69) All That Jazz

All That Jazz (1979)


Director: Bob Fosse

Starring: Roy Scheider, Jessica Lange, Leland Palmer, Ann Reinking, Erszebet Foldi, Cliff Gorman, Ben Vereen, John Lithgow


I didn't know what I was in the mood to watch tonight. I considered a few things but none seemed quite right. As I looked at the DVDs on the shelf my eyes settled on All That Jazz. I'd bought it a while ago but had never found myself in the mood to watch it. With there being nothing specific I was in the mood for, now seemed like as good a time as any.

Celebrated choreographer and director Joe Gideon (Scheider) struggles with a lack of inspiration trying to choreograph his upcoming Broadway musical. This stress is compounded by his inability to finish the film he is directing, which has been in post production for months and is long over schedule and budget. With his personal life neglected for the sake of his art, Gideon finds himself on the verge of a complete physical and emotional breakdown.

There are certain movies which you just put together in your head, even if their is no real relationship between the two. For a long time I had always put All That Jazz together with Cabaret assuming it to be a sequel or an imitation as the covers looked quite similar. So I was quite chuffed when I discovered that they shared a director so there was actually a connection between the two. That director, renowned Broadway choreographer and film director Bob Fosse, should go alongside Hal Ashby (who I discussed in relation to The Last Detail and Shampoo) as another of the influential Hollywood Renaissance directors of the 1960s and 1970s who have faded from the popular consciousness unlike Francis Coppola, Robert Altman and Dennis Hopper.

All That Jazz is effectively an autobiographical film by Fosse said to capture his physical and emotional breakdown while directing and choreographing Chicago for Broadway in the mid-1970s. The musical we watch Gideon working on in All That Jazz has some visual similarities to Chicago, while the film about a stand up comic which he is also labouring over is an obvious nod to Fosse's 1994 biography of Lenny Bruce, Lenny (interestingly All That Jazz includes a scene in which Gideon is read a review of his film which criticises the direction of the film, while heaping praise on the actor who played the stand up, making me wonder whether Fosse felt he did not receive as much of the credit as he felt he deserved for the film's success, while Dustin Hoffman was widely praised for his performance as Lenny Bruce). As an autobiographical film, All That Jazz is a pretty tough piece of self-examination. Fosse doesn't really pull any punches in showing Gideon as a selfish, pill-popping, womaniser who mistreats those in his life because his only priority is his art.

There are similarities between this film and Fellini's 8 1/2. Both films explore the mind of the artist by paralleling scenes from the protagonist's life with scenes obviously taking place in their minds. There runs a thread of scenes through All That Jazz in which Gideon discusses different aspects of his life with a glowing, angelic woman, credited as Angelique, played by Jessica Lange.

It was interesting to see something quite different from Roy Scheider. I haven't seen a whole heap of Scheider's work but I've seen a bit. He first came onto my radar when I was a kid and he was starring in the TV sci-fi series SeaQuest DSV. While that is probably not the role he would have liked his career to be judged on, when I put it together with what I'd seen since of some of his more highly regarded performances in Jaws, The French Connection and Marathon Man, I'd placed Scheider in whatever the category that is not quite action hero was. He played policemen, tough guys, but not the muscle bound, superman type. To see him doing something very different in this film, playing a choreographer and director, was really impressive. He did a fantastic job of showing the gradual deterioration of his character under the weight of the different burdens in his life and rightfully earned him a Best Actor nomination (he was beaten by Dustin Hoffman for Kramer vs Kramer).

All That Jazz is very much a sign of its time, very much a film of the Hollywood Renaissance. It is a slightly messy film in its attempt to be artistic and experimental. It is also an extremely self indulgent film. But despite it's faults it is a really interesting film and rightfully received a lot of praise, winning four Oscars as well as the Palme d'Or at the 1980 Cannes Film Festival. At times you might feel like you are a bit lost in this film, but once you get the flow of it it is really interesting.