Rating summary

Movie		1.5
Video		3.0
Audio		2.5
Extras		3.0
Overall		1.5

Poor Pretty Eddie Blu-ray Movie Review

Poor, yes. Pretty, hardly. Eddie—well, do you really care by this point?

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman May 1, 2011

Leslie Uggams must have an incredible sense of humor. She managed to completely laugh off the viral video that showed her utterly forgetting the lyric to “June is Bustin’ Out All Over” at a July 4th Pops concert, devolving into a lame brained assemblage of nonsense syllables that presaged Serene Branson’s “migraine aura” viral video of recent vintage. Uggams’ video could have seriously derailed the singer’s career had it not been dealt with in such a self-deprecatingly facile way. And Uggams seems to have also reconciled herself to having starred in one of the most bizarre and unseemly films of all time, Poor Pretty Eddie, a 1975 opus that managed, like the cockroach, to survive well over a decade in a variety of edits and with a variety of titles, despite having been critically reviled from its first appearance. Like so many odd films, it somehow attained cult status through the years, most likely from a younger audience which was willing to look past its patently smarmy elements and simply enjoy it for the proto-camp experience it could be. A certain amount of “herbal enhancement” may have played into this latter day appreciation, for the film has a drug-imbued surreality that makes it one of the weirdest film experiences of all time, especially considering it features a fairly well known cast, including Uggams herself, Shelley Winters, Ted Cassidy (Lurch from The Addams Family), and great character actors Slim Pickens and Dub Taylor. This is a film which reeks of decay and decadence, and as Uggams herself avers in the nicely detailed notes accompanying this Blu-ray as a text extra on the disc itself, the making of Poor Pretty Eddie would probably make for a more entertaining feature than the actual film.

Uggams portrays uptight and arrogant superstar Liz Wetherly, a world class singer who decides to chuck the stress for a while and take a road trip. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out Liz’s Rolls Royce soon develops engine trouble and she’s stranded in the creepy backwoods of Georgia, a locale that makes the rural setting of Deliverance look like the Taj Mahal. Liz stumbles into an ancient lodging establishment run by a former Burlesque queen named Bertha (Shelley Winters), whose boy toy is Elvis wannabe Eddie (Michael Christian). Eddie soon develops amorous intentions for Liz, intentions which are only highlighted by the fact he’s convinced Liz can spark his hoped for music career. Hopefully this brief summary at least hints at the truly outré nature of Poor Pretty Eddie, but really this film simply needs to be seen to be believed. And maybe not even then.

As the really excellent accompanying essay by Chris Poggiali details, Poor Pretty Eddie had one of the strangest ever geneses in the entire history of Hollywood, certainly remarkable given the often strange corridors that films usually walk before they’re greenlit. But Poor Pretty Eddie sprang out of porn producer Michael Thevis’ wishes to go legit, at least partially, as the FBI was hot on his trail and he feared he would become the porn equivalent of Al Capone, a criminal brought down for reasons not necessarily related to his stock in trade. Through a bizarre series of interrelationships, the basis for Poor Pretty Eddie was funded by Thevis and a directing buddy of Thevis, Richard Robinson, was brought in to helm the low budget feature. All of this begs the question of how a star like Shelley Winters, then just coming off of her fourth Academy Award nomination (with two wins), would let herself get involved, but of course, this being Hollywood (or at least the Georgia location shooting equivalent thereof), money played a part. According to co-star Michael Christian, Winters insisted she be paid in cash, which was delivered to her weekly in an overstuffed briefcase, which only led to her paranoia about where to stash her income while finishing the film. As Uggams said, a film about the making of Poor Pretty Eddie has “classic” written all over it.

A lot of people have claimed Poor Pretty Eddie is some sort of long lost classic of exploitation fare, but that does a major disservice to exploitation fare. This is a low budget horror show that isn’t just politically incorrect, it’s downright politically indefensible. The only thing that keeps the unseemly goings on from being even partially palatable is that the entire film is imbued with such a surreal ambience that nothing really seems to actually be happening. When Liz is brutally raped by Eddie, we get intercut moments of a bunch of backwoods rednecks grinning as dogs hump madly. No, I’m not making it up. When a catatonic Liz is then taken to help shoot press photographs of Eddie in his Elvis get up, she hallucinates that her camera is a gun and she “shoots” her stalker in a completely different way. Through all of this craziness, Winters struts and preens like an LSD-soaked version of her characters in What’s the Matter with Helen? or Whoever Slew Auntie Roo?. Winters, certainly one of the most hyperbolic Method actresses to ever have been associated with Strasberg and others in the post-Group Theater crowd who took over Hollywood, is just a lumbering, looming presence here, almost painful to watch.

