Rating: 
Summary: Scandal: Very Sexy!
Review: "Scandal" is one hot, sexy movie! Joanne Whalley-Kilmer's naked thighs are a pleasure to look at. Bridget Fonda looks as hot as ever in lingerie! As for the story, it blew me away! This is a terrific film!
Rating: 
Summary: A "Scandal" to miss this one.
Review: Based on a true event of 1963, the "Profumo" affair scandal is one the classic sex scandals of British political history, of which, as you would know, there are many.The story is one of great intrigue showing how one man's weakness and lust for the seedier side of the fairer sex, and another man's weakness, his desire to mix with the higher echelons of society, embroils them both into a downward spiral of self destruction, which in itself is indeed quite a story. But when it also compromises and in fact instigates the downfall of an entire government, and a British CONSERVATIVE Government at that; now add to it a complex web of vices including sex, drugs, alcohol, debauchery, infidelity, betrayal and treason! well you have the makings of a simply excellent movie. John Hurt's acting as "scapegoat" Dr. Stephen Ward is first class, as are the roles of Ian Mckellan as the ill-fated John Profumo and Leslie Phillips as the aloof Lord Astor. Joanne Whalley-Kilmer, Bridget Fonda, Britt Ekland give superb performances depicting precisely the trends and fashions of England's mid 60s. The theme music "Scandal", sung by the timlessly talented Dusty Springfield, was released as a single and made the charts without hesitation. Add to the story a high ranking Russian, a snipit of the "highly respected" British Aristocracy, some excellent shots of London life and a stately mansion deep in England's green and pleasant land, and you have a highly entertaining, "no holds barred" account of a real piece of British political history, the kind that britons would rather you didn't know about! It's been more years than I care to remember since I went to the "flicks" to see this movie, I truly can not wait to put this video into my machine, get a couple of cans, get my feet up and enjoy it all over again. Buy it! you won't be disappointed.
Rating:
Summary: A "Scandal" to miss this one.
Review: Based on a true event of 1963, the "Profumo" affair scandal is one the classic sex scandals of British political history, of which, as you would know, there are many. The story is one of great intrigue showing how one man's weakness and lust for the seedier side of the fairer sex, and another man's weakness, his desire to mix with the higher echelons of society, embroils them both into a downward spiral of self destruction, which in itself is indeed quite a story. But when it also compromises and in fact instigates the downfall of an entire government, and a British CONSERVATIVE Government at that; now add to it a complex web of vices including sex, drugs, alcohol, debauchery, infidelity, betrayal and treason! well you have the makings of a simply excellent movie. John Hurt's acting as "scapegoat" Dr. Stephen Ward is first class, as are the roles of Ian Mckellan as the ill-fated John Profumo and Leslie Phillips as the aloof Lord Astor. Joanne Whalley-Kilmer, Bridget Fonda, Britt Ekland give superb performances depicting precisely the trends and fashions of England's mid 60s. The theme music "Scandal", sung by the timlessly talented Dusty Springfield, was released as a single and made the charts without hesitation. Add to the story a high ranking Russian, a snipit of the "highly respected" British Aristocracy, some excellent shots of London life and a stately mansion deep in England's green and pleasant land, and you have a highly entertaining, "no holds barred" account of a real piece of British political history, the kind that britons would rather you didn't know about! It's been more years than I care to remember since I went to the "flicks" to see this movie, I truly can not wait to put this video into my machine, get a couple of cans, get my feet up and enjoy it all over again. Buy it! you won't be disappointed.
Rating: 
Summary: A world of rats
Review: Being born in 1950, I remember the Profumo scandal personally. Since then, many similar scandals have happened. This film shows the hotbed in which such scandals originate, the shady underground of lies, espionage, dirty secrets and money. I expected it to be entertaining, and it was, but it also showed the tragedy of the people involved. All of them - the politicans, the call girls, the swingers - use each other and are being used. The rich, the powerful and beautiful turn out to be a world of rats where the big devour the small. John Hurt as the dubious character Dr. Stephen Ward is at his best - he started as a good actor and, like good wine, got better and better with the years. His Stephen Ward is a rat and yet a sad character, a pawn in the game of men more powerful then he himself, who use him and drop him when they no longer need him. All through the film you despise him, feel disgusted with him, like him and in the end feel sorry for him. The rest of the actors deserves a general applause, and so does everybody else who helped to make this film.
