The Ritz
by Richard Lester
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DVD details
Actor: F. Murray Abraham, Jack Weston, Jerry Stiller, Kaye Ballard, Rita MorenoDirector: Richard Lester
Brand: Warner Brothers
DVD: Region Code 1
Audio: English (Original Language), Dolby Digital 1.0; English (Subtitled); French (Subtitled)
Format: Closed-captioned, Color, DVD-Video, NTSC, Widescreen
Picture Format: 1.66:1
Running Time: 91 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2008-01-08
Audience Rating: R (Restricted)
Studio: Warner Home Video
DVD Reviews of The Ritz
DVD Review: Forgotten memories of a great movie
Summary: 5 Stars
I first saw The Ritz when I was in college back in 1977. I loved the movie then and was thrilled to be able to purchase it from Amazon. I laughed over and over again while watching. Rita Moreno was awesome in this movie and all of the other characters did a great job as well.
I noticed a couple of actors in the background from more recent roles. The guy from Cheers ( Cliff the mailman ). This is a laugh out loud movie for me and I am sure most would enjoy it as well. If you were just coming out in the late 70's, you will understand the impact of this movie. I am from a small town and such things were rarely discussed. Purchase this movie and watch it with a group. Trust me, you will love it !!
DVD Review: DON'T BUY THIS MOVIE!
Summary: 1 Stars
This is an awful movie. A plot that falls short, great talent wasted, gags that weren't funny thirty-two years ago, and the usual assortment of straight men being shocked by aggressive gays. What a snore. What a yawn. What a waste of a good Friday night trying to watch this piece of trash! I am planning to sell my copy and hopefully will recoup some of investment but PLEASE DON'T BUY THIS MOVIE, YOU'LL BE VERY SORRY!DVD Review: Googy Gomez the last of the real trash Queens
Summary: 5 Stars
This is the famous pre-aids gay movie from the great, now forgotten, Richard Lester who developed it from a Terence Mcnally off-Broadway play.
Without Lester there would have been no Bonnie and Clyde, no Godfather, nor The Graduate. An American in London (not Paris) Lester who presented the world with those incredibly 'up close' Beatles movies in 1964 and 66 teased Hollywood with the new 'Hollywood-Look-that-Could-Be' especially in lighting and editing when Hollywood was still muddling along with 50s style westerns and musicals, whose staple products often had dated, garish colors and frigid, distant editing.
By 1976 he had made his mark but not greatly his money.The wunderkinds of the seventies, Spielberg et al, would take all of the credit for the seismic shift of the early seventies but much was also due to Lester.
This movie was not popular on release but was and is fabulous all the same. Treat Williams and Rita Moreno develop the movie's tone. He a mild mannered eager to please detective with a disturbing high pitched voice,on the lookout for on-the-lam Jack Weston escaping from his Mafiosa brother in law; she, a he who is a she, drama monarch of the house, Googy Gomez the great Klutz-Queen of the New York bath house circuit. A young F Murray Abraham doing a very nice laid back Groucho Marx in undershorts, supports the insurgency.
There are no movies like this any more. The Beatles movies were full of that lovely Lennonesque self deprecation. People now want to laugh at others rather than themselves. Take a look at this movie and see how things used to be in some movies you could go to.
DVD Review: Off-beat comedy - lots of fun for the broadminded
Summary: 4 Stars
Terence McNally's play finds a straight husband hiding out from his murderous brother-in-law in a gay bath-house in NYC. This off-beat comedy has lots of laughs, if you are broad-minded. Filmed in England by Richard Lester, five actors from the original cast recreate their roles - Jack Weston, Jerry Stiller, F. Murray Abraham, Paul B. Price and Rita Moreno who won a Tony Award as the almost talent-less would-be nightclub singer. DVD transfer is fine, in its original widescreen frame. Only extra is a trailer. Great fun!DVD Review: Funnier the First Time
Summary: 4 Stars
While still a very funny movie, The Ritz is probably better suited to an audience uncomfortable in their sexuality. Set in a gay bathhouse, the clientelle are all stereotypes and most of those are unflattering. F. Murray Abraham does do a good job at being the nelliest queen in the place. And while Treat Williams is always a treat to look at, playing (satirically) queer makes him a dull light in the movie. The rest of the characters who are not denizens of the bathhouse (save, Rita Moreno)are so homophobic they keep the humor from hitting the rafters.
Not so much a lead balloon as a leaded ballon.
Friends who have come to expect a little more skin in their gay tinged flicks were non-plussed at my screening.
Chalk this one up as "Quirky".
Times have changed, so(in memory)this was Funnier the First time.
Description of The Ritz
An all-male Manhatten bathouse becomes a hilarious hideout for a man from Cleveland ducking the mob. The fat, frisky film of the Broadway farce featuring original stars Jack Weston and Rita Moreno. Year: 1976Terrence McNally adapted his Broadway farce for this wild, headlong comedy set in one of the gay bathhouses that were once a staple of New York culture. Jack Weston plays a guy who makes the mistake of crossing his gangster brother-in-law. Fearing for his life, he hides in the gay baths and the door-slamming chaos begins. Directed by Richard Lester, the comedy is adept and well handled, with Weston watching his back while trying to pass as a regular customer. It's hard to tell which is funnier: Treat Williams as an undercover cop with a falsetto voice or Rita Moreno as the baths' supremely untalented--and even more supremely self-confident--singer, Googie Gomez. Her performances alone make this movie worth watching. --Marshall Fine
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