Word: film
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Dates: during 1970-1970
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...obscenity-is very much a moral movie. Holly believes in the simple things-love, devotion, trust. And while she must apply these principles to her low-life world of kinky sex, drugs, and eternally imminent death, apply them she does. She is a wholly original creation in a challenging film-the only American picture so far this year worth forcing yourself...
...WHERE'S POPPA?, directed by Carl Reiner from a screenplay by Robert Klance, is another modern screwball comedy, which, like Trash, evokes the kind of desperate laughter we associate with the film farces Hollywood churned out in the thirties. Also like the Morrissey film, its humor is built around the characters' anticipation of the end. To be specific, Where's Poppa? tells about Gordon Hocheiser's (George Segal) anticipation of the death of his mother (Ruth Gordon). Actually, Gordon does not so much anticipate his senile mother's demise as pray for it. He even tries to help her along...
Gordon, a young lawyer, is stuck with his mother because his father's dying wish was that his wife would never be sent to an old-age home. This is a pain in the ass (both figuratively and literally-you'll understand after you see the film), because Mrs. Hocheiser is not only senile but nasty: when Gordon meets his true love (Trish Van Devere) and hires her as his mother's nurse (because at her employment interview Miss Van Devere informs him that "all [her] patients have died"), his mother intimidates the girl at every turn, even...
...this sick? The central premise of the film-distressing and unpleasant as it may be-is conceivable as a parcel of reality: Confronted with so disgusting a reality, can we do anything healthier than laugh at it? I don't think so. Where's Poppa? is a nice temporary escape from a painful awareness of death...
...death-wish for his mom. There are some engaging comments on army generals who like to kill "gooks," Central Park muggers and devious football scouts as well. There are also a few sags-notably a rather sobering voyage into a decrepit old-age home near the film's end. Still, on at least one occasion, Where's Poppa? practically made me fall out of my seat with laughter. With the possible exception of napping, this seems as good a way as any to greet the seemingly grim years ahead...