Thursday, April 13, 2006

Tootsie - 1982

This is a fun movie. Dustin Hoffman is a serious actor in New York whose seriousness has made him unworkable. His life consists of acting classes, failed auditions and trying to raise money for his roomate's (Bill Murray) play. (Murray's best line, 'I'd like to open a theater that's only open when it rains.')

In desperation, he dresses as a woman for a role on a soap opera and gets the part. The only thing to do is to plunge into this new life and see how long he can get away with it. He ends up having to lie to just about everyone for various reasons. The highpoint is on one night when he is mistaken for a lesbian, proposed to, attacked by an amourous drunken actor and finally raked over the coals by Teri Garr for loving a different woman.

I think this movie wants to make a serious point about how women should be more assertive. It succeeds to some extent but undercuts it's own message by showing Hoffman's failures when he's too pushy. As a screwball comedy it works though. It's a very good movie.

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