....you come up smelling like fleas". One of the lines actually spoken (by Tony Bennett)in "The Oscar". Words can not describe this film. It is so so bad...it is GREAT! Stephen Boyd's performance is way way way over the top like nothing you have ever seen before. He is like a rabid dog hopped up on speed. The other performers are terrible too! Especially Tony Bennett who looks like he is reading his lines off cue cards. But it is the script that will have you on the floor laughing. There are so many memorably bad lines in this that I recommend you have a whole pad of paper and a pen ready to jot them all down. Rush don't walk to your nearest video store and rent this! One of the best (if not THE best) of the camp crazed melodramas of the 1960's. 10/10 as ultra grade A+ high camp. Regular still high 6/10 for its sheer audacity and 60's chic look at the bowels of Hollywood. Norma Desmond Mr. Boyd is ready for his close up.
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irishcoffee63015 August 2003
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Theo Robertson29 August 2004If the name Harlan Ellison doesn`t mean anything to you let me point out that he is one of the most respected science fiction authors of the 20th century . Ellison also wrote a couple of episodes of the original OUTER LIMITS series in the early 60s which James Cameron seemed to have borrowed for THE TERMINATOR . In fact Cameron borrowed so heavily that Ellison won a succesful court battle for plagerism and latter prints of THE TERMINATOR acknowledge the works of Harlan Ellison . Seeing as Ellison co wrote this screenplay you wonder if Harold Robbins didn`t think about doing something similar at one point
!!!! SPOILERS !!!!
This screenplay has Harold Robbins ugly signature written all over it . It`s a melodramatic pot boiler along the lines of THE CARPET BAGGERS set in the movie world . The story opens at the Oscars where Frankie Fane is rubbing his hands in anticipation of getting his hands on the academy award for best actor . The story then flashes back to Frankie`s younger days and for the rest of the movie we`re shown he`s an amoral manipulative S.O.B from the mean streets . In a rather contrived manner we`re shown how he got into movies ( His knife skills served him well ) then once he got his foot in the door he walked all over everybody , he exploited everybody , he used everybody to make it to the top of the movie world . Duh isn`t that how everyone makes it Hollywood ? I think Tom Hanks and a few other people may be genuinely nice human beings but can you say that about most players and movers in Hollywood ? So it seems rather rich Frankie Fane should be condemned for exploiting people
And there`s a confusing morality message to all this . All the way through the movie we`re wanting to see Frankie fall on his face which happens in the end since the best actor Oscar goes to Frank Sinatra , but think about it , Frankie is an amoral shark , he`s no scruples and he`basically a ruthless thug but he`s become a major movie star , he has lots and lots of money and there`s no certainty that he will never win an Oscar in the future . Is this actually the fate you would want to see happen to a movie villain ? If having a movie career as a film star with loads of cash in the bank and an Oscar nomination is failure I`d sure like to how success is defined ? I suppose it`s open to conjecture if Mr Sinatra invited Frankie to the after show party where he was never seen again but I`d better not comment on that in case I wake up with a horse`s head in my bed
THE OSCAR isn`t all bad despite it being a bad movie . It`s one of those movies that has a watchable quality mainly down to its schlock value . If you like Harold Robbins novels you`ll like this though perhaps fans of Harlan Ellison`s work should stick with THE TERMINATOR -
bkoganbing16 June 2008If anyone follows my reviews one will note that I always use the expression hero/heel when talking about Tyrone Power. He could be a full blooded hero or he was a hero/heel, a likable sort of guy, but one who was ruthless in getting what he wanted. You need someone of Power's ability and charm to play such a part. And sad to say that was something Stephen Boyd just doesn't bring to The Oscar.
Even when one is an anti-hero there has to be certain qualities brought out that make you root for the guy. Two minutes into watching The Oscar and I wanted to punch out Stephen Boyd. This guy is all heel with no charm and uses people like toilet paper.
Joseph E. Levine assembled quite a cast to support Boyd and I don't think I've ever seen so much talent squandered on such a mediocre picture. Try counting the number of Oscar winners in it. Just Edith Head's Oscars and she plays herself in the film must bring the total to over 20. She got a nomination here for costume design, one of two The Oscar got, the second was for Art&Set design.
Tony Bennett is the hero's best friend who is similarly used and abused doesn't give a half bad performance and this was to be a breakthrough for him as a dramatic actor like Bing Crosby or Frank Sinatra. I also liked Milton Berle as his agent.
Some of the women in Boyd's life in this film are Eleanor Parker, Elke Sommer, and Jill St. John. The one I liked best was Jean Hale as a star who the up and coming Boyd is sent on a publicity date with. She's a female version of him so there is one great moment where she gets dumped on literally.
One woman who was in Stephen Boyd's life and who always tried to promote his career in her column appears her as herself in one of her last appearances. Rumor has it that Boyd made old Hedda Hopper's life particularly memorable in her golden years.
In the old My Favorite Martian series there was an episode where Ray Walston uses a special light bulb in the room and it gives off a benevolence bulb. You just become inexplicably likable to all around. Bill Bixby sees this as a great way to score with women and he uses it. But Walston tells him that on earthlings it gives you a hate me glow and the two spend the rest of the episode trying to find the antidote.
That's what Boyd projected here, a two hour hate me glow. And in fact this review is dedicated to an attorney I knew back in Brooklyn, a man who had ambitions for a great political career, but had a hate me glow that made Boyd look like Albert Schweitzer. No names of course, but Ronald J. D'Angelo this film is for you.
