Great art flows from something very personal, and great films are no different, despite films—and especially Hollywood films—being a collective effort in which commercial considerations often suppress individual artistic visions. During the New Hollywood era, increased creative freedom allowed strongly individualistic filmmakers to create uncompromisingly personal films. Few excelled in this as much as legendary Broadway choreographer and director Bob Fosse in All That Jazz, his celebrated semi-biographical film musical.
Fosse’s alter ego, played by Roy Scheider, is Joe Gideon, a famous and successful Broadway choreographer and director who is almost completely dedicated to his profession. This is reflected in his simultaneous work on two different and very demanding projects – the production of an ambitious and expensive Broadway musical and a biopic about a famous stand‑up comic (played by Cliff Gorman). Joe copes with the physical and psychological demands of his job by consuming large amounts of cigarettes, alcohol and amphetamines, and that, together with his womanising lifestyle, has devastating effects on his health and family life. His excesses inevitably lead to a heart attack, and he, despite the best efforts of his ex‑wife Audrey Paris (played by Leland Palmer), 12‑year‑old daughter Michelle (played by Erzsébet Földi) and current girlfriend Katie Jagger (played by Ann Reinking) to make him change his ways, continues with his self‑destructive lifestyle. As his health deteriorates, he begins to indulge in increasingly bizarre fantasies that include imaginary conversations with a mysterious figure called Angelique (played by Jessica Lange) and staging his own death as a spectacular dance‑and‑song number.
Fosse based the script (co‑written by Robert Alan Aurthur) on his own experiences during the 1975 original production of the popular Broadway musical Chicago, when he was simultaneously editing Lenny, a biopic dedicated to Lenny Bruce, and suffered a heart attack because of exhaustion. Fosse, one of the most talented and influential theatre directors of all time, didn’t spare himself while working and was equally hard on himself by revealing his life and work behind the scenes. All That Jazz features a brutally honest and uncompromising portrayal of an artist who is intensely driven, aware of his talent, but also of his flaws and deep insecurities, which finally reveal themselves when he is forced to face his own mortality.
Roy Scheider, until that time known mostly as a capable but largely supporting actor, seemed an unusual choice to play someone as colourful and larger‑than‑life as Fosse, but in All That Jazz he not only perfectly embodied Fosse but also delivered what could be described as the best role of his career. He not only portrayed the contradictions of that character, but also met the serious physical demands of the role, especially in the scenes where he had to dance with top Broadway dancers, including Ann Reinking, who, being Fosse’s real‑life girlfriend at the time, more or less played herself. Scheider easily outclassed everyone else in the film, although the other actors did a more than decent job, most notably Cliff Gorman, who as a fictional stand‑up comic provides sarcastic commentary and whose routine serves as the basis for Gideon’s fantasies. Jessica Lange, three years after her infamous debut in King Kong, more than acquits herself in the role of a mysterious and morbidly seductive Death‑like figure, and it is easy to imagine how she rebuilt her career afterwards.
As a director, Fosse invests a great deal of energy and ingenuity in telling his story. His use of rapid editing was at times criticised as too confusing for an audience accustomed to more conventional Hollywood film musicals, but this approach worked perfectly by shifting tones in a way quite appropriate for a complex and sometimes contradictory character. Fosse thus alternates between Broadway fantasy and glamour on the one hand and brutal naturalism on the other, all mixed with black humour and further forays into eroticism. One of the best examples is the scene in which Gideon’s open‑heart surgery is intertwined with a conventional dance‑and‑music number. The most memorable segment of the film comes at the very end, when Fosse takes the Everly Brothers hit song “Bye Bye Love” and transforms it into a spectacular dance‑and‑song number under the new title “Bye Bye Life”, which ultimately serves as one of the most poignant and stylish death scenes ever portrayed on the big screen. All That Jazz, with a premiere that coincided with the end of the 1970s and the creative era of New Hollywood, could be seen as one of the most successful finales in the history of cinema.
RATING: 9/10 (+++)
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