Monday, August 29, 2011

Bye Bye Braverman (1968)


Warner Bros.
Directed by Sidney Lumet
My rating: 2 stars out of 4
IMDb
(DVD, Warner Archive Collection)

"Jewish" intellectual comedy of the kind Woody Allen would milk for all its worth in the 70s. It takes place on one day in New York City. Four men attend the funeral of a friend. First they receive the news at home, where home life is mostly bickering with their spouses or family. Next comes the trip to the funeral in a Volkswagen bug. They got lost, have an accident and finally get drunk. The final part of the plot is the funeral service itself, featuring a long, meandering sermon, but it turns out to be the wrong funeral. They finally catch up to their friend at the cemetery. George Segal has frequent daydreams about his own death along the way. Besides the morbid subject matter, it's never funny and has too many out of date cultural references.

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