The Oscar is a campy all star look at an ambitious actor and if you can stand the hate me glow that Boyd projects, you'll like looking at the stars. -
EL BUNCHO14 December 2001There is no other way to concieve of this film getting made other than being the by-product of extraterrestrials intercepting tv signals of DYNASTY, MELROSE PLACE and the like and recreating them as a realistic depiction of the way Earthlings behave. This gets my vote as the most unintentionally fall-on-your-ass hilarious movie ever made; you simply can't write comedy this good! The dialogue must have turned John Waters chartreuse with envy, and the performance by Steven Boyd is akin to what if one of the THUNDERBIRDS marionettes had been cast in WHO'S AFRAID OF VIRGINIA WOOLFE?. His body language is quite like some poor puppet being randomly jerked around while the puppeteer tries to shake off LSD-conjured spiders. And the incredibly strange dialogue from a knife-wielding strip joint owner:(attempting to be intimidating, with a crazy gleam in his eye and tossing his switchblade between both of his hands) "Pretty? Pretty?" No one in the history of civilization has ever talked like any of the characters in this film. If you are fortunate enough to have this unjustly out-of-print film at your local video store, not only should you rent it immediately, but you should invite over all of your friends and let them stare at this mess in slack-jawed amazement. A solid 10 on the laughs scale! And you will pee your pants at Tony Bennet's narration/ performance!!! RENT IT RIGHT NOW, FOR GOD'S SAKE!
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DeanNYC24 February 2013Perhaps the most notable thing about "The Oscar," aside from the fact that the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences probably wishes it didn't allow the filmmakers to use its award as a part of their turkey, is that the opening credits of the film give away two key elements that really shouldn't be revealed, one of which laughably gives away the ending!
This really goes to the point that nobody in this film seemed to know or care about the process of making it and were more enamored with the concept of setting their film on Oscar Night than in having the story make any sense, and were more about getting names to list, hoping to increase the Box Office receipts. Bad move.
I was hoping for an over the top, completely ridiculous, scenery chewing melodrama, and I was rather disappointed. Granted, Stephen Boyd definitely does have some ludicrous dialog and plays bigger than he should for what he's doing, but it really isn't "fun" to watch. Even more to the point, there's no one in the film who can challenge him.
Milton Berle comes the closest as his agent. But Berle doesn't get to crack wise, as we would expect him to do with a knucklehead client like this one. He plays it straight up. What was the point of that? And Elke Sommer is such a conflicted character, it's difficult to understand what she brought to the film, aside from the obvious eye candy intended.
The other oddity is in seeing Tony Bennett play his one and only acting role. Clearly, he wasn't ready for this sort of challenge and I can't blame him for begging off film for the safety of his music career after this disaster.
Wasted were Oscar Winner Ernest Borgnine who plays some two bit private eye and Edie Adams who actually seems the most realistic character in the entire film. Also, Edith Head, the multiple Oscar winning Costume Designer, who was seen on screen in three different scenes, and uttered half a word.
But I'm seriously still reeling over the credit spoilers. If you do watch this film (and I don't recommend you do because it definitely isn't good and it unfortunately isn't bad enough to be amusing) don't read the opening credits! -
I also love this movie. I first saw it about 12-15 years ago on a short-lived series on TNT called "Bad movies we love" or something like that. For many years I traditionally watched it right before the Oscar broadcast. The "Airplane" of bad movies, the hilarious dialogue just keeps coming. I taped it from a pay TV source many years ago, but would also buy a pristine VHS or DVD copy. Jill St. John's finest hour. Struggling young actor,impatient for stardom, steps on everyone he meets on his way to an Oscar nomination. Terrible overacting by nearly everyone involved, and ridiculous,riotous dialogue make this a classic guilty pleasure. Made at a time when Hollywood was not yet consciously making "bad" movies. Great fun.
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funkyfry25 April 2014This is a really bizarre movie. Although festooned with the official Academy Awards logo and crammed full of fancy cars and houses, the film looks and feels cheap. Although it lists on its credits the brilliant and acclaimed sci-fi writer Harlan Ellison (who, around this time, won an Emmy for his Star Trek script) and gifted vet Russell Rouse (whose "D.O.A." was an actual Oscar surprise in 1950, the film boasts of nothing more than a poverty of imagination. Although it features all kinds of celebrities playing themselves, such as Edith Head, Hedda Hopper, and Merle Oberon, and although it has some of the best character actors playing supporting roles, including Milton Berle, Peter Lawford, Eleanor Parker, Jack Soo, Walter Brennan, I mean the list goes on and on -- people who should not be in this movie, frankly -- its emotional center is a character played by a non-actor, Tony Bennett, and leading man Stephen Boyd plays it like a 2:00 soap opera. I mean, they could not have invested more in the support of this movie, and less in the leads.
Much respect to Mr. Bennett -- he's a wonderful singer and a great celebrity, but he does not look good in a movie. He looks kind of impish, his character is given nothing to do but complain, and the character is built on a contradiction -- he's a sensitive man, as we see in his early scenes with the stripper played by Jill St. John (another example of the movie's creativity) and yet he hangs out with this bizarre sociopath played by Boyd. Boyd's character is just incredible. The best scene in the movie is when he lurks behind a cabinet listening while an obese co-worker makes a pass at his girl (Elke Sommer, delivering a typically phonetic performance) and disses him, then comes around the corner and punches the guy in the nuts, whereupon the man makes a comical face, covers his mouth, and runs into the bathroom! And believe me, or don't, but this scene was actually NOT written as comedy! The movie is highly watchable, despite being such a disaster.... well, partly because it's a disaster, but also because the support is really excellent. Maybe sensing the "Oscar" in the air, both Berle and Parker deliver the goods, and the scene with Peter Lawford is touched with semi-autobiographical sorrow. Every two or three minutes if you keep your eyes open you'll see somebody interesting, at least to fans of Hollywood classics. But the drama is so over the top, with Boyd's performance coming off almost like a villain from the Batman TV show, I mean it's impossible to take the movie seriously for five minutes. I'm surprised Ellison allowed them to leave his name in the titles. Of all the films that have ripped him off and not given him credit, it's funny to think that his name is actually on this steaming pile.
