I honestly don’t know the reason why Love Ranch got made. Well, I guess I do. It’s because director Taylor Hackford wanted to work with his wife Helen Mirren. But Dame Helen made it clear to hubby that she wouldn’t just play any part. Here’s what Taylor said about the process of finding the right film to work on:
I looked for various projects and suggested some but she’s tough,…She only wants to do things that are great roles, and she’s right.
Sort of.
The film they decide to work on was Love Ranch which opens tomorrow.
The film takes place in the 70s and Dame Helen plays Grace Bontempo the brains behind the legal brothel known as Love Ranch in Reno, Nevada. The brawn and the idiocy is provided by Joe Pesci (who has made a career of playing Goodfellas over and over again.) The chemistry between Pesci and Mirren is non-existent though Dame Helen kept trying. She’s just clear out of his league.
Dame Helen is not only running the show, she is also den mother to her rag tag bunch of sex workers played by some great and sadly underutilized actresses like Gina Gershon and Bai Ling. Grace’s whole world changes when (SPOILER) she gets a cancer diagnosis and meets and becomes the manager (don’t ask) of a sexy much younger Argentinian boxer named Armanado Bruza played by Spanish actor Sergio Peris-Mencheta.
Even though she knows better, Grace falls for the sexy boxer and starts an affair that turns into the real thing. You can probably guess from the fact that this all takes place in a brothel and involves a loose cannon like Joe Pesci that the story doesn’t have a happy ending.
What the film does well is show a sexual relationship between an older woman and a younger man. Helen Mirren seems to be the one in the 60 plus set (even in the 50 plus set) that gets to have sex onscreen. I guess we could say that Meryl Streep had a sex life in her last two movies, but she doesn’t do onscreen sex like Helen Mirren does. I appreciate that she pushes the envelope on this issue cause we need it badly.
I just wish the film was as good and as worthy of Dame Helen.
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How was it possible to avoid using the phrase, “There’s nothing like a Dame” when talking about Helen?
“of a sexy much younger Argentinian boxer named Armanado Bruza played by Spanish actor Sergio Peris-Mencheta.”
This is off topic. Is Sergio good in the role…beyond being sexy?
He actually is pretty good. I didn’t hate the movie. I thought it was entertaining and I would show up and see Helen Mirren in anything. I actually saw Shawdowboxer- Lee Daniels’ directing debut which is in my top two worst movies EVER. (IN case you are wondering the other worst movie EVER is Darren Aronofsky’s The Fountain.
I felt like Joe Pesci came out of retirement just to do Casino again.
I think Pesci is wonderful exactly who and how he is. The mix with Mirren sounds fascinating and she can handle ANYBODY! Saw the preview but never heard about or saw Love Ranch anywhere – for rent?
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