If there is anything that a person can still depend on in this messed up world of ours, it is my love for all things camp — especially when Old Hollywood royalty is involved and especially when not everyone agrees with me that things are actually camp (the new film Old is actually camp and it’s so terrible I’m starting to think it’s actually a masterpiece). Oh, how wonderful it was of the acting royalty of the 60s and 70s to go to Europe to make things that baffled critics and audiences alike and decades later made ME so very happy.
I don’t remember when or where I heard about Boom! for the first time, but I think it might have been one of those trashy books on the Taylor/Burton romance, as an example of one of their ill-conceived ideas that to the naysayers just proved how embarrassing the couple was — of course I had to check it out for myself.
Boom! is essentially Mamma Mia! — a wonderful time on a gorgeous island. It is exactly the kind of thing I long for in the summer. The set design and the costumes are lush and rich and everyone wears flowing robes and caftans. Say what you will about the film, the look is immaculate.
But the facts are these: the plot of the film, the dialogues, the acting choices… all these things are pretty weird, even I can admit that. And Richard Burton gets to recite quite a lot of poetry just because— as I mentioned, I read a book on those two and I don’t doubt for a second he was REALLY into that idea. It is confusing as to what exactly is happening and what the film is trying to say. My best guess is that the producers were trying, hoping to do Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? again (this was based on/written by Tennessee Williams instead of Edward Albee, but I think the sentiments remain). The film, I guess, for many ended up being “Virginia Woolf we have at home”, but I’m not sure if that’s fair. Boom! to me manages to be bold and interesting and I enjoyed watching it and experiencing the characters’ weird psychological journey.
I wonder if I liked the film so much because it reminded me of one of my absolute favourites, Secret Ceremony, which is also a team effort of Joseph Losey and Elizabeth Taylor, who there is also losing her mind (my preferred type of a character). I think you might just say I have a type.
It also got me thinking of the way 60s function among the older folks, not the hippie kids, but those who were mature adults in the world of counterculture and drugs — definitely a subject worth exploring.
Swingin' at the Seance 