Nine and ten-tenths

One of the movies that TCM ran in the "Hollywood Hair Hall of Fame" spotlight that I hadn't done a post on before is 10. It's available on DVD, so I recorded it to do a post here on the movie.

People think they know the movie, but if they haven't seen it they probably don't know the movie like they think they do. Dudley Moore stars as George Webber, a composer of "popular" music, at least for the Burt Bacharach/Great American Songbook style of music that was going out of style by the time the movie was released in 1979. Not that this change in taste is part of the plot even though it would make some sense for what's about to happen. George has just turned 42, and at a surprise birthday party in his honor he begins to have the first stages of a mid-life crisis.

Not that George has much of a support system. He's got a girlfriend in the divorcée Samantha Taylor (Julie Andrews), but their relationship is always a bit strained because of some of George's behaviors. He and his neighbor, for example, both have telescopes they use to peep through each other's windows, with the neighbor being especially pervy. And he seems to spend a lot of time at the beach house of his lyricist Hugh (Robert Webber), a gay man in a rather difficult relationship.

Leaving Hugh's beach house one morning, George is at a stop sign when another fancy car stops in the next lane, this one carrying the most beautiful woman George has ever seen. So naturally even though he's got a girlfriend, he changes lanes and starts following this car. It turns out that the woman is a bride on the way to her wedding, one Jenny Hanley (née Miles; played by Bo Derek). George crashes into a police car and creates a scene at the wedding.

But he's still interested in Jenny, so when he finds that her dad is a Beverly Hills dentist, he claims a dental emergency to get an appointment with Dr. Miles (James Noble; you may recall him as Governor Gatling on Benson) in an attempt to find out where Jenny and her husband are honeymooning. The painkillers George gets at the dentist screw him up as much as getting drunk would, and Samantha thinks it's just another case of George's immaturity.

George flies down to Mexico to find Jenny, and finds more than he bargained for. There's a lonely somewhat older woman, Mary (Dee Wallace), and even though George fantasizes about Jenny, the actual meeting with her isn't going to go quite as planned. George rents a boat to go out on the ocean, and winds up rescuing Jenny's husband David, who had fallen asleep on a surfboard and is threatened with being swept away by the current. So it's for saving David's life that George really gets to meet Jenny. She's gorgeous and freaky, but it might just be too much for George.

I think when people think of the movie 10, the first thought is of the iconic image of Bo Derek on the beach in that swimsuit and with that hair, running toward Dudley Moore. However, in the movie, the point of that shot is that it's one of George's fantasies, and not something that actually happens. The movie is also generally portrayed as a comedy, and although there is a fair amount of comedy as befits a Dudley Moore movie, there's really quite a bit more drama. The comedy is really toned down once Moore gets down to Mexico.

As I was watching 10, which was directed by Blake Edwards, I found myself thinking of another of Edwards' films, S.O.B. That's because I was expecting 10 to be a straight-up comedy. Because it isn't, my first impression was to think that 10 is rather a pretty slow-developing movie that doesn't seem like it's going anywhere. The turn to drama actually works in the film's favor, as the movie makes much more interesting points for it.

Moore and Andrews are quite good, while all Bo Derek has to do is look good and not screw things up too much. She succeeds in that regard. There are also some quite good supporting performances. Robert Webber mentioned above is one; another is Brian Dennehy in a role that's different for him as a bartender at the Mexican resort.

If you go into 10 knowing that it's not a wild comedy, I think you'll really like it.