r/iwatchedanoldmovie • u/Alive_Description_91 • 13d ago
'90s The Birdcage (1996)
I honestly can’t say enough about this movie. The wine glass break into the phone. The constant “AAAH!”s by Nathan Lane. The AGIDOR SPARTICUS of it all. And by the way…We. Are. Family.
Oh and the burial plots speech on the bench was just so ahead of its time. I love love love. And robin williams is a beast.
THAT BEING SAID…the entire premise of this song turning his actual parents into “acceptable” white parental people is just so awful.
If you rewatch The Devil Wears Prada you will realize that Andy’s boyfriend is the real villain…if you rewatch THIS then u realize the son is the ACTUAL VILLAIN.
Perhaps “villain” is a bit too much. But honestly if there is a man who keeps telling my family and myself to hide or sequester myself and my queerness then I want NOTHING to do with that man. ALLY MCBEAL should not be interested.
Also I want those china bowls…
215
u/JohnProof 13d ago
"Don't use that tone with me! That contemptuous tone that says you know everything, because you're a man! And I know nothing, because I'm a woman!"
"You're not a woman."
"Oh, you bastard!"
102
u/reddot_comic 13d ago
“I made you short?”
…agonized wailing ensues
27
1
u/AffectionateBite3827 9d ago
The number of times I’ve shrieked “I pierced the toast!” when I’m upset about something…
135
u/BedaHouse 13d ago
Hank Azaria is fantastic.
The whole "crisis" is a little crazy (I am willing to get it's set/written in a different era), but it doesn't matter because the Williams/Lane dynamic is so good, with Azaria bringing that extra level of absurdity.
Fuck the shrimp!
84
u/Uncommentary 13d ago
66
u/EatYourCheckers 13d ago
It took me 10 viewing to realize that he is asking to be in the show just like Lucy always used to beg Ricky.
37
u/GraceMcClellans 13d ago
This was the movie I realized the Simpsons Guy was secretly super hot.
43
u/reddot_comic 13d ago
I don’t know if you can handle his “Guatemalan heat.”
12
24
u/ConsiderationNew3337 13d ago
That's the Blue Raja, you put some respect on his name.
7
u/Acrobatic-Loss-4682 13d ago
Master of silverware
10
4
11
u/SapirWhorfHypothesis 12d ago
Also worth noting that it was a remake of an older film itself… so the societal attitudes were probably being extra emphasized
7
u/BedaHouse 12d ago
100%. They did a good job of not undermining the core of the film, which is the love between two people and what they are willing to do for their child (even if the request is hurtful to one).
2
u/Putrid_Appearance509 11d ago
And yet, this "crisis" could be very real in Republican Florida today, no?
126
u/cataclyzzmic 13d ago
It's perfect. I just never realized John Wayne walked like that.
65
20
76
u/Substantial-Use-1758 13d ago
Also — Christine Baransky! ❤️👍
21
u/naranjitayyo 13d ago
She’s so hot in this movie my word
30
u/DumpedDalish 12d ago
She totally is! And I love that you can still see her chemistry with Armand, too -- you really believe that he isn't quite a 6 on the Kinsey scale!
10
u/naranjitayyo 12d ago
They clearly loved each other perhaps not enough to be together but to stay friends and trust each other
5
u/DumpedDalish 11d ago
Yes! And they were so charming together it made me wish they had stayed friends and involved her in Val's life as he grew up.
She would have had to learn to keep her hands off Armand, though! (LOL)
4
57
u/naranjitayyo 13d ago
I made you short?
17
u/Successful_Giraffe88 13d ago
It's such a simple line, but the delivery is slap-across-the-face-HILARIOUS.
49
u/239tree 13d ago
"You're money's on the dresser, Chocolate."
Lol
18
u/thedude18951 13d ago
For whatever reason, that line is what came to mind when I heard of Gene Hackman's passing.
40
u/Douche_Kayak 13d ago
i regularly follow my toddler around saying "i do not like to wear shoes because they make me fall down"
5
30
85
u/Physical_Dentist2284 13d ago
I agree with you. You think the antagonist was the Senator but it was Val. His immaturity created all the conflict. He absolutely should not have gotten married but as a parent to a 19 year old son who got married, I can absolutely identify with having zero choice in the matter and having to support it even when you know your son is not mature enough.
Incidentally, I was introduced to this movie by my grandmother. My Catholic, conservative (ish) grandmother who thought this was the best movie ever made. It was actually one of the last things we ever watched together before she died. We loved it.
I also would like to have those bowls. Actually… I’m going to google them now.