By the way, at least I learned something from the movie -- I'd never seen a picture of Edith Head, much less footage of her, and I instantly realized that she is the basis for the character in "The Incredibles", the little woman who designs the superhero costumes. Costume designer, yeah.....
If you're in doubt.... see it. It's terrible, but in a uniquely 1960s American way. -
AlsExGal28 June 2023... and a film that would never win an Oscar nor do I think its makers imagined that it would.
In the same vein as "Valley of the Dolls", it's a camp classic about Hollywood. It paints Hollywood as full of vicious amoral people, but the worst of them is Frankie Fane (Stephen Boyd). The film starts at the Academy Awards where Frankie Fane is expecting to win the Best Actor Oscar, which he needs to get back on top. The film then traces his rise in Hollywood, a rise that is full of him stepping on other people. There are tons of Hollywood stereotypes and situations in the process.
But along the way he meets an actor who has aged out of leading parts and has suddenly been labeled box office poison and has to take a job as head waiter where his old Hollywood pals eat because he has also ran through all of his money. Frankie is terrified of becoming that guy, and yet he oddly does everything he can to become just that guy. He uses people and discards them, and he also spends like there is no tomorrow. And then tomorrow comes. Complications ensue.
It's too bad Boyd isn't better remembered today for roles other than that of Messala in Ben Hur, because he really was a very good actor. He takes a part that could have been quite two dimensional and breathes some life into it so that his character is a very believable and hissable villain. -
moonspinner5521 July 2002Atrocious film from producer Joseph E. Levine, here ripping the lid off the Hollywood can but getting nothing out of it except hot air. Ruthless, snarling Stephen Boyd scratches his way up from seamy strip joints (as manager for the non-blushing Jill St. John) to the top of the H-wood heap as the world's most constipated actor. Laughable backstage melodrama is high camp, but how can one laugh without feeling sorry for all the embarrassed personalities on the screen--none more so than Tony Bennett, looking like a basset hound in a tuxedo. The fifth-rate screenplay is full of now-legendary fruit-loop lines, boiling over with 'significance', while the surroundings (once considered plush) now look tatty. Elke Sommer (as a sketch artist for Edith Head!) is the one cast member who doesn't bulldoze her way through the picture. Otherwise, it ain't for the squeamish! *1/2 from ****
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photoe20 January 2016I must be blind, but I don't find this film that camp. I actually find it pretty brilliant, a tragedy based entirely around hubris of the worst kind, which uses Hollywood as the fount of a kind of hubris only it can create, separate from government or military or business hubris, but merely the ego of people who sell their identities as actors.
The performance from Stephen Boyd is strong and explosively riveting, but odd, and it's odd because his character Frankie Fain is written in a two-dimensional contradictory way with a lot of violence, but this is an unstable man at his core, a man with no other talent or education, given whatever tickles his fancy. It just doesn't seem possible that this rotten a human could actually be a success with enough charm to be a movie star. However, what's great at the same time about his outrageous rudeness is that it offers great opportunities for people to be hurt, horrified, and in some sick cases, attracted to his ugly decisiveness. It also offers a rare chance for people who aren't intimidated by Fain to openly mock and denigrate him to his face. Fain's character starts out so rude he almost ruins the free break he's getting from a talent scout, but then his rudeness comes across on film as unapologetic manliness, and this is a commodity Hollywood clearly sells, regardless of the man behind the mask. This character was clearly written by someone who was disgusted by some major actor, and is a ruthless direct attack on the hypocrisy of Hollywood stardom.
People mock Tony Bennett's performance here, and he's a bit stiff, but he plays his uncharismatic but devoted friend/servant well. The narration is boilerplate, but functional. Bennett brings the drama numerous times when he has to, especially at the end, and totally saves the film by providing the major sympathetic character, and his pipes sound great yelling instead of singing. Elke Sommer, is gorgeous as a golden foil to Fain's awful character, who also eventually loses faith in Fain at the end. Of course, they had to write that she had trepidation at first, and he manages to gather himself together long enough to woo and marry her, after which point, he treats her so poorly, it's a miracle she stays around at all. However, this is one of the stretchy parts of the plot. Jack Soo plays an excellent supporting role as Fain's live-in butler.
Once the film seems to be achieving a sort of plateau, it jumps up the script with a critical piece of good fortune Fain ruins by a corrupt escalation by Fain by a stealth manipulation of the Hollywood press that makes him even more loathsome. Only an insider could have written this plot twist. The twist is explored in all its horrors, as Fain is openly mocked by his formerly docile manager MIlton Berle, who really twists the knife as he dumps a broke Fain.
Sure, it's camp at times, but the dialog is incredible. Yes, there are some moments of overacting other than just Stephen Boyd, but he really nails a kind of shell of a man who becomes too famous and successful for his own good, someone who becomes famous not for being an artist with talent, but just a man who can be engaging just by being an unpleasant villain on film, as Berle says - playing himself.
