Cannery Row

Cannery Row Review

OK, first let me make it clear that my taste in movies is not quite the same as others. Am I the only guy that likes the movie Tremors? "Stinking weezels!" But I must tell you that this is one of my favorite movies of all time.

Cannery Row is a very nontraditional movie, and even a little quirky. It is sad, almost dark, but funny, and even thought provoking. I mean have you ever tried a beer milkshake? Have you ever wanted to run away and live someplace apart from the rest of society? This movie featured a younger Nick Nolte and Debra Winger. Their characters are attractive and a little sad. I first watched this movie 25 years ago, and still enjoy it. I watched it on vhs recently and today i am going to finally order the DVD.

Get this movie and watch it. Don't pick it apart for it's accuracy or quality of production. Follow the story, imagine yourself in Nolte's shoes. You might be sad and uplifted at the same time.

Cannery Row Overview

Adaptation of John Steinbeck's novels "Cannery Row" and Sweet Thursday". A marine biologist romances a prostitute.

Cannery Row Specifications

Director-writer David S. Ward’s 1982 adaptation of John Steinbeck’s Cannery Row (with material from another Steinbeck tale, Sweet Thursday) has its charms, principally some top-drawer talent on both sides of the camera; the cast is headed by Nick Nolte and Debra Winger, Jack Nitzsche composed the music, and John Huston supplies the voice-over. In a previous life, Nolte’s Doc was known as Eddie "The Blur" Daniels, a star baseball pitcher in the 1920s who mysteriously gave up the game while still in his prime; now he’s a self-styled marine biologist with a predilection for octopi who makes his home on "The Row," a string of sardine fisheries in Monterey, California. There are a variety of colorful characters in this rundown ‘hood--a worldly-wise madam (Audra Lindley) and her charges, a bum (M. Emmet Walsh) and his buddies--but although it takes him a while to admit it, Doc only has eyes for Suzy (Winger), a newcomer to the scene who, by her own estimation, "ain’t got the class of a duck." The film relies mostly on these oddballs and their various idiosyncrasies and adventures, and Steinbeck clearly has considerable affection for them; it’s no surprise that some, including Doc, were based on real folks. But while Nolte and Winger have a certain squabbling rapport, the movie too often comes off as stagey (the dialogue), artificial (the sets), and glib. In the final analysis, Cannery Row isn’t John Steinbeck’s greatest book (at the very least, it lacks the heft of East of Eden or The Grapes of Wrath), and this effort, despite its good points, will hardly be considered the best adaption of the author’s work to the screen or the stage. --Sam Graham

Available at Amazon Check Price Now!

*** Product Information and Prices Stored: Oct 11, 2010 21:58:06