Siskel
Her 14th, and newest film is "Nuts," which
co-stars Richard Dreyfuss. It sounds like, from the title, that it might be a comedy. But
no. The former Funny Girl is now playing a serious woman, a rebel from a middle
class home, a call girl accused of manslaughter in the death of one of her
clients who got violent with her. Her family wants her declared insane, to go to
a hospital rather than jail.
But Streisand doesn't think she's insane. The film
is one long courtroom hearing with Streisand's sanity on trial. She objects,
however, to her attorney, Dreyfuss's request that she sees a psychiatrist. Of
course, Streisand naturally proves that she's better than Dreyfuss at cross
examining a witness against her, in this case a state mental health doctor.
And Streisand being Streisand, well, she even takes on the judge, James
Whitmore.
"Nuts" was a disappointment to me. And I think part of it is the material. It
seems like a TV movie of the week with a social issue, in this case, sanity,
sexual abuse, and the way men view strong women. Now this might work on the tube
with a lesser actress, but on the big screen, with its biggest star, and we've
known this for 19 years since "Funny Girl" that Barbra Streisand is very sane.
She's very smart. She is quite cunning and therefore it is not credible for her
to be challenged. We don't believe it for a second that she might be insane.
She's worthy of a more challenging story. So I suppose, in a way, it's a
compliment to her that I didn't like her in "Nuts."
Ebert
Well, I didn't like her in "Nuts" either but I don't think it's a compliment to
her, because after all, we just said that she's a good enough actress to play a
19 year old boy, so why isn't she a good enough actress to play a woman her own
age who's nuts. I think she is a good enough actress to do that. What bothered
me was, at the beginning of the movie she's so clearly, totally off the wall
that in the first 25 minutes of the film you're absolutely convinced she should
be locked up. And I'm not even really sure by the end of the movie exactly how
balanced she is. That's one criticism. The second one is, you can see right from
the play, is the whole second act with all those would be shocking revelations
about Karl Malden, I mean come on. I won't give it away, but come on.
Siskel
Well, in a way that's my point. I think
the material is not really worthy of her. If she played it well, it would have
still come across as just another court room drama. She can do better.
Certainly, we've seen over 19 years she has done better. And that's what we're
looking for in the next 19.
