A Walk on the Moon | Diane Lane, Viggo Mortensen | Petting and Pawing in the Catskills

A Walk on the Moon | Diane Lane, Viggo Mortensen | A Walk on the Good Side

DVDs:

A Walk on the Moon

	A Walk on the Moon Diane Lane, Viggo Mortensen Miramax, 1999 average customer review:based on 112 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

Petting and Pawing in the Catskills

I get an emotional kick out of A Walk on the Moon, its double-entendre title aside. For me, the DVD is a winner for three reasons: 1) Viggo Mortensen plays a romantic (OK, lusty) leading man; 2) Diane Lane does her unfaithful best three years before her Academy Award-winning turn opposite Richard Gere in Unfaithful; and 3) I get to experience, albeit vicariously, a smidgen of the goings-on at summertime resorts in the Catskills. Let me work my way backward. ...

As a tween living on the East Coast in the mid-'70s, I recall my cousins' families and mine driving upstate to Sullivan County, New York, several weekends out of every summer. Destination: Great big country house a la The Waltons. With my cousins and I belting out every lyric to sunny songs such as The Captain and Tennille's "Love Will Keep Us Together" and Elton John's "Philadelphia Freedom" as their melodies bounced around the car and out of the open windows, life felt as if it could not get any better. Approaching the Catskills, we would read aloud the colorful billboards announcing the different summer resorts. One time I got up the nerve to ask the adults in the car why we never went to any of those resorts and was told matter-of-factly that we would not be accepted there. So as I got older, I always fantasized that the Catskills resorts had to be boatloads of fun to be so exclusive and all. Dirty Dancing (20th Anniversary Edition), while fictional, definitely gave me a glimpse into the exciting lifestyle behind those wonderful billboards. All of this to say that when watching A Walk on the Moon, I feel like an outsider looking into a life I never had the privilege to enjoy. ...

A Walk on the Moon also has many cinematic elements in its favor: breathtaking cinematography, a painstaking attention to time and place, and authentic regional dialects and vernacular. For those viewers who perceive the film's pacing as long and drawn-out, I challenge them with this paradigm shift: Think of the slow pacing as a metaphor for lust's fever running its course amid summer's sweltering heat. ...

Diane Lane is a force to be reckoned with when she portrays a character whose marriage just isn't working out. A Walk on the Moon predated Unfaithful (Widescreen Edition) by three years, so we viewers get a chance to see how she has perfected acting out the visceral female erotic response that perhaps many women envy. That pivotal scene at the rear of the bus, in which she and the Blouse Man seem totally oblivious to a major milestone in world history -- hence, the film's title -- is no less intense than the scene in Unfaithful when she is on the train reminiscing about quivering beneath (hunka-hunka-burnin'-love luscious) Olivier Martinez hours earlier. Watching her squirming in her seat on that train, as she alternates between bliss and angst, I felt as if I had experienced the affair! In fact, I have had to hit the Pause button on the remote, leave the room and ice down my forehead.

Lane knows how to embody a free spirit, whether in Unfaithful, in which her character double-crosses her attorney husband -- who ironically stakes his career on loyalty -- in Under the Tuscan Sun (Widescreen Edition), where American divorcee meets Fellini's La Dolce Vita (Deluxe Collector's Edition), or here, in A Walk on the Moon. ...

Lastly, the No. 1 reason I love A Walk on the Moon is Viggo Mortensen in the role of the Blouse Man. His gaze alone is intense. He possesses a certain je ne sais quoi, an erotically hypnotic, intangible quality that actors such as Clark Gable, Marlon Brando and Steve McQueen translated very well on screen. Serving as brilliant contemporary examples would be Robert DeNiro, Idris Elba and Clive Owen. Oh, and Daniel Sunjata (oh, sing a joyous, sweet Noel). Female actors who also have that seductive quality include Kathleen Turner and Faye Dunaway as past examples; Jessica Lange, Angelina Jolie and Vivica Fox as current examples.

This DVD, A Walk on the Moon, has the starpower and emotional depth of a retro classic. Oh, and by the way, if the Blouse Man does not inspire you to go shopping, please check your pulse.

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A Walk on the Good Side

This is an extraordinary little film. Beautifully acted all the way round, it chronicles one family's passage through the twisty free-love rapids of the sixties - its impact on the parents, the children, and the grandma. It has a heart as big as the era, and a message as profoundly sensible as ever you could wish for. I have heard so many people say that they are stymied why it didn't go bigger. Splendid!

Diane Lane is a sexual goddess

Diane Lane stars in this great movie set in 1969 upstate New York. Pearl is the wife of Marty and mother of Pearl and she should be spending the summer relaxing at a Jewish camp while watching the kids. She meets a hippie salesman who awakens her inner sexual goddess. Her life falls apart though when her teenage daughter, trying to rebel herself, catches her mother. Pearl must then face the difficult decision of staying with her family or following her heart. Or maybe she can have both.

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a sleeper!

Little known film, but excellent actng throughout! No wonder Diane Lane has become a star!

Movie Review of "A Walk on the Moon"

If you grew up in the 1950's and 1960's you will probably enjoy this film which evokes nostalgia for the simpler times (pre-electronic age). Such a scenario as evidenced by the movie plot has been played out by many people. Anyone who did not follow his dreams can identify with something in this film. I have to agree with at least one reviewer that this is a highly UNDERRATED film! I thought the acting was superb on the part of everyone. Diane Lane is a talented beauty. You can really feel her pain if you are not already jaded! This movie makes me yearn for the friendlier times when people knew their neighbors, felt much safer and when life seemed less complicated. If you're a romantic you will probably enjoy this film. If you didn't grow up during the two decades I cited above, you may be incapable of appreciating the nuances of this film. The simplicity of the story line with few, if any, special effects results in a very good movie!

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