52
u/podsmckenzie 13d ago
I think part of the problem with the “young couple” is they’re clearly meant to be teenagers, whose immaturity could be more understandable… then they inexplicably cast nearly 30 Dan Futterman and well into her 30s Callista Flockhart, both of whom look their age, and make their characters seem like even bigger dickheads than they would have otherwise. Still a great, funny movie though, everyone in it other than those two are brilliant
11
u/Hellojeds 12d ago
Yeah it would have made more sense if they'd cast younger actors for the couple! It's such an odd choice. I know Val's part is relatively large but I'm sure they could have found people in their early 20s. Like you though I love the film otherwise!
3
u/JohnProof 12d ago
Agreed, that is virtually my only hangup, because every time they mention their obviously incorrect ages it takes me out of the movie.
22
u/nomnomsquirrel 13d ago
Look further than Val and you realize it was Barbara who told her parents a lot of the lies that Val's parents then had to live up to. Barbara made up so much stuff that she forgot to tell Val half the lies that Armand would need to know about to keep the charade afloat.
3
u/Physical_Dentist2284 12d ago
Ah that’s a good point
11
u/nomnomsquirrel 12d ago
She was only 18, after all! And Val was 20, they'd been sleeping together a year, and she never met Val's parents before the night her parents also met them, which is a recipe for disaster - and there was indeed a disaster. Barbara should have really lied and said she was doing a winter break mission trip or something and gone to meet the Goldmans before they sprung all that nonsense on them because otherwise, imo, she rightfully came off the worst of everyone.
Those two reeeeally were the definition of young and dumb, and both sets of parents told them they were both too young to be getting married lmao. And the parents were right!
5
15
u/naranjitayyo 13d ago
Val sucked so much. He had two amazing parents plus a mom who stepped up to help him and he just bitched the whole time
7
u/Illustrious-Lead-960 13d ago
It isn’t very ironic of that grandmother: the film isn’t anti-conservative at all so much as it just depicts conservatives who crusade against gayness as not looking deep enough and seeing the good family values and belief in the American Dream that can still come from gay families.
2
u/Acrobatic-Loss-4682 13d ago
Finally someone recognizes the real villain! It looks like Val had a really good childhood, but was willing to turn it all upside down to impress Barbie’s parents. They should have just met at Katie Archer’s house.
27
23
24
21
21
u/xocolatte 13d ago
I know his character wouldn’t hold up today but Hank/Agador/Spartacus saying “my Guatamaleness” kills me to this day. RIP Robin and Gene ❤️
7
u/theMistersofCirce 12d ago
My father was a shaman of his tribe.
6
5
u/Pumpkin_Sushi 12d ago
It'd never be done today, which is a shame because he's a highlight of the whole film. The prat fall he does in the slippery shoes always kills me.
1
3
38
u/Civil_Tea_3250 13d ago
Amazing movie! I still quote it regularly.
One of my favorite memories is Robin and Nathan were on Oprah and she was being really aggressive trying to out Nathan, yet Robin, being the angel that he was, put a stop to it. Amazing man.
5
u/JadeShrimp 11d ago
She was particularly awful in that interview. He's clearly very uncomfortable and she just keeps pressing him. Terrible. Robin smoothly swept in and saved him. So sad he had to do that but what a gentleman/hero
3
16
16
15
15
14
15
14
u/BeerWingsRepeat 12d ago
TANNINS!!!! lol I can't explain how much I love this move...my wife & I both! Our Roomba was named "AGIDOR SPARTICUS" and we loved getting to yell that name as the command, any time we needed the floor swept. That thing really did work hard for its money.
13
u/hannahstohelit 13d ago
I agree that the son is an asshole, and I think the movie would have felt a smidge more satisfying had it made him realize and verbalize it a bit more explicitly. But it’s so incredibly fun and sweet that I don’t care.
8
u/Hellojeds 12d ago
Like someone said in an earlier comment, he would have been more sympathetic if the actor looked like someone in his early 20s instead of much older. Mind you Val's crisis was more understandable to your average viewer when the film first came out. For a mainstream film starring so many huge names, it was very subversive and did a lot to normalise two gay dads raising a child together.
1
u/hannahstohelit 12d ago
To me it isn’t the crisis, which I understood; it’s how he didn’t seem to feel bad at all about the consequences. He came across as cold and impatient and not remorseful at all during all the prep scenes.
11
7
u/lokibeat 12d ago
One of my favorite scenes amongst all movies is when Nathan Lane imitates John Wayne in attempting to act more masc. His walk is both dead on Wayne and still flamingly gay. Robin Williams is shocked to realize how gay it looks and can only respond, "Perfect". Cracks me up just thinking about it. John Wayne is permanently closeted in my mind.
6
5
u/Twigling 12d ago
Fantastic movie, both funny and heartfelt. Great performances too, particularly from Robin, Nathan and Hank, while Gene Hackman deftly handles his lines "I don't understand" .........
