Film

Movie theaters, reviews and showtimes in New York, plus articles, trailers and more

 

Down and Out in Beverly Hills (1986)

Director: Paul Mazursky

Average user rating
No reviews

Movie review

From Time Out Film Guide

When Nolte's gentleman of the road tries to drown himself in a Beverly Hills swimming-pool, coathanger baron Dreyfuss welcomes him into a family riddled with the whole gamut of late 20th century neuroses. Another of Mazursky's looks at the pursuit of happiness, this update of Renoir's Boudu Saved from Drowning starts life as a satire on the tribal rites of the new and filthy rich, but goes badly wrong somewhere down the line. Renoir's anarchic hobo romantically ditched bourgeois bliss for the open road; Mazursky presents his bag people as pathetic basket cases, with Nolte's upwardly mobile tramp only too happy to take up permanent residence in Lotusland. And it betokens some kind of desperation (or perhaps the fact that this was produced by Disney's adult offshoot) that the comedy rests increasingly on the cute antics of the family dog. As one of David Mamet's characters would say, money talks and bullshit walks.

Author: SJo 0000-00-00 00:00:00

Time Out Film Guide


  • Print this page
  • Send to a friend

What do you think?
Post your review now

clear rating
Min 1 star. Zero stars will be treated as unrated.

*mandatory fields





Features

Making a name for himself

Making a name for himself

Sin Nombre's Cary Joji Fukunaga learned his lessons well.

To the letter

Forty years later, Costa-Gavras's Z still brims with fury.

Mind over matter

David Cronenberg reflects on a most bizarre body: his own corpus of work.

Fool's gold

Can an Oscar win lead to a cursed career? Here are five stories of postaward professional meltdowns.

We are the championed

Terrorists and teens abound in this year's "Film Comment Selects."

A history of violence

Matteo Garrone's kaleidoscopic Gomorrah wallops you with Italy's crime crisis.

True romantic

James Gray exchanges urban amorality for amour in Two Lovers.

Playing in the dark

MoMA salutes pianist Stuart Oderman's 50 years as the one-man sound of silents.

Junk bonds

Cast and crew recall the making of the classic NYC drug drama The Panic in Needle Park.