OVP: Tommy (1975)

Film: Tommy (1975)

Stars: Ann-Margret, Oliver Reed, Roger Daltrey, Elton John, Tina Turner, Eric Clapton, Keith Moon, Paul Nicholas, Jack Nicholson

Director: Ken Russell

Oscar History: 2 nomination (Best Actress-Ann-Margret, Best Scoring)

Snap Judgment Ranking: 2/5 stars

Each month, as part of our 2020 Saturdays with the Stars series, we highlight a different actress known as an iconic "film sex symbol."  This month, our focus is on Ann-Margret-click here to learn more about Ms. Ann-Margret (and why I picked her), and click here for other Saturdays with the Stars articles.

By the mid-1970's, Ann-Margret's career had taken some interesting turns.  By 1975 she was only 34, but that was considered a bit older back then than it would be today, and so in theory her days as a sex kitten/symbol were waning, if not gone.  Ann-Margret had a very successful nightclub act (oftentimes incorporating George Burns), but her film career was acknowledging that she was aging, and that she wanted to expand as an actress & play against type.  As you've seen throughout our year devoted to famous sex symbols, playing against type was usually a disaster for actresses most famous for their appearance, but Ann-Margret defied that, openly finding parts that skewed or countered her glamour without it affecting her popularity.  She had one of her biggest successes in this style of "deglam" role (as it would be known in the mid-aughts) with Tommy, which won her her second (and to date, final) Academy Award nomination.

(Spoilers Head) Tommy is, for those who are not familiar, a rock opera (give or take The Wall, the most famous of the era's rock operas), which was a subgenre of film/musical theater that hit its popularity peak in the 1970's.  It focuses on Tommy (Daltrey), who as a child saw his mother Nora (Ann-Margret) and her new lover Frank (Reed) accidentally kill Tommy's father, who has returned from war after being presumed dead.  As a result, Tommy goes deaf-mute-blind, and neither Frank nor Nora can get him out of this state.  Eventually Tommy turns to pinball, and though he cannot see or hear the sounds, becomes something of a novelty attraction since he can feel the machine, and as a result is the greatest player in the world.  Tommy eventually breaks out of his near catatonic state to be able to speak, see, & hear, and develops a Christ-like following, but that wanes when it appears as if he doesn't have anything to offer his followers, and when he makes them like he was (deaf, mute, & blind) so they appreciate life more, they attack him, killing Frank & Nora, and eventually Tommy is left, finally free of his parents & his influences, and embraces a state of nirvana at the same place where he was conceived at the beginning of the film.

I...am surprised at how cogent that plot summary sounds, because Tommy is anything but cogent.  There are repeated detours throughout the movie to be able to have psychedelic musical numbers, and to capitalize on some of the rock cameos in the film.  Tina Turner, Elton John, Eric Clapton, and even (in a Carnal Knowledge reunion) Jack Nicholson all show up in various roles, getting their own songs.  The film's roots are firmly in the anti-establishment & being critical of their parents' generation (Clapton's preacher leads a parish that deifies Marilyn Monroe as a god, an indictment on celebrity-worship), but they also have the obvious overtones of drug use, particularly Turner's "Acid Queen."  

The cameos are fun initially, and certainly in a "WTF" way, but I will admit that other than Nicholson's (which I didn't know was coming), I found them a bit overlong and increasingly un-fun, which is how I'd describe Tommy as a whole.  The music is great ("Pinball Wizard" continues to hold up 45 years after the fact), but it keeps underlining the same points-every chorus seems to repeat one too many times, and the fat on the film is plentiful when it needs some leaning up.  The movie's motif is also dated, and its message is warped in retrospect considering so many of the "rebel acts" in this film would eventually become the establishment.  In 1975 the Who might have represented counterculture revolutionaries, but in 2020, a Millennial (like myself) knows people like the Who, Tina Turner, & Elton John as figures who become mega-millionaires that are so ingrained in corporate culture they literally headlined the Super Bowl, the most conventional of commercial American inventions.  As a result, the movie reads as false in its message, even if I understand its impact.

Ann-Margret's nomination was likely a result of both her taking on an atypical role and the dearth of good roles for women in 1975 (generally considered to be one of, if not the, worst years for Best Actress).  Her role here is intriguing, but eventually it just becomes exploitive, and I don't know what she's getting at.  It's obvious that director Ken Russell wanted to trade on Ann-Margret being the fantasy of a generation of young men by both deeply sexualizing her (there are multiple scenes in the film where it appears the actress is in the throes of an orgasm), and then skewing that sexualization (one of those orgasmic scenes, she's writhing in a puddle of baked beans & mud).  It's less of a work of acting and more a performance piece, and I left admitting that I saw something of note, but not necessarily of value.

1975 is where we're going to leave Ann-Margret.  The actress who took the sex symbol role and found a way to not only transform it in the 1970's, but to win industry accolades for her work, did make more worthwhile movies, and was a star for much of the 1970's with films like Joseph Andrews and Magic (and at one point, despite being 37, was considered for the role of Sandy in Grease), before eventually doing most of her career work in TV movies and guest appearances.  Next month, we will look at one last actress, a contemporary of Ann-Margret's whose career mirrored that of a classic sex symbol...even if it also seemed to hallmark the end of the trope.