Robinson evidently had an almost schizophrenic Art House versus Grand Guignol approach to Poor Pretty Eddie, and that dialectic is unusual, to say the least, making this film completely unpredictable in both tone and content from one moment to the next. A perfect example is in the slow motion denouement, which plays out like something out of a Sam Peckinpah wet dream, and is just so over the top it’s hard to even take in on one sitting. Pay close attention to the extras in the background for a few unintended laughs. But when Uggams picks up a shotgun in the film’s final moments, there will probably be some of you hoping she aims the weapon at you to finally put you out of your misery.

Poor Pretty Eddie Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Yes, this transfer has digital noise reduction, so if you're a DNR-phobe, simply move on, as nothing I'm about to say will matter very much. Poor Pretty Eddie is another public domain feature restored for Blu-ray by HD Cinema Classics/Film Chest. Anyone who doubts any significant restoration beyond overly aggressive DNR was done on this title need only look at the restoration demo included on the disc. The 35mm print utilized for the master is literally littered with virtually nonstop vertical green scratches, most of which have been removed. Color doesn't seem to have been retimed, at least not significantly, and so things have a slightly ruddy cast some of the time. But let's face it. Though filmed in Technicolor (and mid-70s Technicolor was not the Technicolor of yore), this was never a big budget film, and that low budget indie ethos shines (if that's the right word) through virtually every frame of Poor Pretty Eddie. This was never a glossy, pretty film to begin with and it still isn't. The DNR applied means there's an overly smooth texture to this release, but it also means that we have a largely blemish free image. Color is certainly above average, if not mind blowingly robust, given the low budget confines of the original film. Contrast is on the low side, as it obviously has been from day one, and therefore detail tends to get lost in some of the darker interior scenes. The image is also very soft most of the time, but, again, that's how this film looked from day one. But overall, this is the second color film HD Cinema Classics/Film Chest has released in the last week or so (The Terror being the other), and the results, while not perfect, are not as hideously troublesome as those who want grain, and lots of it, seem to think.

Poor Pretty Eddie Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Poor Pretty Eddie is granted only a standard Dolby Digital 2.0 mix on this Blu-ray, and the soundtrack itself, while not overtly damaged, suffers from an unpleasant narrowness and almost painful brightness on the high end at times. When you add in director Robinson's predilection for liking to add all sorts of hallucinogenic sound effects, things like slowed down screams, manic grunts and groans and the like, this becomes a bit of a chore to sit through. Dialogue is usually fairly crisp, though occasional moments are a bit hard to understand, probably due to the original recording and not enough time or money to effectively ADR loop afterwards. This is at a bare minimum a serviceable track, nothing more, nothing less. The good news is, you'll probably be so astounded by the imagery you won't be paying any attention to what anyone is saying anyway.

Poor Pretty Eddie Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

For the first time in the brief Blu-ray output from HD Cinema Classics/Film Chest, we get what I consider to be "real" supplements, ported over from their affiliate label Cultra's recent SE DVD release of Poor Pretty Eddie:

• Feature Commentary by Director of Photography (among other credits on this multitasking crew gig) David Worth is interesting, though he doesn't know a lot about Thevis or Robinson, despite having worked with Robinson previously on two 16mm quickie westerns. Nonetheless, there's quite a bit of background information imparted here and some nice anecdotes about the crazy shoot.
• Production Stills
• Historical Essay, mentioned above in the main body of my review, is a really fascinating piece that gives a wealth of background information and includes copious snippets of interviews with Uggams and Christian, who both as strange as it may seem remember the film with a great deal of fondness.

As with other HD Cinema Classics/Film Chest releases, we get some extras which I typically don't count in my scoring of supplements:

• DVD Copy of the Film
• Postcard Featuring Original Poster Art
• Restoration Demonstration
• Theatrical Trailer

Poor Pretty Eddie Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Poor, sweet Leslie Uggams. This gifted performer, who rose to fame on the Mitch Miller show and then won a Tony Award for Hallelujah, Baby! had the unpleasant task of replacing the Smothers Brothers when they were canned by CBS. Uggams' variety show sank like an anchor, and her film career never really took off, either, but she's still out there slugging and attempting to remember the lyric to "June is Bustin' Out All Over." She has the grace to laugh about Poor Pretty Eddie, so the rest of us probably should, too. This is a pretty smarmy little enterprise, however, and it will take a certain intestinal fortitude to make it through, even taken with a dose of salt or, indeed, "herbal enhancement." I can't outright recommend this film, but for a certain element who loves trashy cult films, you may have finally found your Holy Grail. It's wearing an Elvis costume.