Lenny

Rating:
Summary: Really Awesome.
Review: 'Lenny' is a really awesome film about a comedian named Lenny Bruce. I normally don't like Dustin Hoffman, but this has to be his best role and performance. Warning though, it is in black and white and extremely depressing.

Rating:
Summary: Really Awesome.
Review: 'Lenny' is a really awesome film about a comedian named Lenny Bruce. I normally don't like Dustin Hoffman, but this has to be his best role and performance. Warning though, it is in black and white and extremely depressing.

Rating:
Summary: The best overlooked film ever!
Review: 3 great films came out of 1974. The Godfather Part 2, Chinatown, and Lenny. The first two are remembered as masterpieces but the third, no one ever seems to talk about. Why? Lenny is a movie that is equal to Chinatown and Godfahter 2. If I was in the Academy, it would be tough to decide to give the Oscar to Pacino or Hoffman but it would be a scandal to vote for Art Carney. How Hoffman didn't get the oscar is beyond me. Some critics say Hoffman was miscast as Lenny Bruce because he isnt funny. I read material on the real Lenny Bruce saying he was not hilarious at all. Hoffman knew this. The critics didn't. Valerie Perrine acts so great. She should have gotten the Oscar. Fine direction from Bob Fosse. Great screenplay by Julian Barry. Some people might call me stupid but I think this is the best picture of 1974. What a great year that was. Im only 13 but sometimes I feel sad because I would like to go back to 1974 and by myself, go to the theater, sit down with popcorn and a coke, and watch Lenny. But I never will and that is very sad for me. They don't make great movies like they used to.

Rating:
Summary: Either you liked this film, or you didn't
Review: A poignant story of the late comedian who battled both censorship and drug dependency. Unfortunately, as versatile as Dustin Hoffman is as an actor, he wasn't quite the right one to portray Lenny Bruce. Valerie Perrine gives a great performance as Honey Harlow Bruce in this film shot entirely in black and white to give a better description of Bruce's life in the fifties and sixties.

Rating:
Summary: One of Dustin Hoffman's Best Performances
Review: A powerful biography of the brilliant but doomed night-club comedian Lenny Bruce. Taking the form of a pseudo documentary, an unseen interviewer questions Bruce's wife, mother, and agent about his life. We are shown Bruce's early 50's beginnings as an unremarkable comic performing hackneyed material. He then meets Honey Harlow, the stripper who becomes his wife. Their marriage is happy at first. Then they get involved with drugs and swinging, which cause problems and they eventually divorce. This first half of the film uses the effective technique of frequently cutting to one of Bruce's later performances to illustrate how these experiences inspired some of his routines. Meanwhile, during a period working as an MC in strip joints, Bruce develops the improvisational style for which he became famous. He moves back to the nigh-clubs, wher his daring satire brings him acclaim and (initially) fortune. Eventually the authorities take notice, and he is subjected to a string of busts for obscenity and drugs, which make it increasingly difficult to get work. Bruce's legal and money problems pile up, and he finally dies of a drugs overdose. In some ways then, Lenny is a typical Hollywood rags-to-riches-to-rags biopic, but here spiced up with a liberal dose of 70's permissiveness. Its sparse Black and white photography effectively compliments Bruce's increasing despair. The supporting cast are all good, and Valerie Perrine is particularly strong as Bruce's wife. But it is Dustin Hoffman who dominates the film. His performance as Bruce is compelling, especially in the night-club scenes. Precious little film exists of the real Lenny Bruce in live performance. Watching Hoffman recreate his routines is the next best thing. For that alone, this film is to be commended.

Rating:
Summary: A Voice With Too Much to Say
Review: Bob Fosse directs this wonderfully made film documenting the life of Lenny Bruce, played sympathetically by Dustin Hoffman. Filmed in B&W and in faux-documentary style, the film follows Lenny Bruce from the start of his career and his doomed marriage with his wife. With an anonymous interviewer recording conversations with the people around him, including his mother, wife and manager, this 70s portrait of Lenny Bruce is an intimate look at the comic's career and life. It's incredible to see Hoffman's almost boyish charm and look at the beginning of the film to the rough, tired look towards the end. Fosse never looses control of the film and allows every actor the chance to shine.

