Jessica Lange Books

I found the book to be high quality in both content and writing style. I found the title topic was dealt with candidly, in a way that anyone could understand but with a meaningful amount of depth. I appauld the author...

I first watched this movie with a group of my guy friends from work and soon it was clear we couldn't make it through a day without quoting a line from it! Norm McDonald at his funniest!

i love norm macdonald and this is the dumbest movie of all time

if your into dumb humor...or watching artie lang trying to act in a PG 13 arena....this is a good buy

If I could have rated this movie 0 stars I would have. It is terrible, save your money.

OK, this film bombed at the theaters and I am guessing it was panned by the critics. HOWEVER, it has some of the funniest lines and scenes in movie history. Artie and Norm work beautifully together. MOREOEVR, there is one scene in this movie that makes me literally cry because it is so funny, no change that, because it is so ridiculous.

I first watched this movie with a group of my guy friends from work and soon it was clear we couldn't make it through a day without quoting a line from it! Norm McDonald at his funniest!

i love norm macdonald and this is the dumbest movie of all time

if your into dumb humor...or watching artie lang trying to act in a PG 13 arena....this is a good buy

If I could have rated this movie 0 stars I would have. It is terrible, save your money.

OK, this film bombed at the theaters and I am guessing it was panned by the critics. HOWEVER, it has some of the funniest lines and scenes in movie history. Artie and Norm work beautifully together. MOREOEVR, there is one scene in this movie that makes me literally cry because it is so funny, no change that, because it is so ridiculous.

Frank Chambers (Jack Nicholson) is a drifter who manages to scam his way into the lives of married couple Nick (John Colicos) and Cora (Jessica Lange). Nick owns and operates a small diner in the middle of nowhere and his wife Cora is the cook. Nick falls for one of Frank's schemes but nonetheless offers him a job and a place to stay. Frank is immediately attracted to Cora and decides to stay on as a mechanic behind the diner. Cora is initially cold to him and refuses his advances while Nick likes Frank a great deal and invites him into his home to talk and drink all night. Frank waits for the day when Nick leaves town on business to make a move on Cora. He tries to whisk her away to Chicago but she is resistant and the trip ends with her returning home. Frank feels burned by her and isn't interested when she tries to get him to help her kill Nick. " They hang people for that" he tells her. Cora continues that Nick is worth a lot of money that the two could run off with and make a life for themselves. Frank takes some convincing but agrees to act as lookout while Cora kills Nick in their home. The attempted murder doesn't go smoothly since Nick is not really dead and he emerges a changed man who wants to keep Frank and Cora even closer than before. The two decide to try again and make a life for themselves but they have now drawn the attention of cops and lawyers who have them pegged for murderers who are hoping to collect on the hefty life insurance policy. The film is actually a little long and boring in spots. Nicholson is pretty good but this is not one of his best performances and Lange is quite sexy. Colicos is the most sympathetic character and actor Michael Lerner plays a lawyer who represents Frank as the story progresses. Anjelica Huston, Nicholson's lover at the time, has a very brief role as a lion tamer in a traveling circus that Frank has an affair with. The script has none of the usual Mamet dialogue and in fact was changed drastically in spots by director Bob Rafelson. The biggest example of this is the first time Frank and Cora have sex. The scene is very brutal and plays like a rape that Cora doesn't entirely consent to at first. This scene also sets the standard for the rest of the sex scenes. There is practically no nudity only brief flashes but regardless the scenes are quite explicit. The film is okay but a little long and pointless all leading up to a dumb ending. Still fans of Nicholson or Mamet might want to check it out as a curiosity.

Very, very much the classic "Nicholson". Jessica Lang is supremely sexy, beautiful, and the combination of the two of them just explodes on the screen, Both are truly wonderful actors and, although a remake of the original, it is better by far.

There are only a few movies that I would put in the same category along with it: Casablanca, The African Queen, and The Great Escape. In short, I loved it and probably have seen the movie about 50 times. It is indeed a classic!

I saw the 1981 "Postman" when it first came out. The period recreation and photography are excellent. Moreover, the performances are convincing and the sexual heat can be felt. Lange, who hit major stardom the following year with "Tootsie" and "Frances," has been a top notch actress ever since her arrival in Hollywood. Here, she gets her first high profile dramatic role. In her prime, Lange was an incredibly sexy woman. Hot with a capital "H." In this version, Rafelson and company are true to the ethnicities of Cain's characters. Nick is Greek not English and the lawyer is Jewish not Irish. Another reviewer, Dennis Littrell, suggested that 1946 Hollywood was afraid of being offensive. Littrell is mistakenly applying modern PC concerns to the past. Unflattering and even offensive potrayals of different races and ethnic groups were commonplace at the time. Even though Jews of European descent largely ran Hollywood, they were convinced that many audience members didn't want to watch anyone that might be a little different from them. Of course, John Garfield was Jewish but he wasn't playing a Jewish character. Although certain forties films like "Gentleman's Agreement" addressed the issue of bigotry, it wasn't until the fifties that people of different races and ethnicities were up on the screen more often. Nonetheless, the 1946 version with sultry Lana Turner and ruggedly handsome Garfield really captures the era and the tragedy of these doomed characters.

