Movie NINE is Minus Zero.

I generally don't go to the movies. We Netflix instead. As a matter of fact, I haven't been in a movie theater in over a year...maybe longer. But a friend asked me to go with her to see "NINE" and since it was a cold, gloomy day in Dunedin, Florida, I accepted her invite. We got to the theater and there were 10 thousand old people in line. I'm not joking. Turns out it was seniors day. Five bucks per geezer. To make matters worse, it was a 20 multiplex theater with only one cashier. My friend and I fit the age criteria but we didn't want to wait in line because we figured tickets would be sold out by the time we got to the front. Luckily, my friend has a keen eye and spotted a credit card ticket machine outside. These devices are a brilliant invention and nobody was using it. She stuck her credit card in the slot, punched a few buttons and out popped 2 crisp, blue tickets for the movie NINE. We did a quick happy dance then ran inside and found the very last seats in the entire theater...way, way, way in the back. We were so far up and to the rear, we could touch the back wall...and the ceiling. Nonetheless, we still had a good view of the screen and the sound system was fine. I looked around and noticed that every seat was occupied by somebody who grew up knowing the names of all the original Mouseketeers or the Little Rascals or had served in WWI.

OK, enough of the prelude. Here's the main point of this story. Do NOT, I repeat do NOT go see the movie NINE...unless you are a masochist. It is excruciatingly, outrageously, painfully, atrociously dreadful. Boring doesn't even begin to describe it. After the first 5 minutes, I prayed it would end quickly but it dragged on and on and on for what seemed like a lost weekend at a mortuary. Hours of sheer, unadulterated, tediously dull, insipid monotony. Oh, did I mention it's a musical?

The movie is set during the 1960s and revolves around the life of a famous but tortured Italian film director and his lust for women. It is based on the influential Italian director Frederico Fellini, who was known for his distinct cinematic style of blending fantasy and sexual desire. La Dolce Vita and 8 1/2 are two classic Fellini films.

If ever there was a movie audience that might have been the least bit receptive to NINE...it was the crowd of old boomers packed in the theater with us. In our heyday, we actually knew who the real Federico Fellini was and we adored Sophia Loren. Back then, we were mesmerized by the glamorous Italian lifestyle, chic fashion and fast cars. Oleg Cassini, Lamborgini, Gucci and Gina Lollobrigida. We dreamed of living the sweet life in Rome, having a romantic tryst with a beautiful Italian, riding a flirty Vespa motor scooter while belting out Cuando, Cuando Cuando. Well, at least some of us did.

So it was with great disappointment that this film, in my humble opinion, did not deliver...anything. It was a collossal waste of my time and of the multi millions of production dollars spent on it. There was a lot of singing and dancing...out of which came not a single show-stopper song or even a catchy tune. For the most part, the music was downright depressing. After a while, I inwardly groaned every time somebody opened their mouth to sing. Flamboyant, elaborate sets, surreal dream scenes, extravagant costumes and tons of gaudy sex still don't make this movie the least bit interesting. Watching spaghetti boil would have been much more entertaining.

I did enjoy the location scenes of Rome...the ancient buildings, narrow streets and sexy little Italian sports cars. There are a bevy of popular and beautiful actresses in this film but I was most fascinated to see legendary movie icon, Sophia Loren again. Her bio lists her as 75 but I bet she's pushing 80. Even so, she looks fantastico...absolutely stunning. 

Throughout the movie, I had the weird feeling I was watching an Italianized version of the award-winning film CHICAGO minus a plot, decent acting, superb dancing or kick-up-your-feet music. I enjoyed CHICAGO very much and I'm shocked to learn that the fellow who directed NINE is the very same guy who directed CHICAGO. How could he go so abysmally wrong?

When the film finally ended in anticlimatic fashion, the audience seemed so totally glazed over from hours of monumental boredom that we didn't realize it was indeed finished. It was like a sentence left in mid air. But when the entire screen abruptly faded to black, I swear I heard everyone in the theater whisper, "Thank God, that's over."  For five bucks, I could have had a tasty lunch of linguine and meatballs instead of enduring what amounted to one man's pathetic obsession with the female buttocks and Italian cigarettes. