Tuesday, January 27, 2009

Life on Laura Mars

Ah, the Bowery Boys do justice today to a long-lost (unintentionally hilarious!) NYC classic...The Eyes of Laura Mars from 1978. With Faye Dunaway fresh from winning an Oscar for Network. As the Bowery Boys put it:

As such, it seems a thin but playful satire of downtown New York decadence. Manhattan looks unusually great for such a commonplace horror flick. The best set is easily Mars' studio, in one of the Chelsea warehouses piers overlooking the Hudson River, just steps from the West Side elevated highway. The most notable -- and campy scene -- erupts at Columbus Circle, at a ridiculous fashion shoot involving burning cars and models in lingerie and fur coats. Oh Columbus Circle! Were you ever so fun?

You get a taste of Hell's Kitchen in a brisk chase scene involving Tommy Lee Jones' cop character, his feathered hair flapping in the wind. But seeing Soho was more striking to me, devoid of shopfronts, mysterious flat warehouses during the day that open to become large, disco-thumping galleries at night. There are still galleries in Soho, of course, but the one in 'Laura Mars' is a big, hokey circus. (The director even condescendingly throws in a dwarf, to get the point across.)


Here's a trailer/infomercial for the film....



And those memorable, uh, lines...

3 comments:

Colonnade Row said...

Not sure what this reveals about me, but "EoLM" definitely influenced me moving here. That fetishist photography by Helmut Newton, Rebecca Blake, and Deborah Turbeville were huge in 70's fashion and were the inspiration for the movie. And "After Hours" was brilliant - and sort of on target. SoHo used to feel like that! Two of my absolute favorite NY movies.

Anonymous said...

Thanks for the comment, Kirby...However unintentionally funny in spots now, EoLM is stylish...and I love Faye's apartment!

Need to watch After Hours again...Haven't seen it in 10 years...

Wonder how many people moved to NYC because of SATC? You hear about it anecdotally, but I'd like to see some hard numbers...

Colonnade Row said...

Yikes! Hope I'm not an early wave of SaTC invader! At least I moved here for murder and not just fashion!