When a film lacks originality, everything else just feels bored. This is the case with the Oscar-nominated film (for best Actress) “The Fabulous Baker Boys”, and why it remains merely a speck in cinematic history. In this tired tale, two brothers – semi-content with playing a lounge or two here or there – living in the past, consider the option of bringing a female singer into the act. One is the organizer, one is the chain-smoking wild-card that continually impresses the ladies, yet has a stronger passion for the keys. It won’t take a rocket scientist to realize which is which based on mere talent alone. Throw into the mix a husky female singer, a mistaken love, and chaos between a seemingly stable piano act. As our film winds down, cliché over recycled cliché is used to tear these brothers apart, and slowly bring them back together – in an awkward way. While the film boasts collaboration between two of Hollywood’s biggest brothers (one a recent Oscar winner), great piano music, and the quintessential red-dress-on-piano scene, what this film actually delivers is merely a tired script, an overused plot devise, and lines that could have been promoted by anyone with an Acting 101 degree. While the concept seems dramatic, the final result of this feature (despite the numerous awards) felt disappointing. Brotherly love destroyed by inevitable change? Guess what? Seen it all before – and better!
Despite the negative introduction, there were a couple of small elements to this film that worked, ensuring that “The Fabulous Baker Boys” was more than just a one-star movie. Bridges, muscled down by the day-to-day life of being a piano player, is watchable. His apathy towards all situations coupled with his “Joe Cool” smoking-attitude, creates the correct amount of tension with unknown to keep the plot slowly moving in the right direction. Beau, the weaker big-screen actor (better able to manage the television roles), tries to keep up, but what tries to be anger ends up just being a man with big eyes and anger-spit. But, on with the positives…the Bridges’ music was, for lack of a better word, fabulous. Without making the guess if it was them playing, the tone of each of the songs respectively worked in their scenes. Along with the music, the visions of LA worked to show that in a city that never sleeps, these two brothers will always have work. Keep the drinks flowing, and you are sure to be a crowd pleaser.
With some slight parts to make you enjoy the hour and a half of a band’s destruction, the rest just crumbled quickly. To begin, while the pairing of Beau and Jeff seemed powerful on paper, the screen told otherwise. Absolutely, the two were able to play their respective roles well – Jeff the darkened, smoking, looming brother – while Beau played the optimist, looking to keep his dream (or business) alive. The issue with the Bridges’ is that they are too far apart. There is never a scene to show their chemistry together as amazing pianists. Instead, we see through posters that at once they were happy, but those days are long gone. We begin our film on a downtrodden note, and it never quite picks itself up from that even when the brothers seem to be back on top again. Director Steve Kloves never gives us, the audience, an opportunity to cheer for Jeff and Beau’s happiness. Instead, we are forced to suffer right along with them, picking ourselves up after each depressing hour. The same can be said for Pfeiffer, and while Oscar-nomination, Golden Globe-winning, still means something – her portrayal of Susie Diamond just wasn’t breakthrough enough to be remembered after 1990. The prostitute-turned-singer routine has been done in Hollywood, over and over and over; and not to sound repetitive, better. Pfeiffer’s husky voice (at times in tune, at times not), and butch demeanor, did create a sex-symbol, but instead another tragic character. While I agree, the story isn’t conducive to happiness; somebody should have considered it as an opportunity to see these characters differently. It would have added a new layer to their characters, allowing for a stronger emotional punch at the end.
As our characters floundered through their roles, playing piano and off-beat singing, the story was another part that just fell short – forcing our characters to have mixed material to work with and missed character opportunity. “The Fabulous Baker Boys” as a film doesn’t work, as a television mini-series perhaps it would have been better. There is too much left on the table from writer-director Kloves that nothing evolves. Scenes like upstairs neighbor of Jeff’s that is like his mother, busting the dog out of the vet, smelling bathroom equipment, and destroying memorabilia, look good on paper, but without the correct backing just doesn’t feel finished. That is the overall feel with “Baker Boys”, a sense that scenes, moments, and plot-points went unfinished. Kloves isn’t the best in handling the talent he has hired. From leaving cameramen in shots to overusing the piano music, Kloves believes in his work (there is no argument there), but his execution is fallible. Why would you use piano music as your theme music when the Bridges are playing piano music as well? This was horrible. With strong keys being played by the brothers, the cheesy background music just diluted the overall feel. It is the perfect example of having authentic reality and a cheap knock-off. With lacking characters, it would be up to Kloves to cover the differences, but he can’t control what is happening. His camera direction, musical focus, and story have too many flawed plot holes that instead of a creative story, we are left with a sad overused cliché. I would agree that these boys are “Fabulous”, but Kloves couldn’t prove it. His scientific directional equation remains a hypothesis.
VIDEO: With cheap VHS quality of DVD, a lackluster story, and mixed characters. “The Fabulous Baker Boys” failed in its attempts to prove to me that at this moment, the band had to be destroyed. Perhaps they should have been on a “Mission from God”.
VISUAL: For being an Oscar-nominated film, the transfer was horrid. The quality is similar to finding this film on VHS (probably where it is most comfortable), and while you can scratch the surface and see the talent – our actors just don’t bring it. The graininess of their decisions corrupts the story even further, making the final output unmemorable.
SOUND: The key element to this film actually sounds pretty good with the Bridges brothers are playing, but it is Kloves disappointing use of similar piano music in the background which becomes tiresome to the ears. Creating tension to here the Bridges play would mean little to no background music, but the diluted extra music fails to make this a film about pianos and for pianos. Instead, it is like going to Chuck-E-Cheese and having too much pizza.
EXTRA: Nothing. Languages, if you consider those extras is all we are given for this award-winning film. Bummer.
Overall, I wasn’t a fan of this film. Bridges is like a modern Gene Hackman, while the film may not be good, he continually shows that he can be good in anything, alas, not everyone could keep up (even our director). Our mood, music, and plot points were all misused and poorly developed. Our story, cliché after cliché, didn’t feel original or exciting. There needed to be some brightness at the end of our tunnel, but nobody could demonstrate this. “The Fabulous Baker Boys” could have been a shifting film for everyone, but it just wasn’t able to contain the solid nature of the work. It was corrosive and disappointing.
Found in my “Seen That Now What” film book – it was sad to go from a great cinematic experience like “A Face in the Crowd” to this. Nothing worked in this movie, and I don’t think I will ever watch it again. For that, it gets a black mark with a yellow highlight. Never to be watched again nor suggested to friends. This was a massive, miscalculated film that I wanted to enjoy due to Bridges’ win this year, but alas, just couldn’t.
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