Great Film overall

Good movie but grossly overrated

Fresh and Exciting

Admirable film.

And so it came that RavenGlamDVDCollector put his sights on Raquel Welch, there was ONE MILLION YEARS B.C. and the less I say about that one, the better, there was HANNIE CAULDER, yet another wreck to say the least, but, ooh boy, you couldn't fault Raquel in those two. Blame it on the scripts, not on Raquel. Research led me to the movie with the most unattractive name, MYRA BRECKINRIDGE, and the warning bells went off full blast, but here on IMDb I went for the reviews that said this movie was actually Raquel Welch at her best. So I took the gamble, against my instincts. Did it pay off?Let me tell you that this is a horrendously atrocious piece of junk made out of flotsam. If you are one of those people who enjoy watching really really bad movies, this is the one for you, and you could even have Raquel as your co-pilot if you select her commentary. Then, and only then, would I suggest this train-wreck as a hilarious fun-fest.But if you want to watch anything that could at least be made sense of, avoid this one like the plague.It is a neutered movie, in theme, and as it turned out, an emasculated version of what it was supposed to have been. One explanation seems to be that there was a whole lot of pot-smoking going on. But it's obvious that the theme itself doomed the project. I appreciate that Raquel got the part, but the way it was done, there is just no way this make the tiniest bit of sense.What is wrong with it? Virtually everything! In the first place, not one shred of credibility. Casting Raquel as the product of a sex change operation. No scalpel could produce Raquel Welch from Rex Reed. Yet we are expected to accept that this beautiful, beautiful creature was a man just weeks before, I mean, just because of one incisive cut... The casting of Mae West more than two decades after she retired. Mae West might have been a former sex symbol during the War years, but this was 1970, and she had by then become... Well, unladylike. Let's just say unladylike. I have other descriptions, but if this is to get published, they might not suffice. She would have been excellently suited for a movie titled "Reanimated Corpse Bride" though. I do not have any knowledge of her early movies, but in here, she cannot act, cannot sing, and only makes a queen-sized spectacle of herself with her brash personality. Witty? In that department, I'd have told her not to quit her day job, it's lame, unfunny and only serves to make her a camp old queen. And she blew onto the set, demanding special treatment, never mind Raquel! She needed to be kicked off the set for the good of the movie.The other fatal flaw is those interjected film clips. So this is where DREAM ON was born. Only here, it shouldn't ever have been done. Nonsensical. Intensifies the level of the junk. What actually happened is that during post-production, director Michael Sarne realized they had missed the p(l)ot and tried brightening up the whole mess turning it into a satirical comedy. In my own opinion, only made it a bigger mess underlining their stark realization that they had produced this useless piece of trash.What do I like? Farrah Fawcett shows she is destined to become the idol of every teen boy in America. Raquel's dancing during the opening/closing sequence. The leitmotif fruit 'n' nuts girl. The DVD box cover artwork, the menu artwork. But most of all, the trailer of FATHOM, the Raquel movie I should have bought.As for this, it actually isn't worthy of the 1 I gave it. It's a fitting -2 out of 10 for this gelded movie.In short, the movie that they shouldn't even have bothered to try and make.

It is an excellent take on the novel IMO. I've read the novel multiple times & I think Sarne captured the essence of it. Raquel is simply amazing as Myra & it's probably my favorite of her may roles simply because she gets to shine throughout the proceedings. John Huston is great as well, I mean how can U not love this guy? Amazingly talented director & auteur, he goes low brow & just hams it up.The entire film is a Cult film fanatics wet dream...there were plenty of cinematic car wrecks from the 60's (Candy, Bluebeard come to mind} trying to cash in on the 'hip' times with movies that pushed the envelope but Myra Breckenridge is in a class by itself.Commentary by Welch is worth the price of admission alone. Sarne's is a bit more self serving but worthwhile to hear the director's perspective on the whole proceeding.All in all recommended. If U like 'Beyond the Valley of the Dolls' then U'll like this although BTVOTD is the pinnacle, the Cult film to end all Cult films, Myra is right up there!

Reading the Citadel Film series book on the Films of Mae West I got the distinct impression there was no one really in charge of this film. This was certainly not Gore Vidal's vision of a satirical novel on gender stereotyping and transitioning. His name was on the credit as involved with the production, but this was not his film.Instead it was both a Mae West vanity film and a trashy and exploitive treatment of some new ideas that were being discussed publicly about gender identification. Gay man Rex Reed has decided that in his sexual journey he is indeed a transgender person. Surgery transforms Reed into Raquel Welch.What Raquel/Rex does is decide to cash in on an early inheritance. Raquel Welch travels west and says that she is Rex's widow and that through her mother as sister of old time cowboy star John Huston who runs a phony acting school. Raquel demands and gets a half interest, but Huston smells something wrong.As for Mae West she has a supporting part as a talent agent who only represents strapping and sturdy young men. One of them in a bit role is Tom Selleck. Mae demanded and got top billing though this is a Raquel Welch film. This was a move of sheer vanity on Mae's part, but not as bad as Sextette which was to come.Despite the billing the youth market surely came to see Raquel Welch in her prime taking it out on the male of the species for her treatment while she was one of them. Issues of homophobia and transphobia are raised, but they're not dealt with satisfactorily.One thing that was raised put me in mind of a question my young nephew raised many years ago when his other uncle who had Down's Syndrome died. He asked his mother will Uncle Jimmy be retarded in heaven? There is an afterlife coda to Myra Breckinridge where the issue is raised just who is in said afterlife Rex Reed or Raquel Welch? But you won't find an interesting point of view raised here.

Quite how this became Hollywood's most famously reviled and ridiculed creation is almost as mysterious as how such a bizarre film was ever made in the first place.It's the story of a gay film critic knocked unconscious in a car accident who then dreams he has undergone a sex-change operation and been recreated in Raquel Welch's image. I managed to work that much out after two viewings, the first wondering what the hell I was seeing and the second spotting the few clues to the "plotline" that exist between the scenes of insane camp and bizarre sexual acts.Somehow, through all the confusion and early '70s delirium, I found myself enjoying it. It is a ridiculous mess, but where else are you going to see the legendary John Huston receiving a brutal Swedish massage and Raquel Welch in glorious widescreen, Technicolor Panavision wearing a strap-on and cowgirl outfit ensemble? Not in Legally Blonde, I know that much.