I admit to being a film noir fan of long standing. Maybe it was the fact of growing up in the time of black and white television and watching all those late night movies which were freely available at the time. Maybe it was that tight, if improbable, dialogue, the relatively simple plots and the dramatic effect of the shadows of black and white photography on mood. In any case, the Postman Always Rings Twice fits nicely into that mix. The plot line is fairly simple- unhappy California house wife, an older overbearing, uncaring lout of a husband and a younger man at the door who turns out to be handy with a wretch- all the ingredients for a murder. Of course, as always the guilty parties will have to face justice. You know this is a modern morality play, after all. This remake, in color, starring the always watchable Jack Nicholson and forbiddingly sexual Jessica Lange is probably truer to Cain's wicked designs but to my mind the old noir classic black and white starring John Garfield and Lana Turner is the definitive Postman. In any case one should read the book by James M. Cain to get a better feel for the language, the steamy sexual tension and better insight into the motivations driving the characters to their fates.

Director Bob Rafelson reunited with his "Five Easy Pieces" star Jack Nicholson on this film, which also stars Jessica Lange, Anjelica Huston, and briefly Christopher Lloyd (also reunited with Nicholson from "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest"). When Rafelson set out to make this film (which had already been adapted from the novel into a 1946 film starring Lana Turner), he wanted to take a detour from the original. In 1946, you weren't really allowed to show sex so the film had destroyed the whole vision of the novel. So, Rafelson has been adamant about not calling this a remake. I've never seen the original or read the book, so this is my first exposure to the material. Having said that, there's something about this film that's kind of funny...There is no postman. When we meet drifter Frank Chambers (Nicholson), he just scammed a restuarant owner named Nick (John Colicos) out of a free meal. About to leave, Nick offers him a job and Frank accepts. Problem is, Frank can't contain his feelings for Nick's wife Cora (the beautiful Jessica Lange). After Nick and Cora begin having an affair, Cora tells Nick that the only way they continue is if Nick is killed. After a failed attempt, they cool off for awhile...But eventually realize that it's something that must be done. The first hour of the film is spectacular, it sags a little in the second hour (causing me to almost give it 4 stars). But the performances are so good and the ending is so beautifully done (some complain it's abrupt, but it works to suit Nicholson's character). I don't know how this film is compared to the book and movie that inspired it, but it's a great movie. For people just looking for nudity, this isn't your movie. The sex scenes are pretty graphic, but the only nudity is Anjelica Huston side-boob.

GRADE: A-

I learn a lot from this book. The examples and illustration helped me easily understand the concepts.

Now in my second statistics course, I have a great base in statistics. This book seems to confuse everything that i've already learned. I would recommend using The Basic Practice of Statistics over this book anyday.

There is no doubt that after a startling career rebirth in 1982 and an artistic career that spans 20 years and over 25 films, two-time Academy Award winner Jessica Lange deserves attention in a book. However a biography of the actress' life and career (no matter how badly written) seems a bit premature. The actress, after all, is still working in film and on stage. This book embarassingly focuses on her career since the one-two punch of "Tootsie" & "Frances" in 1982 and vaguely pieces together information about her parents, siblings and children. The information is obviously carelessly gleaned from articles and interviews the actress gave to "Esquire", "Rolling Stone", "Vanity Fair" and "Life" magazines, so to say that the author actually wrote this book is a stretch at best. Career highlights are inaccurately reported concerning "steam" on the set of "The Postman Always Rings Twice" with Jack Nicholson and when the author does not have an article about the actress to plagirize, he fills in the gaps with inaccurate and obviously unauthorized information concerning Lange's feelings, character, opinion and craft. Showered with a few pictures from Lange's Cloquet high school yearbook and still other poor stills from her movies,the book stops at her work on 1986's "Crimes Of The Heart" with Sissy Spaceck and Diane Keaton. Lange has gone on to win another Oscar ,performed on Broadway and received an Emmy award nomination since that time. There's no wonder the book is out of print. The actress' mysterious reclusivity and brilliant work has kept audiences at arm's length and at the same time intrigued. If those intriguied audiences want a true glimpse of Lange's thought-provoking life and work, they should find a copy of The Actor's Studio interview from January of 1997, in which Lange herself muses about life, love and being one of today's leading motion picture actresses.