For The Boys (1991)

Bette Midler might be playing Bette Midler in For The Boys, the fictional story of USO entertainers Dixie Leonard and Eddie Sparks, but she nails it (as the former) and deservedly received an Academy Award nomination for her work. She sounds great in the many enjoyable musical sequences that pepper the story (using standards covering the film's fifty year span) and is supported by a fine cast (including James Caan as Sparks, George Segal, Melissa Manchester, Patrick O'Neal, Norman Fell and Dori Brenner). The movie is long and the make-up used to age the two stars is not the most realistic but I did find it to be absorbing and more than the sum of these parts.

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Chapter Two (1979)

Chapter Two has not aged well despite the poster's proclamation of it being a very special movie from Neil Simon. James Caan is miscast as a Neil Simon type writer getting over the death of his first wife with shrill Marsha Mason as a Neil Simon type second wife (a role she played in real life before their divorce) and Valerie Harper as a Neil Simon type anorexic looking best friend. It's overlong and underwritten (by Neil Simon) but ends with a nice surprise as Marilyn McCoo sings the trite theme I'm On Your Side over the credits - not a good place for an audience to start taking notice of a film.

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