Reds

The kind of film that has sadly just about disappeared - the personal,
auteur driven epic. Very rarely if ever now will a studio give a film
maker huge funds to do a risky, personal, not obviously commercial
project, one that could never be made as a `small' film.

While critics can nit pick, and a few of their points may be valid (both
Beatty and Diane Keaton were at least 10 years older then their real life characters,
making some behavior seem overly naive and juvenile instead of understandable
for their youth and inexperience), overall this is a masterful combining of the big picture
and the personal, and how the two interrelate in life. How do we deal with emotions that
are much messier than our ideals of how to live?

It explores the twin faces of revolution - the sometimes desperate need to fight to
create a new order, but the danger that the new order may be just as corrupt as the old.

Rare is the film that deeply, honestly explores both idealism and the dark realities of
political compromise. Rarer still is the film that explores both in a personal way, without
judgment, but with deep insight.

Beautifully shot by Vitorio Storraro, wonderful production design.

Keaton and Beatty are very good in the leads, and the supporting cast, down to the
smallest role, is generally magnificent. Especially amazing are Maureen Stapleton
as Emma Goldman, and Jack Nicholson in one of his very best (and most restrained)
performances as Eugene O'Neil. He may capture the true pain of trying to live through
the eyes of an artist as well as anyone I've ever seen.

The Blu-ray is particularly beautiful.

Thrilling, challenging, gorgeous, emotional and epic. They don't make 'em
like this anymore, and that's our loss.

It's a brilliant movie really; romantic, funny, intelligent and sad, as well as historical. John Reed was a confused American, or perhaps just an inspired one. His real battle was for the American working man, an underpaid, over-worked breed of Americana who helped form this nation. Reed really just believe, if you break it down into bare essence, that men should be treated fairly. He was labeled a communist, and probably believed himself to be one on some level, but his views were really more socialistic. This was his basis, and that basis took him to Russia, where he became an unwitting spokesman for the communist regime, his words twisted and translated to meet the Party's needs. His heart was just with the working man, and a misguided feeling that life should be fair. His writing speaks for itself--read "Ten Days that Shook the World". Ah, but there's more behind Reed's Russian connection, far more. He, along with the people who formed his circle of friends, was a bohemian in all respects. They were people of art, and of talent, intellectual artists in their own right, and far ahead of their time. The movie touches upon it, and leads one to want to learn more about the man, and his time. His relationships with Gene O'Neill and Louise Bryant goes far beyond what is portrayed, but the movie does at least give one the insight into those relationships. In their time, Reed, Bryant, and O'Neill did much in America for American writers, and for American theatre. They were all people of art, and of deep emotion. In a time of growing comformity, they tossed comformity aside. Their lifestyles were not the lifestyles of "proper people" of the time, but they gave great emotion to merely living, and to living each day as it came. Each of them touched this world in some way, left something of themselves behind, and that's what Reds is really all about...what one leaves behind. John Reed is the only American ever buried in the Kremlin...hardly a matter to be left a faded shade in history. His belief was strong, and he stood by those beliefs, and that's something that most of us never achieve in the long run of things.

It's a good movie, and worth seeing, and worth remembering.

It was nice to see this movie again since I saw it in the movies back in early 1982. It is a refreshing alternate to Dr Zhivago which was in the same time frame.