Thoughts on Ladies and Gentlemen, The Fabulous Stains

Sunday, November 21, 2010 1:36 PM By Simon

-Recently orphaned Corinne Burns (Diane Lane), her sister (who's name, neither character nor actress, I can find the bloody name of), and her cousin Jessica (Laura Dern) start a punk band called (uh) The Stains, and after three rehearsels, start a tour with The Looters (half the band members of The Sex Pistols, one from The Clash), who's lead singer (Ray Winstone) gets all up in her business, and blah blah fucking blah, you know that shit.

-Rousing and funny and weird and brilliant as a rise-and-fall biopic without the biopic, probably my favorite Diane Lane performance (ahem), and some awesome music (yeah, okay, one really good song, called 'The Professionals', which I suggest you download somewhere), commenting on the hypnotically groupie effect bands with gimmicks have on the youngins (which I don't think is fair. I mean, I've had Lady Gaga nailed into my head for the past three years, don't see me wearing metal beards and meat dresses)...

-Christine Lahti does not look old enough to be anyone's mother here, okay?

3 comments:

Alex said...

This movie is pretty cool, though I sort of wanted more from it. It was a bit too sparse, I guess. Diane Lane is excellent and I really wanted to be her/a skunk for Halloween but decided the endless "Who are you supposed to be?"'s I was bound to get would make it less fun. Maybe next year.

I always forget that Nancy Dowd is uncredited for her screenplay. I think she had her name taken off since they changed it against her will or something. Hence "Rob Morton" on that rad poster.

November 21, 2010 at 4:03 PM
Marc Edward Heuck said...

Thank you for calling the poster "rad," Alex - I made it myself when I was in high school! Nancy Dowd once told me she thought it was a real ad that Paramount made, and was surprised to learn it was just me with some drawing, cutting, and pasting. I'm just as pleasantly surprised Simon chose it to illustrate the review.

Simon, I don't know if you ever listen to commentary tracks but I would really dig it if you'd download and listen to mine at my website - there's a fascinating history behind this movie and I think I was able to dig up most of it. Don't bother listening to Adler's commentary track on the DVD; it's worthless, he barely remembers anything and Dowd demanded that they remove any reference he makes to her.

November 21, 2010 at 10:29 PM
Simon said...

Alex: I'll be a skunk next year. I know at least my sister will get it.

Marc: Yeah, I saw the poster on your site, and liked it a lot more than Diane Lane pouting over a microphone. And I didn't listen to Adler's commentary, I listened to Diane Lane and Laura Dern's...I mean, it's not terribly informative, but I find them so immensely likeable. I'll check yours out.

November 22, 2010 at 11:32 AM