Whatever it's faults, I think this film is a unique look into Hollywood, albeit a bit unrealistic in the creation of the Fain character, but completely realistic in how it portrays an empty suit of an actor who bounces around for brief success in a Hollywood system that uses and discards him, just as he does them.
At the end, you pity him even though he's an awful person, (which everyone explains in great gruesome detail) but you actually grow to hate some of the people who claimed to help him, but are really predators themselves. It's a real comment on the general emptiness of Hollywood, but also a very personal warning to anyone who lets their ambition ruin their lives.
The Oscar made me wonder how bitter the screenwriter was who penned it, but also made me really respect the way they pieced it all together, including their biting, rapid but precise dialogue.
I just don't think is really all that camp. The look may be camp because it was shot in 1966, but it looks great. The look and the colors just add to the entertainment value. It is not a 5 out of 10 star film. Def at least a 7. -
eyecandyforu30 December 2008Sometimes Hollywood thought of itself in such high regard that taking a serious look in the mirror was impossible. The Oscar is probably the weirdest example of this. Stephen Boyd stars as Frankie Fane, a walking, talking Ken doll with the charm to match. Boyd has always been one of my favorite actors in the looks department, he had a great face and usually gave good performances. Here it's like someone else borrowed his body for the production. The story tells of how a star got to the point of an Oscar nomination, his rise to fame and all the people he walked over to get there. This film would make a great double feature with Valley of the Dolls, they both take themselves way too seriously for the level of writing and direction and the result is bizarre and unintentionally hilarious. Chock full of stars of the time, great production, costumes, sets, it's all there in an epic extravaganza of campy melodrama. Very colorful and big yet it has the performance quality of an episode of The Beverly Hillbillies. The script is beyond cliché and everyone tries to eat the scenery to grab their moment. Everyone that is except Tony Bennet who would have served the film better by being a singer in a nightclub scene. Elke Sommer does strange things with her eyes to emphasize emotion and many of the fine actors must have cried themselves to sleep the night of the premier, or thrown tantrums, aghast at what they had been part of. Must be seen to be believed. At one point Bennet calls Boyd to tell him of the nomination, "You and Burton and Lancaster..." Righhhhhht.
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I just saw this film and I had to go out to buy it. Why? it's so bad its good!
This film was supposed to show all the nasty side of how an Oscar nomination goes to the head of its nominee and what he would do to win -- and in a way it does.
But the acting is so over the top...you can't help but laugh. The hair styles are big, the performances are big..come on, it's just one of those fun little 60's 'soap opera' films that you'd never watch for serious sake, but mindless fun with you and your friends. (Remember the soap opera 'General Hospital' in the early, early 60's with the obviously over the top acting, silly drama situations, the real organ playing, etc.? Well this is even funnier!)
It grabs ya, but you cannot help but laugh, laugh laugh, it's SO over the top. If anyone wants to know what makes a "campy" film, don't rent "Mommie Dearest", rent this one. There isn't any way you could hate this film, you'd be laughing too hard. I'd watch it on rainy days, or if I'm feeling blue, or I just want to get together with a bunch of friends and just point out just how over the top this is.
This is a 10+ on the campy scale, a 5 regular. Go out and rent it, just to have a ball. It's fab-u-lous! -
sol-kay26 April 2010***SPOILERS*** One of the greatest bad movies of all times "The Oscar" has it all ham acting laughable dialogue ridicules plots and most of all those in it thinking that their involved with one of the greatest and thought provoking films ever to be released since "Birth of a Nation" back in 1915.
If there ever was a movie about the behind the scenes activities before and during the Academy Award over-hyped Oscar Night this is it! With at least a dozen real life Oscar winners in it's cast who know full well what it takes, besides their acting, to win one. Actor Frankie Fane, Stephen Boyd, has gone from the gutter to the glittering heights of Hollywood's elite as we first see him on Oscar Night waiting to win the coveted prize that he's been scheming for all these years. It's then that we get first hand the lowdown, and I mean low, to Frankie's life from his good friend Hymie Kelly, Tony Bennett, who together with Frankie's estrange wife the gorgeous blond beauty Kay Bergdahl, Elke Summers, are in the audience.
Starting out as a two bit bar and strip-joint hustler Frankie worked himself up to the top by screwing everyone, especially a bevy of beautiful women, who helped him on his climb on the ladder to success. Not caring for no one but #1, himself, Frankie made a slew of enemies on his way to the top whom he knew had their knives sharpened to do him him when he finally starts to fall from grace in the eyes of the movie moguls in Tinsel Town. It was that fanatical passion to stay on top that lead Frankie to the events he was to face as the film "The Oscar" came to its shocking but very predictable conclusion.
With Frankie nominated for best actor for his role as a lowlife creep and shyster, which he is in real life, in the film "Breakthrough" he still had doubts that he won't be able to win the Oscar against the likes of fine and seasoned actors like Richard Burton and Burt Lancaster that he resorted to type, in the swine that he is, to fix the vote in his favor! Frankie gets private eye for the stars Barney Yale, Earnest Borgnine, to plant a story about him Hymie and his late girlfriend Laurel Scott, Jill St. John, being busted five years ago in the south on morals charges: pimping and prostitution. Frankie knew that the members of the Academy of Motion Pictures, who vote on who's to win the Oscar, would flock to him knowing that one of the other nominees, for best actor, leaked the story in order to destroy Frankie's chances of winning! Of all the lowdown sleazy and outrageous things that Frankie pulled during the movie this was by far he sleaziest!
