Nickelodeon (1976)

User Rating:

6.2/10   

Director:

Peter Bogdanovich

Writers:

Peter Bogdanovich (writer)
W.D. Richter (writer)

Release Date:

21 December 1976 (USA)

Genre:

Comedy

Tagline:

Dreams. 5 cents.

Plot:

This homage to the childhood days of the motion pictures starts in 1910, when the young attorney Leo...

Plot Keywords:

Celebrity | Hollywood | Movie Business | Movie Production | Film Making

Awards:

1 nomination

Cast

Ryan O'Neal	...	Leo Harrigan
Burt Reynolds	...	Buck Greenway
Tatum O'Neal	...	Alice Forsyte
Brian Keith	...	H.H. Cobb
Stella Stevens	...	Marty Reeves
John Ritter	...	Franklin Frank
Jane Hitchcock	...	Kathleen Cooke
Jack Perkins	...	Michael Gilhooley
Brion James	...	Bailiff
Sidney Armus	...	Judge
Joe Warfield	...	Defense Attorney
Tamar Cooper	...	Edna Mae Gilhooley
Alan Gibbs	...	Patents Hooligan
Mathew Anden	...	Hecky
Lorenzo Music	...	Mullins

Runtime:

121 min

Country:

UK | USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono

Certification:

Iceland:L | West Germany:6 (f) | Finland:K-8 | Sweden:11 | UK:PG (2003) (re-rating) | UK:U (original rating) | USA:PG

Filming Locations:

California, USA

Company:

British Lion Film Corporation

Trivia:

Cybill Shepherd states in her autobiography that she turned down the role of Kathleen Cooke.

Quotes:

Franklin Frank: Okay, then you tell the actors what you want them to do in front of the camera, you tell me to crank it, and when you've had enough you just tell me to cut.
Leo Harrigan: Cut?
Franklin Frank: Then you do the same thing all over again with the next scene, and well, that's it.
Leo Harrigan: That's it?
Franklin Frank: That's it.
Leo Harrigan: That's all D.W. Griffith does?
Franklin Frank: Sure, more or less. They tell me Griffith doesn't say "cut", he says "cease".
Leo Harrigan: Griffith says "cease". Well, I can do that.
Franklin Frank: Then you can direct. Let's go.

Movie Connections:

Referenced in Easy Riders, Raging Bulls: How the Sex, Drugs and Rock 'N' Roll Generation Saved Hollywood (2003)

Overdone slapstick gags make for a tedious look at early film-making...

If director Peter Bogdanovich hadn't used such a heavy-handed slapstick treatment of his little epic about early film-making called NICKELODEON, there might have emerged a fond tribute to the pioneering days of silent films in the early part of the 20th Century.

But instead, he has filled NICKELODEON with a whole series of non-stop sight gags that become tiresome and repetitious, even more so because none of the characters involved really come to life. As the pretty heroine of the piece, JANE HITCHCOCK has very limited abilities beyond staring wide-eyed into the camera lens for comic effect. BURT REYNOLDS at least does derive several good chuckles from his comedy efforts as a reluctant participant in RYAN O'NEAL's troupe of silent film actors.

O'Neal has obviously chosen to play his role as though he has just watched a Harold Lloyd film, wearing spectacles for his first entrance and doing the bumbling sight gags on cue, as hapless a hero as Lloyd was in all his comedies. He's not too bad, but is never as funny as he was in WHAT'S UP DOC?, an earlier Bogdanovich film.

Tecbnically, the film is handsomely produced and pleasing to look at in color, but STELLA STEVENS is given little to do in what amounts to a supporting role. JOHN RITTER doesn't have too much opportunity to display his comic gifts. Entirely too much footage is devoted to a rough and tumble fight between Reynolds and O'Neal that takes up too much time with too many slapstick pratfalls to emerge as anything more than filler.

The film plods along without the benefit of a tight script or a really compelling story and suffers, mainly, from the heavy-handed approach to comedy.