The Life and Death of Peter Sellers (1 Viewer)

[Lew Crippen]

Just a head’s up to anyone who has HBO but missed The Life and Death of Peter Sellers. Don’t miss this if you have any interest in the subject matter.

And don’t miss it, if you want to see a finely crafted movie, with outstanding acting. It will no doubt gather a host of Emmy nominations. And wins.

Geoffrey Rush is a lock for an Emmy nomination.

Just an outstanding job by all concerned.

 

[Ray H]

Yeah. I checked it out and liked it. Rush did a good Strangelove impersonation though his voice was too raspy for President Muffley,

 

[Marc Fedderman]

I really liked Rush's performance, but thought the movie was a bit uneven. It seemed to skimp on exposition and would have turned me off if I didn't already have a basic understanding of Sellers' life and work. The Watson and Theron characters were tantalizing, but weren't given very substantive roles. Too, I thought Sellers' relationships with Kubrick and Edwards were not well fleshed-out. The only impression I came away with was that he was difficult and capricious. Overall, not very flattering to Sellers (or Edwards for that matter).

I did, however, like the conceit of having Rush inhabit not only the myriad roles that Sellers played, but the multitude of people in his life. This blurring of fact and fiction (waking and dreaming) was clever and served the notion of Sellers the man as a blank slate who lived vicariously through his various screen personae.

On the whole, a good movie, but I think it could have been much better.





I thought it was a good impersonation, maybe just slightly off. His Strangelove and Clouseau impressions wowed me. I really would have liked to see Rush take a stab at Sellers as Kong. I wonder if much (any) footage exists of Sellers in this aborted role.

 

[Gary->dee]

I thought that was genius, not just the acting involved from Rush but the concept itself being introduced into a biopic. Very fitting for a movie about Peter Sellers. And yes Rush did a spectacular job of portraying Sellers' Dr. Strangelove. That was almost the highlight of the movie for me because there were moments when I completely forgot it was Geoffrey Rush.

Some of the music selections were great and I'm glad they used music from Sellers' movies, although I wanted even more. I'm also glad they mentioned his last movie "The Fiendish Plot of Dr. Fu Manchu" in the epilogue, a movie I saw at the theater when it came out. I don't think he even fully completed that movie.

I'm a stickler for details and the one minor detail they got wrong(that I'm aware of) was when they showed the downtown L.A. skyline as it presently is and not as it was. Other than that though the movie featured some good acting, good visuals, and perhaps most importantly it was insightful. Although I'm not really sure how true it may be. The scope seemed rather narrow too, concentrating mostly on Sellers' working relationship with Blake Edwards. For example, and maybe this is my own personal bias, I would have liked to have seen Sellers working on his last movie, 'Fu Manchu' instead of it merely being mentioned. They also glossed over Sellers' work with Kubrick on Lolita.



I'd give the movie 3 out of 5 stars.

 

[Grant B]

There is a scene late in the picture where Sellers is standing outside while Edwards was waiting for him.
My wife thinks he was doing an impression of a lightpost but to me that makes no sense since he only did impressions of other people in the movie (not that I would question her on it)

... maybe we missed something earlier

Just wondering if anyone else noticed this strange scene and has an idea about its meaning

 

[GuyW]

I don't have HBO. :frowning:

Any idea where else this might be available?

I heard that a "making of" special was also broadcast. I wonder if the movie/special will be released on DVD?

 

[Patrick_S]

I don't think you have anything to worry about the trend appers that everything produced for Television these days is making its way to DVD.