Sunday, March 18, 2007

B-sides: Just a Gigolo

I've been on a Marlene Dietrich kick lately, and this led me from 1930's The Blue Angel (her breakout) to 1979's Just a Gigolo, a Cabaret-esque post-World-War-I melodrama starring David Bowie as, well, a gigolo. Dietrich came out of a 15-year exile to shoot a single scene, collect her $250,000 check and fade away again. Even though Bowie disowned it after a ravaging by critics ("It was my 32 Elvis Presley movies rolled into one," he lamented in 1980), I really want to see it, if only for Dietrich's performance of the title song, the last scene (screen or otherwise) of her career. But the movie's not on Netflix (seems there is no Region 1 DVD). The VHS is on eBay, but I'm reluctant to plunk down $28 for it. Has anyone seen this movie?

This is the first in a continuing series on B-sides, a well-known term from the music industry that I'm adapting for my own purposes. B-sides, in this case, are movies that have been forgotten, overlooked, relegated to second-banana or semi-cult status, or are generally way off the radar of popular culture. Upcoming: Man about Town (an intriguing Affleckian trifle that went straight to DVD last year) and Losin' It (in which Jackie Earle Haley and Tom Cruise go to Tijuana to lose their virginity).

1 comment:

Unknown said...

Falling in love again
Never wanted to
What am I to do
I can't help it