"Tommy" --- do you "get" it??

When I think of great musicals of the cinema, TOMMY certainly doesn't come to mind! But, it's a pleasant, quirky diversion, if nothing else. Campier than the original Lp concept would suggest, that's for sure....

On the other hand, SGT. PEPPER is more delightfully bad, and therefore, for me, more watchable.

 

I liked it as a teenager. When I attempted to watch the dvd a couple of years ago, I wondered what it was I liked about it over two decades ago. Apart from Elton John's "Pinball Wizard" and Tina Turner's "Acid Queen," I found it rather tedious.

 

I never really "got it" too much. Considering how much I like Tommy the original album. It dose have some classic scenes though. I picked it up on Superbit dvd the other day and stuck it on for a watch it is very dated and can be disturbing. For as disturbing as "pink floyd the wall" is I find pf-tw easier to watch oddly.

 

I've never seen the appeal of musicals, but the movie "Tommy" was further proof to me that nearly all rockers aren't actors.

 

Before my ex and I were married, she rented E.T. for us to watch. She was raving at how good of a movie it was. And yet, when it finished, she realized she really didn't like it all that much, and I couldn't get over how bad it was. (Granted I slept part of the way through it.) I guess some movies just "do it" for some viewers, and not for others.

 

Hasn't Pete Townsend said that the director Ken Russell didn't "get it" either? More sepcifically, that Pete envisioned Tommy's father killed his mother's boyfriend originally, not vice versa.

 

Love the (original) album, hate the movie.

 

I saw it for the first time 8 or 9 years ago when it was restored and got a quick theater run for 1 week or so. A friend had told me it was fabulous and I really need to see it.

At the end while walking out, the friend admitted that it has not held up so well.

I said it was the most OVER THE TOP film I can ever remember seeing. Over the top, as in completely Over The Top!

Jeff

 

Saw Tommy for the first time when I was in college. I hated it, thought it was just a pretentious mess.

 

I love it, but then, I love Ken Russell too. He has a unique and very quirky, audacious style as a director, and if you're in for a penny, you're in for a pound. Not many people are lukewarm about his work. And as his rant about The Who in The Kids Are Alright shows, he's very passionate about what he does.

Understanding what he was trying to do with Tommy is easier if you see The Devils, Women in Love, and some of his other earlier movies. His style is built far more on visuals than dialogue, and so this should have been a good match. I think the times when the movie doesn't work are due as much to casting misfires (Jack Nicholson??!!) as anything.

Considering that making a movie out of that album was probably a no-win proposition, I think Russell did an admirable job of bringing to the screen some of the nightmarish, otherworldly images and undercurrents from the album -- and of making an actual narrative out of what's a pretty sketchy story on the LP.

 

This is a movie that is BEGGING to be re-made! Think of the built-in audience! Three and a half decades worth of built-in audience. This should be a no-brainer for any movie studio. Just don't let the budget skyrocket and it should re-coup its money back plus some. Oh yeah, I hate the 70's dreck called "Tommy". A very bad movie complete with a singing Jack Nicholson.

 

Most of the flaws the movie has -- pretension, self-indulgence, incoherence -- it shares with the album.

 

The Tommy soundtrack was the first album I ever owned. Bought it just because it had Elton singing Pinball Wizard. i didn't even know who the Who were for another 5 or 6 years!
I get the soundtrack more than the movie, though jack Nicholson singing is kinda cool.

 

It's been running on a lot of cable movie networks of late, so I watched it recently, for the first time in many years. I had hoped it might have graduated into the "so bad it's good" category, but sadly no, it's just bad. Some scenes are hilariously over-the-top, though. Watch Tommy hang-glide! Watch Tommy jog through lava!

 

I loved it when it came out. I was 13 at the time and was way into pinball so it was cool to me at that time of my life. I don't think I got it then and I watched it recently and don't get it now. I didn't enjoy seeing it again as much as I thought I would!!!

Mike

 

I'm with Citizen Dan on this one. I guess y'all should stay away from LISZTOMANIA, heh heh.

 

I saw Tommy at it's original theatrical run in Manhattan at the Ziegfield theater in marvelous "Quintaphonic" sound.

Yikes! - it really wasn't any good then, and it has held up as well as I originally remembered it (and I am a major Who fan). Tommy was NOT the first "rock" movie ( a slight distinction from a "rock n' roll" movie) - but in the 70's "concert documentaries" were more the fashion, and made more sense, than this long form fantasy video.

My favorite rock movie of that era was "Ladies and Gentlemen the Rolling Stones" which I also saw in it's original theatrical run at the Playboy Theater (now gone) in Manhattan. The sound system for that engagement was supplied by The Rolling Stones, and consisted of little more than concert horn stacks piled up in all four corners of the theater (and I mean PILED folks, the front speakers actually blocked a part of the screen). High Fidelity? No way. But it did sound just like being in the front row of MSG - and the ushers were wearing ear plugs.

 

I saw "Tommy" once about ten years ago. I hope to never see it again.

Sean

 

Ironically, "The Kids Are All Right" may be the best rock-and-roll movie I've ever seen.

 

I thought Quadrophenia was much better as a film. (I saw both Tommy and Quadrophenia in the theatre.)

I also think Ken Russell finally "got it" when he made The Commitments.

 

The soundtrack album, I assume you mean.

 

I think Keith Moon probably had the best scene in the whole movie as Uncle Ernie "fiddling about". Moon is right at home playing a lunatic, and he's accustomed to stealing the show as usual. Oh, and watching Ann Margret writhing around in baked beans is the only other thing that caught my attention.

Other than that, those Superbit DVDs are nice and no I don't get it.

 

I am a big fan of Quadrophenia, I thought it captured the themes and feeling of the lp perfectly. I used to be a big Ken Russell fan, especially "The Devils".

It was Alan Parker who "got it" when he made "The Commitments", you might have gotten "Tommy" mixed up the Parker's "The Wall".

 

I hated it the first time I saw it as a teenager. When it came on TV a few months ago, I didn't mind it too much.

The album itself doesn't do a whole lot for me though.