Rating:
Summary: The best performance of Dustin Hoffman to date!
Review: Bob Fosse was one the more brilliant minds in the story of the cinema . Gifted with that gaze of genius , left us several treasures Cabaret , Lenny , All that jazz , Star 80 , Sweet charity are undoubtly his better achievements.
But this movie became a reference issue. Lenny Bruce became a hard challenge for any actor. But what Hoffman got with this role still surpases , in my point of view all his next achievements.
Valerie Perrine never reached the highest peak as actress with this breathtaking performance. Her role deserved her the Prize as best actress in 1975 in the Cannes International Film Festival.
The film is deeply bitter and tolds the slow but progressive decadence of Bruce Lenny : in his private life and in his creative gifts as a stand-up comedian. Filmed in glorious black and white . this film is one my personal one of the major cult movies in any time.

Rating:
Summary: Dustin Hoffman convincingly plays late comedian Lenny Bruce
Review: Dustin Hoffman convincingly plays the late comedian Lenny Bruce. Lenny Bruce may have been funny to some people, but others thought he was very foul and cruel with his humor. Very Adults Only material. Valerie Perrine plays a stripper who Lenny falls in love with. Jan Miner, who you may remember as the "Palmolive" lady in the commercials we saw for many years, play's Lenny's mother. Gary Morton ( Once a comedian himself and later,Lucille Ball's second husband) plays "Sherman Hart". Elaine Joyce also plays a stripper. Lenny Bruce was arrested for using obscene language in a nightclub in the State of california. Later, he studied law obsessivly. In court, he presented his case. By jury, he won and was found innocent. But still the police had to be present at his nightclub acts. Rarely shown on regular television anymore and if so is heavily edited. It's best to see this film in its entirity on DVD. British Board of Film censors gave film an "X".

Rating:
Summary: Dustin Hoffman convincingly plays late comedian Lenny Bruce
Review: Dustin Hoffman convincingly plays the late comedian Lenny Bruce. Lenny Bruce may have been funny to some people, but others thought he was very foul and cruel with his humor. Very Adults Only material. Valerie Perrine plays a stripper who Lenny falls in love with. Jan Miner, who you may remember as the "Palmolive" lady in the commercials we saw for many years, play's Lenny's mother. Gary Morton ( Once a comedian himself and later,Lucille Ball's second husband) plays "Sherman Hart". Elaine Joyce also plays a stripper. Lenny Bruce was arrested for using obscene language in a nightclub in the State of california. Later, he studied law obsessivly. In court, he presented his case. By jury, he won and was found innocent. But still the police had to be present at his nightclub acts. Rarely shown on regular television anymore and if so is heavily edited. It's best to see this film in its entirity on DVD. British Board of Film censors gave film an "X".

Rating:
Summary: THE BEST FILM OF 1974!
Review: Dustin Hoffman gives a brilliant Oscar nominated performance as the controversial comic, Lenny Bruce. Lenny spent years trying to make it big in comedy being obscene and using bad terms and language and when he finally made it big, he destroyed himself. The best part about this film is the performance of Oscar Nominee Valerie Perrine as his wife, Honey Bruce. I hate it when people say, "oh, she gave a nice SUPPORTING performance." Valerie's performance was intrical to the plot and she's on screen for more than 50 minutes, which is more than I can say for Louise Fletcher of "one flew over the cukoo's nest." This is probably the most overlooked and under rated films of all time and it shouldn't be. It's just a shame that everyone involved with the film went on to great careers and Valerie Perrine ended up turning into a whatever happened to? star!
6 1974 ACADEMY AWARD NOMINATIONS:
BEST PICTURE
BEST DIRECTOR-BOB FOSSE
BEST ACTRESS-VALERIE PERRINE
BEST ACTOR-DUSTIN HOFFMAN
BEST SCREENPLAY-JULIAN BARRY
BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY

CANNES AWARD WINNER:

BEST FEMALE PERFORMANCE- VALERIE PERRINE "LENNY"