HELLO AGAIN
US, 1986, 97 minutes, Colour.
Shelley Long, Judith Ivey, Gabriel Byrne, Corbin Bensen, Sela Ward, Austin Pendleton.
Directed by Frank Perry.
Hello Again is a pleasantly innocuous updating and reworking of Noel Coward's Blithe Spirit. It is also a star vehicle for Shelley Long (Cheers as well as film's like Night Shift, Outrageous Fortune). Corbin Bernsen (L.A. Law) is her husband and Irish actor Gabriel Byrne (Defence of the Realm, Julia and Julia) is strangely miscast as a doctor in New York. Judith Ivey tends to steal all her scenes as the daffy white witch sister.
The film was directed by Frank Perry, a director of many interesting film's written by his wife Eleanor (David and Lisa, Last Summer) but whose later career was quite varied-(Monsignor, Mommie Dearest).
1. Entertaining frothy comedy, Americana? New York locations?
2. Special effects for the incantations and the ghost? The world of affluence and ordinariness? The musical score?
3. The film as a star vehicle for Shelley Long? Her comic style and personality?
4. The title and its reference to marriage and the ghosts? An updating and reworking of Blithe Spirit? How effective a ghost story?
5. The focus on Lucy: her long marriage, love for her husband, for her son? The comedy with her being accident prone and the details of her gaffes? Dressing up, going to parties, people ignoring her? her glamour and her friendship? Her friendship with her sister? The dilemma in middle age and where life was leading? Her husband and his promotion? The accident and her choking? Her dying and seeing the Irish doctor? The pathos of her funeral? The humour of her being raised and not knowing that anything had happened? Her being persuaded that it was a year later - going back to where she worked so well with the children, her son and his work and marriage, her husband and the promotion, the development on the hospital wing, the destruction of the children's centre Her accepting the reality? Being briefed by her sister? Going to see her husband and finding him in bed? The marriage? Going back to the doctor? Trying to persuade him of the truth, the tests? The hospital administrators and their hostility? Her wanting to set up the child care centre? Her going to the friendly man and his believing in her? The press discovering the reality, the press conference, her being hounded, her attempts at disguise? The scepticisms, denunciation? The plan to expose him - her greed, the details about her life? Her conceding the truth? The need for Lucy to find true love in order to stay alive? The friendship and clashes with the doctor? Endangering his career, setting up the stunt for him? The happy ending and a chance to begin again?
6. The husband and his ambitions, plastic surgery, the elegant and arrogant patients, their snobbery? Parties, promotions? The administrator? Lucy as a liability, her gaffes? His relationship with Kim? His hopes? Her death? His marrying Kim, getting the job, the great success, pandering to the rich? His discussions with Lucy and not wanting to go back to her? His hopes for success? The expose with Kim? His getting her? The satire in his characterisation?
7. Kim and her glamour, the best friend from schooldays, her many marriages, philosophy of marriage, money? Her eye on Lucy's husband? The death, her remarrying? Her being upset with Lucy's presence? The press and publicity? Her denunciation of fraud? The set-up of the expose and her wealthy husband coming back to life, her believing it and being caught, humiliated?
8. The sketch of Lucy's son, his skill as a chef, his father's? His grief at his mother's death? His setting up a restaurant, marriage, happiness, in on the plot?
9. The sister and her eccentricity, her witchcraft shop, the spells, the comedy and her gaffes? Society looking down on her.., her raising Lucy from the dead? The humour of the incantations? Her knowledge of the conditions? Helping Lucy readjust, with the doctor, the plan to raise Kim's husband from the dead and expose herself? Love at first sight with the millionaire? A happy couple?
10. The millionaire - Austin Pendleton's style and comedy?
11. The snobs of the city, plastic surgery patients, hospital administration, the investment in wings for surgery? The contrast with the needs for funds for child care centres?
12. The spoof of the media and their hounding personalities, promoting stories, exposes?
13. The doctor: Gabriel Byrne miscast as the doctor? In New York, at the hospital, his hopes and ambitions, authorities suspicious, his meeting Lucy, suspicions, the tests, in love with her, exasperated by her, in danger of losing his position, the final expose and the reconciliation?
14. Frothy and pleasant American comedy?