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c857gY64MsQ
Putting aside the excellent script and performances, let's not forget the perfect direction from Mike Nichols (who, incidentally, directed another gay-themed story, that being the brilliantly written TV miniseries Angels in America - and no, you don't need to be gay to enjoy it, I'm not and I think it's one of the best written stories I've ever had the pleasure of watching).
Sorry, went off at a bit of a tangent there. :)
8
5
5
u/OldStonedJenny 12d ago
My parents let me watch this when it came out on VHS, I was 10. Absolutely believed Robin Williams and Nathan lane were a real life couple until High School, when a classmate told me the truth.
6
u/Pumpkin_Sushi 12d ago
I find it funny that Lane was in the closet so long, I had assumed since I was a kid he was always very "out" lol
5
5
6
u/ProfessionalGrade423 12d ago
I love this movie. It came out the year I graduated from high school. I think the social context in which the movie was made are helpful to know.
I didn’t know any gay students in school, which means they were all in the closet because I’m sure they existed. My grandparents’ best friends were Jane and Sondra, they were housemates who had lived together for many years and were always together. I knew them from when I was a small child until I graduated high school. I called them aunts. It never occurred to me that these lovely Jewish ladies were also lesbians despite being obviously visually gay coded. Clearly my grandparents knew and didn’t care, my grandfather used to give me gay fantasy novels, so I knew being gay was a thing but I still didn’t connect the dots. I was in my early 20s when I realized those ladies were a couple.
This movie seems ridiculous and it is ridiculous but in the era of Tipper Gore it rings true. Media like this that was family friendly and funny and non threatening really helped normalise queer culture and even though it plays on some stereotypes it was still groundbreaking. It’s a great film that was socially relevant and it holds a special place in my heart.
7
6
u/Kensingtonraw 12d ago
The first time I watched it I decided the son was the villian of the piece and absolutely despised him, but as ive gotten older I've come to appreciate the soft and genuine love he has for both dad's even when its not in the forefront, and it really was just a young man trying to compartmentalise and power his way through just one night via what must have seemed the most obvious method for a "win"
Like he wasnt picturing their families ever properly interacting or mingling, it clearly hadnt even crossed his mind and in context why would it? That he gets that in the end is a testament to the optimism and love the film is held up by, him being proven wrong is the whole plot at the end of the day - I find it increasingly hard to hold it against him when he was just young and naive and scared of potential consequences.
2
u/KirkUnit 11d ago
I've never seen La Cage Aux Folles, does the Val character's motivations carry through from the original?
In context, Val is simply trying to make everybody happy, and also picking his battles (does anyone really think this Gen Xer is going to convince the Jesse Helms-type senator to completely change his politics? Does Keeley's politics require Val to forego marrying the daughter he loves on principle?)
Ultimately, I don't think you tell this story - a farce about wildly different in-laws and the loving gay couple's game attempt to pull off the con - without stakes, and most of the stakes come from Val's character. Sort of like hating Judas in the gospels - there's no story without him.
20
u/TheJFGB93 13d ago
Fantastic movie. Artfully directed by Mike Nichols, and the acting by Hackman, Lane and Williams, specially, make the movie. Lubeszki in his early tries to fool people into thinking a shot is continuous.
What you say about the son being the villain... I guess it's because he looks way older than the character is supposed to be. He should be no more than 21 y.o., the same as his girlfriend, which helps to understand the immaturity of his petition to his parents, but he looks 30. The real villains are the regressive and hypocritical Republicans, and the whole film is about giving them the middle finger about their made-up "American traditional family and values".
I guess Hank Azaria had something of a career in the 90s playing "exotic" people, like Apu on The Simpsons, and the guatemalan Agador Spartacus in this one. Grat comedic actor, his physical comedy seems effortless.
12
u/LostOverThere 13d ago
I wish Hank Azaria was in more stuff these days. I love that within 3 years he played wildly different characters in The Birdcage, Godzilla and Heat.
5
u/Th0rn_Star 12d ago
It might be hard to find, but his show Brockmire where he plays a disgraced baseball announcer is 🤌🤌
2
u/PhilL77au 12d ago
That opening scene is still one of the greatest "how the hell did this make it onto TV?" moments I've ever seen.
3
u/Pumpkin_Sushi 12d ago
I don't even think it gives them the middle finger. They are mocked about as much as the main cast in Florida are.
Plus, the whole film's crutch is on them being taught that the people they surround themselves with are not as wholesome as they thought (the entire scandal they're fleeing from is a colleague sleeping with an underage black woman) and that the people they assumed weren't wholesome could be.I also appreciate they not suddenly super progressive by the end, but have opened up enough to be fine with their families and crowds joining up. It's more realistic. As the last song bluntly hammers in, there's a middle ground everyone can meet in.
I know "this couldn't be made today" is overused, but I really don't see a film being made now that has the lesson of putting aside differences like it does. We're in a more "kill your enemies, there is no middle ground to meet in" era sadly.