***SPOILERS*** It's when a greedy Barney starts feeling that Frankie didn't pay him enough, a measly $2,000.00, for securing him the Oscar that he blackmails Frankie into giving him $15,000.00 or else he'll reveal not who paid him to release this shocking information about his past but who did't! Frankie in a fit of hysteria tries to get his good friend and now full time gofer Hymie Kelly to do in Barney in order to keep him from talking!
Hymie, or Tony Bennett, in what has to be one of the most explosive performances since the taxi scene between Marlon Brando and Rod Steiger in "On the Waterfront" comes to his senses in finding out what a creep and back-stabbing lout his good friend Frankie Fane really is! It's then that Frankie gets a dose of his own medicine in not only getting creamed, from behind, by Hymie but finding the reason his former girlfriend Laurel died and also his part leading to her untimely death! But by far the best, or worst, was yet to come for Frankie when later at the Academy Awards when the best actor was announced the roof or sky fell on top of his head with him finally getting all that he had coming to him which he so rightfully deserved!
P.S Despite his eye-popping performance as Hymie Kelly in the film Tony Bennett never was in another movie in an acting, but only in a singing, part! You go figure it out! -
diamondgroup23 August 2005I believe that this movie was a career killer for Stephen Boyd. He made a brief resurgence in Fantastic Voyage, but the die was cast after this epic.If you look at his career after making this film, you will definitely notice a downward spiral. In a few years he was doing TV pilots and well known turkeys like Slaves and Kill. In Hannie Caulder, he didn't even get a credit.The movie, itself, is so poorly written, cast and acted that it almost looks intentional. You keep thinking to yourself, this was a joke, right! Tony Bennett takes the acting honors as "Hymie" Kelly(they couldn't decide on an ethnic group, so they made him bi-ethnic), the heel's good buddy and stooge. The producers probably thought -- "Now here we have a popular Italian singer, with some real acting potential, This will do for him what From Here To Eternity did for Sinatra." All I remember is Bennett flailing his hands around and saying, "If you lie down with pigs, you wake up smelling like garbage." A nifty line, if I do say so, and quite original. Needless to say, Bennett went back to his vocals. The part that always makes me laugh is the ending, where the Oscar nominees competing with Frankie are announced. There is something with Richard Burton and Frank Sinatra. Then the last nominee is Burt Lancaster in the "Spanish Armada". Burt Lancaster in the "Spanish Armada". Sure sounds like an Oscar candidate to me.
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Poseidon-313 November 2002This obscure, sublimely over-heated film is a second cousin to "Valley of the Dolls" in terms of pure, unadulterated Hollywood camp. The film is like a massive wad of cotton candy for those who enjoy a two hour trip to movie hell. Opening at the ceremony for the title statuettes, we see that Boyd is the front-runner for Best Actor. But first, the audience must step back in time to discover how he got there. It falls to Bennett to narrate the with the most dry delivery of horrendous socko '60's scripting. Looking like a Dean Martin wax figure that's been left in the sun for two hours, he is a stumpy, squatty disaster in this film. Billed as "Introducing Tony Bennett", he has zero charisma, receives corpse-lighting, doesn't sing even once and forever after (thankfully) played only himself in films. At any rate, as the film flashes back, lean, mean Boyd (in a performance that ensured he'd never see another "Ben-Hur") is instantaneously irredeemable and agonizing as a big mouthed roamer who's joined by his stripper girlfriend (St. John) and a passive buddy (Bennett.) In these early scenes, St. John actually manages to come off as sexy despite a crazed tigress costume and the tacky surroundings. Soon, though, she's chewing one end of the scenery while Boyd chews the other. They meet in the middle where hapless Bennett is sitting like a bump on a log. Soon Boyd is trying to make it as an actor with the assistance of love-starved talent scout Parker (in a typically dedicated performance) and agent Berle (solid, also, in a non-comedic role...at least it is meant to be non-comedic!) Boyd's eternal bad attitude and horrible personality continue to inflict pain on all those around him and the viewing audience. In the film, he has a magnetic presence that draws everyone to him and causes them to embarrass themselves repeatedly. This charm is invisible to the film's viewers. One of his victims is the lovely Sommer, who looks stunning in an array of Head gowns and intricate hairstyles. His rise to the top of his profession is spoiled by his own ego and eventually he gets tripped up. He even gets one of those hilarious dreams with smoke swirling and actors dully repeating their lines. The movie is jam-packed with bits by stars who should have known better, some of them even Oscar-winners themselves (Crawford, Brennan, Borgnine.) Other cameos of people playing themselves lend a faux verisimilitude to the proceedings (Hopper, shortly before her death, Head, Hope, Oberon, even James Bacon appears at a press conference looking pouty because Archerd got all the lines.) There's a great little part for Hale as a snotty, demanding starlet and it's one time when Boyd comes off well. Lawford has a bit as a fallen star who works in a restaurant. Sadly, his own career would soon hit the skids as well. Adams adds a bit of verve as Borgnine's showy wife. She has one unfortunate scene, though, in which her behind is spread right in front of the camera. The film is a feast of kicky '60's production design, fun clothing and enormous hairdo's. There are a few clever touches in the film. At least twice, scenes involving different people are duplicated to show the parallels. The film has one of the all-time hilarious "surprise" resolutions...one last cackle before the credits roll. A MUST for any connoisseur of bad films!
