Isn’t She Great Review

Isn't She Great
A look at the life and times of author Jaqueline Susann (Midler) - she who penned 'The Valley Of The Dolls'. After failing as an actress, manager-turned-husband Irving Mansfield, who suggests she become a writer. Initially rejected as trash, once the sexual revolution hits, so does she. Illness, however, is on the horizon...

by Colin Kennedy |
Published on
Release Date:

23 Jun 2000

Running Time:

93 minutes

Certificate:

15

Original Title:

Isn’t She Great

Talk about an open goal. Naming your precious movie Isn't She Great is like a red rag to any reviewer. Oh well, never look a gift horse and all that: Isn't She Overwhelmingly Average? Bette Midler stars as Jacqueline Susann, author of bonkbuster Valley Of The Dolls, and this bio-fluff charts her not entirely remarkable rise to fame and battle against disease.

However, not even Susann in her wildest flights of egotistical fantasy would have dreamt that the assembled cast, the story, the entire premise had any ambition beyond a Sunday evening TV movie. At its zippy, zingy, one-liner best (as when Nathan Lane is trading barbs with Stockard Channing), this was only ever a three star movie. Since it fails to maintain this pace for very long, it can't really lay any claim to the moniker, "great".

A lame duck of a movie with a sitting duck of a title, this barely makes any impression - good or bad - which does render it rather pointless.
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