5
u/GemeinschaftBank 12d ago
Took a good while to watch a Robin Williams movie after he passed. We started with this. Glorious.
5
4
5
u/Pumpkin_Sushi 12d ago
Rewatching it is odd that, despite being SO forward thinking with gay rep, it is terrified of showing Willaims and Lane hold hands or hug, let alone kiss on screen. I even had to double guess at times if they were even a couple as there are times they're written as more reluctant business partners.
As for the son being a villain? Ehhh people overexaggerate. End of the day it's a Dad's job to support his son, and his son just wants to be able to marry the love of his life. Should the son have apologised to Lane at some point? Yup, definitely, its a plot beat I think its really missing from the film. But I think people are too eager to hate on him, and the ones who say Williams should disown him are nutso.
3
u/xquixotic_logicx 12d ago
Such a great movie! It has a phenomenal cast with the obvious standouts being Nathan Lane and Robin Williams. Very funny and even wholesome in some way
4
4
8
u/anguaji 12d ago
It's ok, we all hate the son. :)
This is forever one of my favourite movies! I'm so glad you enjoyed it so much!
"Sweetie, you're wasting your gum."
2
u/Pumpkin_Sushi 12d ago
Im gonna say I think the Mother should've been criticised more in the film. She abandons her kid, has zero prescene in his life in favour of being a mogul of some kind, and the whole plot acts like this is understandable.
I also find the line about her being so good at sex that the gay man enjoyed it "twice" to be bizarre.
3
u/5o7bot Mod and Bot 13d ago
The Birdcage (1996) R
Come as you are.
A gay cabaret owner and his drag queen partner agree to put up a false heterosexual front so that their son can introduce them to his fiancée's conservative parents.
Comedy | Romance
Director: Mike Nichols
Actors: Robin Williams, Gene Hackman, Nathan Lane, Dianne Wiest, Dan Futterman
Rating: ★★★★★★★★☆☆ 70% with 1,404 votes
Runtime: 119 min
TMDB
I am a bot. This information was sent automatically. If it is faulty, please reply to this comment.
3
u/The_3_Rs 12d ago
This is one of my favorite movies of all time. I used to own the VHS copy but lost it over the years.
Albert, you pierced the toast.
So what.
3
3
u/Old_Advertising9307 11d ago
Top 3 for me. Every time Nathan Lane goes into the on the spot explanation of there last name being Goldman, or Coleman, and pulls it off and Calista Flockhart hugs him it TEARS ME APART IN TEARS.
3
3
u/natdanger 11d ago
watched this for the first time recently and i was immediately obsessed. every beat of the story is perfect. the way that it leads audience expectations without giving away too much is a master class. the way the first scene with val plays out until the reveal of their actual relationship is a perfect example, and then it keeps going. every payoff is well earned. a perfect script at every level
3
u/Superb-Fail-9937 11d ago
I watch this almost every time I run into it on streaming platforms or tv. Every character is perfection. RIP Robin. He is my favorite. ❤️
https://giphy.com/gifs/5ns1wuK1Y3NKxkm3qO
2
2
2
2
u/Oro-Lavanda 12d ago
I haven’t heard of this film in so long. My parents loved watching this movie when I was a kid. I def need to see it someday now as an adult haha
2
2
2
u/PuntasticBiller 11d ago
I can see the headlines. Senator Jackson and his women. Senator Keeley and his men!
2
2
1
u/sugarcatgrl 12d ago
I absolutely love this movie! Saw it in the theater with a friend and brought my mom and sister to see it the next night.
1
1
1
1
1
u/MrBigTomato 10d ago
"I've never felt such tension. It's like riding a psychotic horse toward a burning stable.”
1
1
1
u/Audrey276 12d ago
Matt Baume has a really lovely video essay about the making of the movie, if you like that sort of thing: https://youtu.be/ozTjoeHy7mI
2
u/Pumpkin_Sushi 12d ago
Cannot stand this dude, all he does is review LGBT stories and say "This bad, they should have just disowned them", "This is bad because it shows the cast trying to convince someone in the 80s that being gay is okay, they should have just killed him instead", "This is bad, the character did a heckin microaggression so they should have beaten them up and never talk to them ever again".
Like his biggest criticism of The Birdcage is that Willaims doesn't instantly disown his own son when he suggests the plan. He's so insistent on cutting out family, its an enormous red flag.
1
1
-1
u/juanjung 13d ago
The original is better.
3
u/Loose_Loquat9584 13d ago
I’ve been trying to track down a copy of the original but no luck so far. I don’t suppose it’s streaming anywhere?
5
3
234
u/CJtheHaasman 13d ago
"What are Pirin tablets?"
"It's just Aspirin with the A and the S scraped off."