace,
barbara

-----Original Message-----
From: Sean Courtney
Sent: Sat, 8 Oct 2005 22:44:37 -0700
To: mb-hair at islandlists.com
Subject: [Mb-hair] My wife's first time watching the Hair movie

First of all...a warning to anybody on this list who hasn't seen the 1979
movie...this account of my Saturday evening might have a spoiler or two...

Okay...so I'm taking Monday off to share a three-day weekend with my wife,
who as a teacher has Columbus Day off...and Lisa suggested watching a DVD to
pass part of the evening together. I said cool, but I don't have anything
I'm dying to watch right now, so you pick. She went through our DVD
collection and said "Hmm...you think I should see Hair?" She had gone with
Tioga Joe and me to see a pretty....blah...production here in Jersey a few
years ago...

Now...Lisa is not a Hair fan, really, but does appreciate it and its
importance and does want to see a truly good production of one. Before
seeing the movie tonight, she did see that one production and read the 1969 book
(and therefore knows the basic plot of the stage show),
went to the reunion with me, and knows a lot about '60s pop culture. Having
said that, here are her comments about the movie, all of which she asked me
to share with you folks....most of this she couldn't even say without
breaking into laughter -- and I don't mean that in a good way, either! :)

- First, the choreography. During "Aquarius" she said it was "way too
ballet," "too West Side Story," and "fruity", but she always thought the choreography was supposed to be a bit more free-form.

- Poor setting up of the plot...During the first several scenes, you have no
idea who most of the main characters are, their relationship to each other,
or even what time period it's supposed to be -- you can only assume the late
1960s because it's well-known that it's a period piece [when I typed that, I
accidentally typed "peace" -- not bad, eh? :)  ] for that time...

- "You're supposed to LIKE the hippies, right?" she said. Lisa felt that the
main characters were pretty hostile to each other -- Woof and Hud at each
other during the "Colored Spade" scene, Hud and his fiance, Berger and
Claude toward the end of the movie, etc. And the fact that you're not given
a good intro to the characters just adds to that separation between the
viewer and the rapport with the characters.

 - It's established that Shelia lives in Short Hills. Why would a girl from Short Hills, NJ be, in full riding gear, riding a horse in Central Park?
Especially when 1) there aren't any facilities in Manhattan for residents to
keep horses? (or are there?) and 2) when there are plenty of places in and
around Short Hills for that kind of thing?

Other comments from the better half:

- "The first 20 minutes of the movie is more about horses than hippies!"

- "Claude seemed to lose his Oklahoma accent over the course of the film."

- "It was just bad. It was just really bad."

- "I could have lived without seeing Beverly D'Angelo's tits several times."

- "Hair is not supposed to leave you with a bleah feeling, right?"

- "Claude had this look on his face like he had to take a dump."

- "It was pretty obvious that a lot of the men were wearing wigs."

- "Berger looked like a Muppet."

- "Berger was also extremely annoying. When he was trying to con the MP, I
wanted the MP to take out a gun and shoot him! I laughed at the ending when
Berger's being marched off with the troops because he screwed himself over."

As you can see, Lisa didn't like the movie. At all. Period. And you know
what? I loved it when I first saw it as a 15-year-old in 1990, but every
time I saw it again, especially after I first saw a stage production in
1996, it got worse and worse. And I keep noticing things that just don't
make sense:
- how they get arrested in Short Hills and run across the street from jail
into Central Park...
- The army scene when that Washington rally somehow interferes with the PA
system in Nevada....what the hell sense does that make?!
- So Berger and company hang out with Claude for, what, 40 hours or so? So
they barely know the guy, yet months after he leaves for the army they drive
across the country, with Berger sacrificing his hair, just to see him for a
couple of hours???

Strange....very strange...

--
dauber at banana-and-louie.org
 * ICQ: 28677921 * YIM: dau_ber * AIM: ddaauubbeerr

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