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edwardholub25 June 2005There are good and bad movies in every genre. The genre of the film making business contains Sunset Boulevard, The Player, Contempt. It also contains Won Ton Ton, The Wild Party and The Oscar. One of the things wrong with the Oscar is that it's attempt to portray low down sleaze with kid gloves. If the story is down and dirty, FILM it down and dirty. Where Hymie Kelly should have yelled BULLS**T, they have him yell, "BIRDSEED." I would love to remake this movie and make it totally repulsive and revolting. Make it a Hollywood story by way of Sin City. Take no prisoners. Change the names that would normally distract from the horrible elements that would push the story forward. Where do I sign?
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If any of the reviews on IMDb say that "The Oscar" is a good film, you can safely assume that they either wrote the screenplay for this film or they are insane (or both). However, despite being a very bad film, I can see folks liking it, as it IS entertaining in a sleazy, over-the-top and awful sort of way--much like the film "Valley of the Dolls".
Frankie (Stephen Boyd) is a vulgar, self-absorbed jerk. At the beginning of the film, he's basically pimping out his girlfriend (Jill St. John) instead of working. But when he sees someone who can help him move up the food chain, he quickly dumps her for the new girl...and pretty much this pattern is repeated throughout the movie. Frankie hurts people, uses people and charms the right people in order to become the Oscar-nominated jerk.
During the course of this film, you hear the worst dialog ever recorded on celluloid. Oddly, however, despite being nothing but god-awful dialog and over-acting, the film has been given the full Hollywood treatment. It has a HUGE cast of stars and guest stars and obviously producing trash took a LOT of money! The likes of Eleanor Parker, Joseph Cotten, Milton Berle, Bob Hope and MANY others make appearances in the movie...presumably because the checks from the studio cleared! They obviously did NOT make the movie because of its artistic merits or quality!! Perhaps the producers were holding family members hostage to get them to appear in this dreck-fest. -
Director Russell Rouse's over-the-top opus follows the exploits of Frankie Fane (Stephen Boyd, with all the animation of a mechanical bear) as a Hollywood heel hellbent on becoming a star and, as the title implies, there's a "melodramatic" climax at the Academy Awards. It's irresistible trash with an all-star cast -producer Joseph E. Levine's very own "Hollywood Babylon"- and epitomizes the often incorrectly applied expression, "so bad it's good". Naturally, this over-ripe farrago is right up there with the schlockmeister's HARLOW, THE CARPETBAGGERS and WHERE LOVE HAS GONE, twinkling eternally in Bad Movie Heaven, Super-Productions, all.
What a glorious mess- Stephen Boyd is bombastic and way too intense throughout but no one got away unscathed, especially the ladies, all in various states of undress. They shot Eleanor Parker through Vaseline (she had the same lighting Joan Crawford did with shadows hiding her neck) and they should have shot Jill St. John for the appalling histrionics. I never realized what an awful actress Elke Sommer was, either, and the only thing that really bugged me about this howler was Elke's bangs. I'm sure I must have at some point in my life but I can't recall ever seeing that woman's forehead (she probably had the f-word tattooed on it or something). I enjoyed seeing Merle Oberon, Frank Sinatra, Bob Hope, Hedda Hopper, and Edith Head all-too-briefly play themselves and I also spotted James Bacon and Army Archerd (I think, it's been so long) in a crowd of reporters.
I didn't pick up on this when I first saw THE Oscar on TV back in the '70s but the obnoxious, self-deluded movie queen played by a platinum blonde Jean Hale was named "Cheryl Barker", a none-too-subtle swipe at Carroll Baker who was having it out with Paramount producer Joseph E. Levine at the time. There was obviously a lot of bad blood there; Hale's "C. Barker" was made up to look exactly like C. Baker in HARLOW and Jean did a mean (and mean-spirited) imitation of Carroll at a premiere. This "CB" was as over-bearing as Frankie Fane who humiliated her by shouting, "She's NOTHING!" before dumping a salad all over her in front of Hedda Hopper on their studio-arranged "date". Jean Hale/Cheryl Barker is also listed dead last in the closing credits even though her part was larger than a number of others listed above her. At this point, Carroll Baker was at the bottom of the heap in Hollywood; an industry joke, she high-tailed it to Europe where she'd make films for the next fifteen years before returning "home" (in triumph, by the way) for STAR 80. For many reasons -none of which have anything to do with film as an art form- THE Oscar is not to be missed! -
info-627-66443912 June 2014Embassy Pictures and Joseph E.Levine brought us "The Oscar" in 1966 which was the film version of a novel by Richard Sale, an insider look at a fictional Oscar race for Best Actor. Even the movie version which was watered down and smartly leaving out of a lot of the machinations of the erratic plot of the novel and concentrated on its good qualities like the "Frankie Fane" lead character expertly portrayed by Stephen Boyd. Some say Boyd after appearing in "The Oscar" never had a commendable role in a Hollywood film again. He is cast to a tee and perhaps too much so. Elke Sommer plays the part of "Kay" who becomes his wife has the role tailored for her attributes. She was never better than in "The Prize" with Paul Newman. Jill St.John, who gets the acting honors here has never been better than she is in this film. Rather dubiously, she receives that honor. On hand are Eleanor Parker, Joseph Cotton, Ernest Borgnine, Milton Berle as "Cappy" the agent, Edie Adams is also a well realized casting coup for her character and Peter Lawford is on hand and sympathetic. The picture is very well known for featuring and introducing Tony Bennett in a sizable co-starring role as "Hymie Kelly," Fane's PR man and friend from his past who has what for any other actor I would imagine a chance to really act. Unfortunately, he is not up to the challenge. The script is loaded with great dialogue and in hindsight becomes festooned with quotes ripe for the picking. The screenplay is credited to Harlan Ellison, director Russell Rouse and producer Clarence Greene. The picture is studded with celebrities making cameos and playing themselves in parts like Frank Sinatra, Nancy Sinatra, Merle Oberon, Bob Hope. In hindsight, "The Oscar" scores higher than when it was made as everything about it proved to be "second rate" except the sheer splendor of the wallow it provides. Director Russell Rouse has his moments like at the end when the camera backs away from Fane sitting twisted in his chair at the Academy auditorium reduced finally to see what happens to his vulgarity while nearly everyone around him is giving the winner a standing ovation. Color.