Rating:
Summary: underappreciated tearjerker!
Review: I wish they would reissue this video so I could have it for my library. Last time I watched it, I was moved to tears by the suicide of Ian McKellen's character. The aftermath of the Profumo affair illustrates how foolish and sad prostitution laws really are. It was these laws, in large part, which Steven Ward was so humiliated by -- and the movie gives a human face to that fact. The girls in question were labelled call girls but they were more like party girls -- and yet, when the powers that be conspired to find their scapegoat, they were able to portray these amateurs as prostitutes, for the purposes of humiliating Steven Ward publicly. This isn't adequately explained by the movie but then, it's entertainment, not a documentary.
Rating:
Summary: Skinemax for the Pinky's-Up Crowd
Review: If you want to sell softcore porn to a "sophisticated" audience, including button-down critics, what do you do? Why, class up the joint by sticking a bunch of stage actors in tuxedos and evening gowns and making them talk in those nasally, affected British accents, of course. Oh, and it'll help if you base the story on a true event and tell it in an ironic, tragic sort of way. That's about what "Scandal" does, though not with particular style or grist. Purporting to delve into the so-called Profumo Affair in the 1950s that led to mayhem for the British government, it's more about skin than politics, titillation than character. Joanne Whalley stars as a cat-faced party girl and professional homewrecker, not above any kink or good time with her crowd of over-the-hill frat boys (including Sir Ian McKellan, looking rather ridiculous with a partially shaved head, and a kooky John Hurt). She cruises the fast-track to success by bedding every London politico in sight until predictably, inevitably, things go wrong. It isn't that "Scandal" doesn't at times grab the viewer's attention; it's that it uses exactly the same T & A as the cheapest of cable TV softcore to do so. The stuff in between seems just a sham to add the faintest air of respectability to it all . . . just like the cheapest of cable TV softcore. Controversial when it was made in the late 1980s--(Gasp!) this white vixen even sleeps with black men!--the film's sexuality will seem somewhat quaint today. If you want to see reasonably attractive people get naked or pretend to have a threesome, then "Scandal" is for you. If you want something more, keep looking.
Rating:
Summary: Skinemax for the Pinky's-Up Crowd
Review: If you want to sell softcore porn to a "sophisticated" audience, including button-down critics, what do you do? Why, class up the joint by sticking a bunch of stage actors in tuxedos and evening gowns and making them talk in those nasally, affected British accents, of course. Oh, and it'll help if you base the story on a true event and tell it in an ironic, tragic sort of way. That's about what "Scandal" does, though not with particular style or grist. Purporting to delve into the so-called Profumo Affair in the 1950s that led to mayhem for the British government, it's more about skin than politics, titillation than character. Joanne Whalley stars as a cat-faced party girl and professional homewrecker, not above any kink or good time with her crowd of over-the-hill frat boys (including Sir Ian McKellan, looking rather ridiculous with a partially shaved head, and a kooky John Hurt). She cruises the fast-track to success by bedding every London politico in sight until predictably, inevitably, things go wrong. It isn't that "Scandal" doesn't at times grab the viewer's attention; it's that it uses exactly the same T & A as the cheapest of cable TV softcore to do so. The stuff in between seems just a sham to add the faintest air of respectability to it all . . . just like the cheapest of cable TV softcore. Controversial when it was made in the late 1980s--(Gasp!) this white vixen even sleeps with black men!--the film's sexuality will seem somewhat quaint today. If you want to see reasonably attractive people get naked or pretend to have a threesome, then "Scandal" is for you. If you want something more, keep looking.
Rating:
Summary: The war minister, the model, and the Russian spy.
Review: In terms of pop culture, 1963 was a good year for the UK, as that's when the Beatles first exploded on the scene. For Harold Macmillan and the Conservative Party, it was the opposite, as a scandal involving Russian spies, his Secretary of State for War, John Profumo, and two callgirls named Christine Keeler and Mandy Rice-Davies, led to the collapse of his government in October due to the national security issues. However, of the two girls, Keeler was crucified by the press and ended up in obscurity, while Rice-Davies made it big, even appearing in the movie Absolute Beginners. And the man who introduced Keeler to Profumo, Stephen Ward, became the scapegoat of the whole affair and committed suicide. Scandal tells of the rise and fall of the three central characters: Keeler, Profumo, and Ward.
