Sweet Liberty (1986)

A Brilliant Conflict

A film of deceptively outspoken contemporary relevance, this is cinema at its most alert, alarming and alive.

By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.

Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable

Written, directed, and starring Alan Alda, Sweet Liberty follows, well, Alan Alda as he gets introduced to the wacky world of Hollywood. He plays an author—which foreshadows his real-life accomplishments, since he later wrote three memoirs and became a New York Times bestseller—whose novel is being adapted into a film. Even though he has his hands full with his personal life, when he becomes surrounded by the cast and crew, he learns an entirely new definition of drama.If you like movies about making movies, you'll probably want to rent this one. The lead actors of the film within the film are Michael Caine and Michelle Pfeiffer, and it's always fun to watch beautiful people on the big screen. A ninety-two-year-old Lillian Gish plays Alan's mother, and Lois Chiles and Bob Hoskins join the supporting cast. In general, I find this genre a little too over-the-top in the backstage "drama", and even though I love Michael Caine, this movie didn't really break the mold. But there are some pretty funny scenes, and if you don't take it too seriously, it can be fun with a bunch of your friends and a bowl of popcorn.

If you've ever wondered how Alan Alda went from being one of the most popular figures in American entertainment after M.A.S.H to being an aging character actor playing small parts in other people's movies, Sweet Liberty is the reason. This thing is so appalling, I'm surprised it only crippled his career and didn't cause him to be retroactively expelled from the space-time continuum.This movie tries to be about 8 different things and it sucks hard at all of them. It's about history professor Michael Burgess (Alan Alda) and his weird relationship with his girlfriend, Gretchen Carlsen (Lise Hilboldt). He desperately wants them to move in together and just as desperately doesn't want to get married. She doesn't want to get married or live together, just keep banging him. It's about Michael's even weirder relationship with his crazy mother (Lillian Gish), who sleeps on her own sofa and demands to be reunited with an old boyfriend she hasn't seen in decades. It's about Michael's fights with movie director Bo Hodges (Saul Rubink), who's comes to town to make a movie out of Michael's book on the American revolution. Saul wants to make it into a teenager-pleasing piece of crap that's all about defying authority, blowing stuff and people getting naked. Michael wants it to be historically accurate with everyone wearing the right kind of hat.Sweet Liberty is also about Michael's relationship with the movie's lead actress, Faith Healy (Michelle Pfeiffer). You see, Gretchen conveniently breaks up with him right before the movie starts production and Michael falls in love with the character Faith is portraying. Michael appears to be some sort of idiot savant, capable of writing a successful book but incapable of recognizing when an actress is acting. He also has to worry about the movie's lead actor, Elliot James (Michael Caine), who's like an overgrown child who only cares about fencing, driving recklessly and sleeping with as many women as possible. Helping Michael navigate the minefield of the movie's production screenwriter Stanley Gould (Bob Hoskins), who wrote the script based on Michael's book even though Stanley acts more like a Catskills comedian or a vaudevillian stage comic than a writer.The film also wastes time on Elliot's adulterous affair with a local woman and a feud between the stuntmen working on the movie and the local American Revolution re-enactors who've been hired on as extras.Now, if any of the things I've just described seem even vaguely interesting, I apologize for misleading you. Sweet Liberty isn't funny, it isn't clever, it isn't engaging or enjoyable on any level. I t is sad and pathetic to watch Hollywood legend Lillian Gish lamely attempt to ham her way through a "wacky" old lady role that couldn't have been more poorly written if it had been done by a 5 year old orphan. Lise Hilboldt moronically grins her way through every scene, no matter the context, like she was heavily medicated for the entire production. Alda's direction is incompetent and his script is a jangled mess.Sweet Liberty is proof positive that there had to have been a lot of extremely talented people working on M.A.S.H. because despite his star status, it's clear that Alda couldn't have had much to do with the show's success.

First of all, let me say that Michael Caine is pure genius in this film. His portrayal of a screen-idol that "makes the girls wet their pants" is perfect!Michelle Pfeiffer's part is a bit 2-dimensional, but she does have her moments. Even Alan Alda is surprisingly good (gee, I had never realized before that he could act!).Anyway, the film is very light-hearted and easy on the mind. Some good laughs, some nice scenes, etc. I'd recommend renting this, making a nice disgustingly buttered tub of popcorn, a nice big glass of sugared soda ... sit back and enjoy!

The "making of a Big Hollywood Movie" is certainly not a new idea for a comedy. Over the years there have been many movies like this--most recently David Mamet's "State and Main." What Alan Alda did for this movie is playfully comment on the state of the blockbuster (six years before Robert Altman's "The Player"). In 1986, the "blockbuster movie" was in its early stages. This film originally came out around the same time as Top Gun--case in point. Saul Rubinek plays the obnoxious Hollywood director (what? An obnoxious director?) who turns Alda's historical, and serious, book about the American Revolution into a romantic comedy, complete with big stars who take their clothes off. What makes this movie different from Alda's other films is that there are no serious undertones. Everyone is having a great time, and it shows. Michelle Pfeiffer, in one of her first starring roles, has rarely been funnier. Michael Caine struts his best comic stuff. And Bob Hoskins--how can you go wrong? The film has an obvious mid '80s feel (the music is terrible), and Alda's direction seems more suited for television, but this is still an enjoyable movie, less successful and acidic in its approach to Hollywood and its stars and blockbusters (compared to Sunset Blvd., The StuntMan, and of course The Player) but still worth watching.