Vincent Canby’s original review of Reds<\/i> in 1981. <\/a><\/p>\n An amazing quote from the review:<\/p>\n Most astonishing is the way the movie, which abounds with Great Moments of History, including the Bolshevik takeover of the Winter Palace in Petrograd, avoids the patently absurd, even as Reed and Louise, drunk on the excitement of the successful revolution they’ve just witnessed, make love in a cold Petrograd flat to the strains of ”The Internationale.” The secret, I think, is that the film sees Reed and Louise as history’s golden children, crass and self-obsessed but genuinely committed to causes they don’t yet fully understand. <\/p><\/blockquote>\n Wonderful observation here:<\/p>\n These, however, are minor faults in a large, remarkably rich, romantic film that dramatizes – in a way that no other commercial movie in my memory has ever done – the excitement of being young, idealistic and foolish in a time when everything still seemed possible. <\/p><\/blockquote>\n (I actually loved the montage of Louise Bryant’s difficult journey to Russia overland and ice … but I agree with him about the reunion scene – it doesn’t quite work.)<\/p>\n And the whole Provincetown Players thing … and Louise Bryant trying to be an “actress” – and Jack Nicholson (playing Eugene O’Neill) having a private response to how atrocious she is an actress – so funny – his eyes go dead, he sits and watches the atrocity before him, with dead dead eyes … You can just see how much it HURTS him, like physically HURTS him, to hear her say HIS WORDS in such a dead and affected voice. Jack. He’s just great in this film.<\/p>\n I can’t wait. It opens in New York this weekend for one week only – and I’m gonna be out of town for most of next week – so Allison and I are determined to get into one of the matinees on Saturday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Vincent Canby’s original review of Reds in 1981. An amazing quote from the review: Most astonishing is the way the movie, which abounds with Great Moments of History, including the Bolshevik takeover of the Winter Palace in Petrograd, avoids the … Continue reading