Review of La Cage aux Folles (1978) by Johnnylee T — 21 Jul 2016

You know, one of the best things I've done this year is to buy a book called "Cult Movies" by a guy named Danny Peary. He wrote three of these books, and I own all of them. I like buying books that are more or less lists with commentary, since it gives me more films to check out. Peary's book is special though. I'd already seen almost half of the 200 movies that span his three books, but as I've been watching others and reading his commentary I've found myself learning a lot about the art of cinema that I never really get from my other favorite reviewers. Peary comes off as sort of half professor, half filmmaker, and half fun cult movie fan (and obviously I'm not half a mathematician). This means that his reviews reveal a real zealot's fondness for cinema, while still being almost completely detached enough to critique something for what it is without factoring in a reputation. Take this film for example. The film is by far one of the most successful foreign films ever made, and a highly respected one as well. Peary acknowledges these things, but he doesn't let the film get off easy. Much like another huge French cult comedy classic I saw recently (King of Hearts), Peary has a lot to say about how bad the direction is in this film and how much better it could have been with improvements. He argues that the director, Eduoard Molinaro treats his characters shallowly, which makes the comedy less effective. This is true. He also argues that the movie is clearly made for a straight audience (not an opinion you see a lot) since most of the jokes are at the expense of the gays, and that the characters are terrible in general. He rightly calls the plot trite, and issues one of his most frequent complaints on comedy films, which is that the director never lets the scenes run long enough for the gags to develop sufficiently. I have this problem just as much as Peary does. I've gotten to the point where I've realized that my dissatisfaction with a lot of comedy films that just aren't good enough is that they do not push the joke far enough for it to get funny. The dinner scene in this film is a fine example, since it has all sorts of potential to be hilarious (an example of a good version of a somewhat similar scenario is Peter Sellers' dinner experience in Blake Edward's "The Party"), but ultimately fails because as Peary states, it "dribbles to a conclusion before it really gets started.".

This is something else I love about Peary's books. The movies he surveys are not all great, in fact many of them through a sober lens of film criticism are downright awful. But there are many gems to be found in the cult movie canon even when the film isn't completely executed correctly. I generally enjoyed watching La Cage Aux Folles despite the issues with it. I'm just glad to have a new companion in Peary to take me through some of cinema's highs and lows that is teaching me so much about the art I never knew. Films like this are a fine representative of some of the "mixed blessing" movies in Peary's books. They have so much potential, but without the brilliant direction needed for a brilliant film they fail to achieve little more than mild cult appeal. There are many lessons to be learned here.