SYNOPSICS
Becoming Cary Grant (2017) is a English movie. Mark Kidel has directed this movie. Mark Kidel,Cary Grant,Frank Sinatra,Judy Balaban are the starring of this movie. It was released in 2017. Becoming Cary Grant (2017) is considered one of the best Documentary,Biography movie in India and around the world.
The future star grow up as Archie Leach, son of a tailor in Bristol, but was traumatized when his parent's marriage broke down, leading to his father leaving for another and the bottle, his mother utterly abandoning him to be raised by an aunt. A friend introducing him as knave to the variety theatre, he joined a traveling company and on their first-ever tour overseas stayed behind in New York. He gradually made his way I-on Broadway as handsome antagonist, until offered a Hollywood contract with Paramount, which proved rather disappointing, but he went on to become a major star, brilliant under directors like Hitchcock who tapped into his commoner past. Several marriages brought mostly frustration, like the reconciliation with his mother, whom he put up in an English home, only his daughter proved a relationship for life.
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Becoming Cary Grant (2017) Reviews
A compelling story ruined by over pretentious directing
The Cary Grant/Archibald Leach story is a treasure trove almost impossible to fail at. In fact it's such a compelling story that despite the failings of the director one does stay through to the end watching this tale. And personally I don't have a problem with missing bits of the story like other reviewers do or with the somber tone of the story. The somber tone, is an integral part of Cary's life, and as long as the director tells the story I think he does have the right to omit parts that don't fit into the story he wishes to tell. On the other hand I did find his pretentiousness very annoying. Having such a wonderful source material the director Mark Kidel had to show how he entered Cary Grant's mind and deciphered his innermost secrets. So he keeps on showing us scenes from Grant's therapeutic sessions with LSD pretending he knows what Grant saw there. It's groundless, pretentious and completely unnecessary for the story itself. But it's being repeated over and over again, and I found it to be detrimental to the movie
From my perspective, this was amazing
Not every movie is for everybody. If you're a die hard Cary Grant fanatic and wanted it to be just documenting everything he did in life, you're gonna be disappointed. This is merely exploring his pursuit of happiness. It's fascinating hearing about the things that had happened in his past and how they shaped him to become who he was. It's also very meaningful to me to have movies like this. It's a unique perspective and it made me think and feel heavily. Which is something I really love from a movie, and if you do too then you might like it. I hate not giving it 10 stars, but definitely as far as film making goes it's not award winning. Still great nonetheless.
Very disappointing biography of who was probably America's greatest actor
I was really looking forward to this. I had read what was probably the best written biography of Grant (by Marc Eliot), but I thought so much could be done with film supplementing the story. The best addition -- a look at the LSD sessions. Worst deletion -- even the mention that Grant may have been bisexual or gay. And then there are the MANY films Grant took himself (like home movies). Occasionally they are meaningful to the story, but often you looked at them having no idea who the people were in them, what the buildings, or why they were important. Similarly, there were excerpts from films that implied that they had some deep meanings about Grant's real life. Or then again, maybe they were just words written by a screen play writer. I'd say buy the book by Marc Eliot. I would guess that a lot of people will be disappointed by this video version of Cary Grant's life.
Many holes in story.
How can you do this "documentary" without discussing the years he lived with Randolph Scott. I heard not one reference to this part of his life. I don't know if they were gay or not, and I don't really care, but I've read they had a very close relationship. The film is incomplete without it.
Good Documentary
Becoming Cary Grant (2017) *** (out of 4) This here is like many recent documentaries where the subject themselves tells their story. The subject here is the one and only Cary Grant who we hear from interview clips as well as actor speaking from an unreleased autobiography. If you're familiar with the life of Grant then I seriously doubt that you're going to learn anything new here. We start off hearing about his LSD trips later in life and then we bounce back to his troubled childhood, which includes losing his mother to mental illness and then reaching out to her decades later. We cover his move to Hollywood, his rise to stardom as well as various roles throughout his career. Other documentaries have covered this stories several times before, which is why I say there's really not too much new stuff here. What new stuff there is includes some home movies that Grant filmed, which are quite interesting and towards the end there's an interview with his last girlfriend as well as his daughter. Truth be told, I would have preferred more to do with these two ladies as I'm sure they had some great stories to share. As it is, BECOMING CARY GRANT does a nice job for those unfamiliar with the life of the actor but at the same time I wasn't really bowled over by the structure of the film. I think some of the visuals go a bit too far as the story itself is strong enough to hold the viewer's attention. Still, fans of Grant will want to check this out.