MY MOVIE SHELF: Working Girl

The Task: Watch and write about every movie on my shelf, in order (Blu-rays are sorted after DVDs), by June 10, 2015.  Remaining movies: 132 Days to go: 92

Movie #308:  Working Girl

Has anyone ever thought about the title of this film? If there had been the Internet and Twitter in 1988, I’m sure there would’ve been a dozen clickbait thinkpieces on it, but I’ve no idea if it had ever really been discussed in the traditional formats of the day. Working girl is a term for a prostitute, as we all know, and while the movie Working Girl is not about a prostitute but about a woman trying to make it in corporate America, it is a clever little play on words about how difficult that actually is. Women (even today, not just way back in 1988) aren’t always taken seriously, are sometimes objectified, and are almost always required to play by men’s rules in order to get ahead. This particular working girl, in fact, (Tess McGill, played to perfection by Melanie Griffith) is quite literally prostituted out by  her boss (Oliver Platt) over to some cokehead in Arbitrage (Kevin Spacey), the assumption being she could maybe sleep her way into a better position. It’s gross, but not really all that surprising, and I find the double meaning of the film’s title to be an intriguing detail, an added layer to the richness and depth of the story.

Working Girl is not just about the struggles of women in the business world, though. It’s also about the Haves versus the Have-Nots. After the unfortunate moment with the cokehead from Arbitrage and his porn limo, Tess gets a job working for Katharine Parker (Sigourney Weaver). It’s her first time working for a woman, so she thinks things will finally be different. Katharine, however, is not of the same ilk as Tess. She comes from money, has been afforded every advantage, and has never really had to work or hustle for anything. She thinks Tess is beneath her, and she takes advantage by trying to pass off Tess’s idea for a business deal as her own. Like everything else, Katharine considers it her due.

Thanks to Katharine being laid up with a broken leg in Europe, though, when Tess finds out about the subterfuge, she goes to work correcting it. She contacts the man Katharine was going to reach out to, Jack Trainer (Harrison Ford), and fakes and stumbles her way through this new world, passing herself off as Katharine’s colleague instead of her secretary. It’s crazy, and yet you can’t help rooting for her — because she’s been wronged, because she’s smarter and works harder than almost anyone else around, and because the deck has always been and will always be stacked against her.

There are close calls and shenanigans in all sorts of settings: tropical themed weddings, “lust and tequila,” changing shirts at the office, failing to check the dosage on the Valium, and Tess’s boyfriend Nick (Alec Baldwin) screwing some skinny chick while Tess is supposed to be at class and then still having the cajones to get pissed when she answers “Maybe” to his marriage proposal. It’s a rollercoaster.

Harrison Ford is at maximum charming in this film, shorting circuits for miles in every direction with his serious sexiness overload. Whether he’s making up stories about where he got his chin scar or discarding the idea that Tess might not like him or admitting that he MIGHT have peeked when he got her undressed for bed, he is the most desirable man on the planet or any other planet in this movie. Han Solo IS a scruffy-looking nerf herder next to Jack Trainer. He’s sharp, witty, quick on his feet, and never once patronizing or condescending to Tess the way literally almost every other person she’s met up to that point has been. “The Earth moved. The angels wept. The Polaroids are … are … uh … are in my other coat.” More’s the pity.

This particular tale also benefits tremendously from the presence of Tess’s best friend Cynthia (Joan Cusack), who is loving and supportive but who also doesn’t want to see her friend get hurt by all this social-climbing and who frequently tells it like it is. “Sometimes I sing and dance around the house in my underwear. Doesn’t make me Madonna. Never will.”

Some people might dub Working Girl a Cinderella story, but it’s not. Tess works and strives for every single thing she has. She knows her stuff, she’s aware of the stakes, and she plays their game. And she wins. “You can bend the rules plenty once you get to the top, but not while you’re trying to get there. And if you’re someone like me, you can’t get there without bending the rules.” It’s a gamble, but it pays off in spades. She gets the better of Katharine’s “bony ass,” she gets the guy who is WAY BETTER BY LIKE A MILLION TIMES than the disconcertingly hairy guy she was with before, and she even gets a much better position than she thought when Oren Trask (Philip Bosco) offers her a job at his office. And she never once had to prostitute herself.

It kind of makes you want to sing a soaring Carly Simon song, doesn’t it?

MY MOVIE SHELF: Suspect

 

The Task: Watch and write about every movie on my shelf, in order (Blu-rays are sorted after DVDs), by June 10, 2015.  Remaining movies: 162  Days to go: 115

Movie #276:  Suspect

I love it when my kids watch these movies with me. Tonight my son sat down for Suspect, and he’s the exact age I was when it came out. It’s funny to me the ways in which our initial impressions were eerily similar. Are movie watching habits/preferences hereditary?

He kept being struck by the music in this one. Being a murder mystery, Suspect is filled with striking, dramatic music with ominous tones and startling crescendos. They did not underplay their hand on this one, is what I’m saying. I remember being just as affected when I was younger, finding the whole thing a lot more gruesome and terrifying than it perhaps is.

Suspect is the story of a murdered law clerk and the deaf-mute homeless man (Liam Neeson as Carl Wayne Anderson, showing an aptitude for punching things well before it became his vocation) on trial for the crime. His put-upon public defender is Kathleen Riley (Cher) who winds up illegally working with lobbyist Eddie Sanger (Dennis Quaid) — a smooth-talking sly fox who gets sort of cornered into jury duty on Kathleen’s case by way of sexy banter– to find the real killer and the underlying conspiracy that led to it. The movie is tense and puzzling and the final showdown is incredibly satisfying, as well as being a surprising revelation. I’ve seen it a dozen times, at least, and I never get tired of it.

First and foremost, I can’t possibly emphasize enough how much of a sweater and jacket game both Cher and Dennis Quaid are bringing to this party. She’s got warm, comfy sweaters she lounges around reading case files in, big chunky bold print sweaters for looking chic but casual at the office, and gorgeous midi-length sweater dresses with pockets for conveniently hiding secretly delivered keys. To say nothing of her shearling-lined coat she wears with a jaunty beret or the smartly cropped black leather number she sports in the final scene. Dennis Quaid, meanwhile, has chunky fisherman’s cable knits for days, which he pairs with upscale leather bomber jackets in a combination thick enough to save his life from a maniac wielding a straight razor. Sad it no doubt got ruined by the cut and all the blood, though when he takes it off it’s “Hello abs!”

Supporting turns come by Philip Bosco as the maybe-underhanded District Attorney Paul Gray, Joe Mantegna as the ruthless, arrogant and snide prosecutor Charlie Stella, and an unfortunately-coiffed John Mahoney as the having-none-of-Kathleen’s-shit Judge Helms. One or more of them are onto her.

The movie’s tangential attempts at a little social commentary by way of Carl’s afflictions are pretty half-assed and ineffective, and I must admit I keep wondering if maybe the writers made him a deaf-mute just because Liam Neeson is this awesome, imposing figure to look at but his accent was too strong at the time. It was 1987, after all. It seems plausible to me.

Still, like I said, the central mystery is satisfying and the chemistry between the two leads is surprisingly potent. Quaid was at the peak of his sex-appeal in this era, and Cher has this awesome, reluctant but enthusiastic laugh to close the film that you just know is accompanied by some serious frisky activities behind her closed office door. Seems like good old Kathleen Riley won’t be feeling so put-upon anymore.