After a brief shot of Keeler being mobbed and manhandled by journalists following her testimony at court, the movie takes the viewer back to 1959, when Keeler was a dancer in a revue at a West End club, wearing all sorts of daring costumes. It's there that she catches Ward's highly-trained eye. It takes looks or money to enter the privileged world of the elite, and to Ward, and given her looks, Keeler is a racehorse. He promises to introduce her to all sorts of important people, but that she needs to be wild, liberated. The two share the same apartment and a special relationship grows between them. Ward is quite the libertine, saying that the "trouble with everyone is they're too ashamed to enjoy themselves." However, he is seen by others to be vain, shallow, and empty-headed.
Keeler is introduced to Eugene, a Soviet naval attache, and in a very sexy moment at Lord Astor's mansion, to Profumo, who is quite taken by her. He's quite the shy soul, and at first, he just talks with her. Later, well, the rest is history. But she finds herself stifled, preferring men her own age instead of the older men Ward introduces her to. She complains "You pull the strings. I'm what you make me."
As for Mandy, she ends up working at the same club as Keeler, and at first the two butt heads. Mandy though upstages Keeler during a sizzling dance number where they are wearing Native American feathers and costumes, with the loss of her top apparently not hindering her. The two become friends later on.
It's amusing to hear Profumo's address to the House of Commons regarding Keeler. Initially he says there was no impropriety whatsoever. Fast forward to another politician, an American president no less, who said "I did not have relations with that woman." Hmm....
The scenes that caused a ballyhoo during its release isn't as explicit as all that, unless one counts the scene of a client being turned on by Christine and Mandy together before he ends up joining them--other than that, nothing beyond softcore.
Joanne Whalley-Kilmer radiates a sizzling cuteness as Christine Keeler. She's quite expressive, from those winning smiles to the tearful looks of heartbreak when she is forced to betray her mentor. Bridget Fonda's Rice-Davies isn't a warm or appealing character. John Hurt (Stephen Ward) radiates an aura of excitement and self-destructive behaviour in one of his best roles yet, with Ian McKellan (yes, Gandalf himself) doing quite well as the shy yet doomed Profumo.
And the guy who plays Johnny, the Jamaican lover of Keeler who is later described as a "lovesick jungle bunny," is none other than Roland Gift, lead singer of the Fine Young Cannibals. Was it Whalley-Kilmer he was thinking of when he sang "She Drives Me Crazy?"
The fact that Macmillan and Profumo got honours later on shows how forgiving the UK could be. But it's also interesting how a scandal can affect one's successors. Sir Alec-Douglas Home inherited the scandals and problems of Macmillan and lost to Harold Wilson's Labour Party a year later, the same way Gerald Ford lost to Jimmy Carter in 1976 due to his associations with Nixon and inheriting the high inflation of his predecessor.
One wonders if Keeler wasn't exactly chuffed to be reminded of an episode in her life she'd rather forget, but if Scandal shows that she became a victim and object of scorn, then it has served its purpose.
Rating: 
Summary: good
Review: It's a bit slow in spots, and apparently, according to some reviews, portrays the John Hurt character as more sympathetic than he was. But in interesting character study of true history. I actually saw this because I'm a Beatles fan, and a sociologists explacation for the Beatlemania in England, was that the English public needed at distraction from the sordidness of this scandal. (The same way Beatlemania in America is explained that America needed an emotional distraction from the tragedy of the then recent asassination of Jack Kennedy.
Rating: 
Summary: DVD version not as advertised
Review: My comments are not aimed at the merits of this fine film but at the recent DVD release by Anchor Bay. The cover boasts that the version it contains is "uncut & uncensored"; however, that claim is false. Inexplicably missing is the entire "nightgown" scene with Bridget Fonda, which should appear just after the orgy. I'm pretty sure that this scene appears in every other version of the movie. I'm almost certain it was in the R-rated general release, I know it is in the "uncut" VHS tape, and part of it even appears in the broadcast televsion version. In fact, watching the censored TV cut of that segment on BBC America a month or so ago is what inspired me to order the DVD in the first place. Now I just feel ripped off. This is not the first time I've purchased DVDs that were missing key scenes, but this instance was particularly galling.
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