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JasparLamarCrabb4 August 2007So bad it's good. The mere fact that Stephen Boyd is cast as a potential Oscar winner should clue you in to how outré this movie is going to be. As an actor who claws his way not only to the top, but to the Academy Awards, Boyd outdoes all of his previously bad performances. There are times when it's difficult to believe he's not playing this thing for laughs. It's the classic story of the ego-maniacal lunatic hitting the big time --- Of course he becomes the apple of various women's eyes (Elke Sommer, Jill St. John, Eleanor Parker) and of course he has his toady (Tony Bennett!) who you know is going to tire of his abuse, but it's great fun to watch nonetheless. NOBODY in the oddball cast escapes unscathed. Boyd is expected to be bad, but real talents like Joseph Cotten, Edie Adams and Ernest Borgnine manage to get caught in the mire. Cotten looks ghoulish as a cranky studio head and the appearances of Adams and Borgnine in a wacky Mexican set episode are real head scratchers. Milton Berle, in one of his occasional forays into straight acting, plays an agent, but stripped of anything funny to do, he's just dull. Broderick Crawford plays a sadistic sheriff in one of the film's early scenes, proving that he'd do just about any role for a paycheck. For some reason, the film is top heavy with character actors who'd actually WON Oscars in the past (along with Crawford and Borgnine, Ed Begley and Walter Brennan also have roles).
It's difficult to believe that the likes of Bob Hope, Frank Sinatra and Merle Oberon (playing themselves) agreed to make cameos...one has to wonder if the Academy threaten to strip them of their membership if they didn't appear in this claptrap. Written, unbelievably, by Harlan Ellison! -
I used to watch this film every time it appeared on TV. The long list of heavy hitters in the cast doesn't make this a quality film, but sometimes a film can be so bad that it's GREAT! Frankie Fane is desperate to make it. He treats women terribly; he will use and abuse anyone to get what he wants. The dialogue is hideously bad, and I laughed out loud at this film far more than I do at comedies which are billed as "hilarious." This movie IS hilarious! It's a cult classic and a definite "must see." It is chock full of Hollywood clichés and it's a real head-scratcher that the makers of this film actually took it seriously.
My favorite part of this film is at the very end. Frankie is at the Academy Awards. The winner is announced. He hears the name "Frank" and stands up. Yes, it was all worth it! This is his shining moment of glory and the world is his! He is still basking in the glow when the name "Frank" is followed by the name "Sinatra." To my recollection, it takes Frankie Fane a moment to realize that "Old Blue Eyes" is the recipient and not himself. He slinks back into his car, almost shrivels before your eyes. It's absurdly ridiculous, and again, memorable and funny even if that wasn't the original intent.
See it if you can! The ending doesn't ruin. It's a true piece of work: interpret that as you will. -
tomreynolds20045 April 2004Apparently antihero Frank Fain, stiffly played by Steven Boyd, never heard the saying "Be nice to the people you meet on the way up..." because he abuses everyone he meets and makes every mistake in the book including believing his own press clippings. The trouble is that Steven Boyd doesn't give us a hint of the charisma that made Fain even a potential candidate for the Oscar to begin with. Tony Bennett's portrayal of agent Hymie Kelly nearly sinks the movie like a torpedo. Fortunately, the rest of the supporting cast understands kitsch and do what they can to have fun while moving things along at an otherwise bearable pace. Milton Berle, Ernest Borgnine, and Edie Adams are especially marvelous as hard-boiled bottom-dwellers. Elke Sommer actually does a halfway decent job as Fain's disillusioned main squeeze. The final sequences are camp classics.
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abcpc12 February 2005When oh WHEN, will whom ever owns the rights to this classic HOOT, ever release it on video (VHS/DVD)? I'd buy it in a NANU SECOND! It's got to be the funniest "Drama" ever! The fact that NOBODY involved in this movie noticed, at the time it was being filmed, how DREADFULLY BAD it was turning out is ASTOUNDING! I haven't even seen it on broadcast, cable or satellite TV lately. I wish I'd have taped it when it was running. Other MUST release films are, "Crack in the World", "The Great Bank Robbery" (Zero Mostel). Still waiting.....P.S. Maybe IMDb can have a page set up just for movie fans to LIST films that we think should be available to buy, then maybe studios could check it out and see how popular those films are and hasten their release!
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kirbylee70-599-5261799 March 2020There was a time when the Oscars was the be all to end all of entertainment awards shows. It was a festive night with tons of fans gathered along the red carpet to get a glimpse of stars, of spotlights igniting the skies and of the best of the best receiving high praise from fellow craftsmen. Somewhere along the way that got lost. Instead of the best of the best money got involved and advertising took over in an effort to milk out every dollar possible from a film once it won an award. Then politics dropped in and suddenly films were praised more for the stands they took on issues than on the quality of the film itself. It's gotten to the point that if you asked an average person to name 3 of the best film winners from the last 10 years the odds are they couldn't do it.
