My Favorite Year (1982)

Sadly Over-hyped

Highly Overrated But Still Good

When a movie has you begging for it to end not even half way through it's pure crap. We've all seen this movie and this characters millions of times, nothing new in it. Don't waste your time.

An old-fashioned movie made with new-fashioned finesse.

'My Favorite Year' is quite simply, a hilarious film from the early 1980's! Over-The-Top, Crazy & All Heart, this is an underrated comedic gem! And The Late/Great Peter O'Toole is astonishing in the funniest role of his legendary career.'My Favorite Year' Synopsis: When a dissolute matinée idol (Peter O'Toole) is slated to appear on a live TV variety show, chaos ensures. 'My Favorite Year' works because its genuinely funny & the sequences that follow one after the other, result in hilarity. And while it aims for laughs predominantly, the film also has heart in the form of a sub-plot involving O'Toole's daughter, who's away from him. So its not just the laughs that work, but also some genuine emotion.Dennis Palumbo & Norman Steinberg's Screenplay is really funny & arresting. The Writing is consistently brisk & builds the story scene-by-scene. Richard Benjamin's Direction is superb. Cinematography is nicely done. Editing is perfect. Art & Costume Design are fabulous.Performance-Wise: Peter O'Toole is at his best, yet again! In a parody of himself here, The Thespian is a riot all through. I was pleasantly surprised by how funny he is & how he effortlessly carries the film. A Stellar Act! Mark Linn-Baker is wonderfully goofy. Jessica Harper is first-rate. The Late/Great Joseph Bologna also lends excellent support. Bill Macy & Lainie Kazan are superb. Rest lend great support.On the whole, 'My Favorite Year' is a fun watch! Two Thumbs Up!

First Errol Flynn was the consummate Hollywood action hero, and then he was the consummate Hollywood has-been. The substance abuse, the wrecked relationships, the legal scandals; by the end of his life he was a guy who needed a lot of rehabilitating. "My Favorite Year" is a posthumous rehabilitation of Flynn, and it is also a sweet and funny tall tale about what his redemption might have looked like had it happened during his lifetime. Flynn's actual appearance on the 1950s variety show where Mel Brooks was a young writer came and went without incident, but in "My Favorite Year" that forgettable television moment is reimagined as one huge, crazy, boozy incident worthy of Peter O'Toole in his hellraising days. O'Toole infuses all of Flynn stand-in "Alan Swann"'s lines, every flourish of his hands, every drunken stagger, with a precise mixture of charm and pain.The story is mostly a buddy comedy of the sort that thrives on the emotional closeness of its characters. Maybe a supremely irresponsible person like Swann, whose insecurities cause him to limit his relationships to the categories of one-night stands and autograph sessions, wouldn't really tolerate the presence of a straight-laced worrywart like the Mel Brooks stand-in for days and nights on end. But in the movies, opposites attract, and here they make a good pair. The young writer gets to meet his hero, and although Swann is a case in point of why it's not always best to do that, the movie argues that the hero is always there, in a way, inside the less-than-heroic has- been. Swann is self-destructive, yes, but with each new failure comes a chance for one more last hurrah, one more horse to jump on and ride into the sunset, one more crowd to win over. O'Toole is heartbreaking when he shows Swann's weakness and vulnerability, and this makes each new triumph, however modest, all the more inspiring. At the high points, the young writer is the necessary sidekick, a witness to a performance that exists solely to be seen and applauded, and when the cycle returns to darkness and doubt he is the hero's conscience. It's an old formula, but it works.Between the party-crashing, horse-stealing vignettes, there is a by-the- book romance storyline and an organized crime farce. Both are simple fare, but they do a lot to raise the stakes of Swann's television appearance and to set an amiable atmosphere through a vibrant supporting cast and obvious but endearing jokes and set- pieces. The movie's various threads all crash together in a big finish that is predictable, and not believable, but very satisfying, entertaining, and moving—not unlike a great Errol Flynn movie.Replete with tributes to Flynn's filmography, "My Favorite Year" is a must-see for fans of the Australian-born swashbuckler. "Captain Blood," "Dodge City," and "The Adventures of Robin Hood" are repeatedly and lovingly referenced, under thinly-disguised alternate titles, and the iconic scene from the ending of "Robin Hood" is recreated in astonishing detail, complete with a Basil Rathbone lookalike.

I was in Germany when the film came out so didn't see it for the first time until 1984 or so, but I have seen it probably almost every year since then. I should have it memorized by now, but somehow each viewing I find something new and special. I've loved it since the first time I saw it.There is little I can add to the basic story--a washed-up Errol Flynn type of action movie star goes on a live television comedy program in the 1950s. O'Toole is just masterful in the part and according to director Benjamin, he even insisted on doing all his own stunts (some of which were dangerous!). I could believe him as a movie hero and as a real-life washout.Joseph Balogna is just hysterical as the Sid Caesar TV star, rough, bombastic, occasionally mean, but kind under the crust, and utterly fearless. I grinned at every sight of him.Mark Linn-Baker is superb as the kid from Brooklyn who finds himself rubbing shoulders with his childhood hero and discovering the statue has feet of clay. His embarrassment over his background and his weird family rings true and yet are hilarious; I forget the name of the actress who plays his mother, but she is screamingly funny.I just can't say how much I love this movie, how inspiring I find it, how it touches my heart. But it's my favorite movie, and in a house where we own something like 5,000 movies and most of our conversations contain at least one movie quote, this film is quoted almost daily, so that's saying something.

Yep - and one of My Favorite Comedies too, that seems to get better and better each time I catch it! That title year is 1954 and young TV comedy show writer (Linn-Baker) gets assigned as the chaperon to former, swinging, - and heavily drinking - swashbuckler movie star on the downfall (O'Toole) for one wild weekend in NYC. Loving, glorious comedy nostalgia that is both a dreamy-eyed glance at old-time movie matinées & stardom as well as a smashingly production-detailed ode to those seemingly innocent, care-free days of the 1950s and its dawn of television.Bullet-paced and aloof like a sitcom (or a Marx brothers movie), with nonstop parade of quotable lines and caricature-like characters that makes it ideal for multiple viewing... and a mystery why it seems SO overlooked and not rightly revered as one of the best comedies of the 1980s. The star of O'Toole shines at its brightest, but down to the smallest role, it's cast to utter completion.... which makes me ask: what ever happened to Mark Linn-Baker and Joseph Bologna?8 out of 10 from Ozjeppe