The thing is that this sort of maneuvering has been going on for years but never as blatantly as it is now. But there were some who tried to get the word out. Back in 1966 the movie THE OSCAR was released. It was based on the novel by Richard Sale, featured a star studded cast and had several impressive names to its credit for writing the film (Harlan Ellison, Clarence Greene, Russell Rouse and Richard Sale). Released as a drama the film was panned by critics and faded into obscurity. Until now.
Kino Lorber has just released the film on blu-ray and for fans of unintended campy films this is your chance to add it to your collection. Since its release that's the category that the film has been tagged with by so many. One watch and you'll understand why with a ton of over the top performances and cringe worthy dialogue. But in spite of that you may find it more entertaining than the actual Oscars these days.
The story revolves around Frankie Fane (Stephen Boyd), a scummy grafter who starts the film off promoting his girlfriend Laurel (Jill St. John) as a stripper in dive bars. But his mouth rubs people the wrong way and he ends up losing her as many jobs as he gets. Along with the pair is his best friend Hymie (Tony Bennett), a sidekick that is there for him throughout the movie. Frankie lives off of Laurel and her earnings until she finally kicks him out.
Not one to want hard labor, Frankie gets work in a sweat shop where he meets and woos fashion designer Kay Bergdahl (Elke Sommer). He goes with her to a play rehearsal and speaks openly about how terrible the actors are. When asked if he could do better, he takes the stage and shows them how to play the part, one he is familiar with since it mimics his own early life. Talent scout Sophie Cantaro (Eleanor Parker) is there to see it all and it isn't long before Frankie dumps Kay and hooks up with Sophie. She brings him out to Hollywood and along with an agent named Kappy Kapstetter (Milton Berle) it isn't long until Frankie becomes a star.
But Frankie remains true to his roots. He spends too much money, takes advantage of people and steps on those beneath him without caring about them at all. He sets himself up for a fall when his films begin to die at the box office. As the offers begin to dwindle and he finds himself forced to do the unthinkable, work in a TV series, he gets a last ditch chance of success once more. He's nominated for an Oscar for best actor. This is when the worst characteristics of Frankie Fane come to light as he hires a sleazy private investigator to help released dirt on his sordid past, pretending his competitors are responsible. But will it be enough to push him over the top and reclaim his fame and fortune as the Oscar winner?
With enough soapy moments to make the best daytime drama cringe the film is reminiscent of the novels of Harrold Robbins and Jackie Collins without the talent involved in their writings. The dialogue is filled with clichés and the performances reek of actors and actresses behaving as if they've had no direction or ignored any provided. Surprisingly the worst of them here is Boyd who was a big enough star at the time to know better. With major star making roles in films like BEN-HUR, GENGHIS KHAN and THE FALL OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE his career would never quite recover from this film. His acting here is so overblown and his accent so muddled as to be near incomprehensible that it's no wonder.
In spite of all of this the film was ironically nominated for two Oscars, best production design and best costume design, winning neither. The only award the film has won is the Golden Turkey Award for worst performance by a popular singer for Bennett. Bennett too didn't walk away unscathed from the experience, never appearing in another film as an actor again.
One would think that all of this would make for a terrible movie viewing experience. But it ends up being just the opposite. Granted it feels a little long at just a minute under 2 hours, the movie is still fun viewing if for nothing else the complete lack of self-restraint on hand. There is also the fact that the film holds a large number of well-known actors who should have known better. Including the aforementioned stars the cast includes Joseph Cotton, Ernest Borgnine, Edie Adams, Ed Begley, Walter Brennan, Broderick Crawford, Edith Head, Hedda Hopper, Bob Hope, Nancy Sinatra and Peter Crawford, many in cameo roles. No doubt many felt this would be a top notch movie but sad to say it is little more than the camp classic it's been praised as. But if you love movies and the movie making business, then this is one worth checking out.
Kino Lorber is releasing this with a few extras and in the best condition it's ever had beginning with a new 4k restoration of the film. It features a new audio commentary track by Patton Oswald, Josh Olson and Erik Nelson, another new audio track commentary by film historians Howard S. Berger, Steve Mitchell and Nathanial Thompson and trailers as well. -
Bucs196021 September 2007This movie is soooooo bad you don't know whether to laugh or throw up. I never thought much of Steven Boyd's acting but this has to be the nadir of his less than successful career. I expected him to have a stroke at any moment as he rolled his eyes, clenched his manly jaw and appeared to be on a bad acid trip. He rolls through this film, spouting ridiculous dialogue and brutalizing all who stand in his path to stardom.
Somehow he ends up on the top of the Hollywood heap and then comes (dare I say it), Oscar NIGHT. He has garnered a nomination, although God only knows how based on his performance in this film, and must win to keep from sliding back into obscurity. Well, guess what?......he doesn't. What does it mean to his career?.....who cares?
There is one more highlight of this obnoxious film and that is the "performance" of singer Tony Bennett in his first and last film role. Watch him wander through his lines with the emotion of someone in a coma and you will know why Tony has stayed with singing. It's not even "so bad, it's good". It's just plain bad.
I can't say one good thing about "The Oscar". You can love "Plan 9 From Outer Space" or "Robot Monster" because of their lovable ineptitude but there is not excuse for this film. If you are a masochist, then this is your cup of tea.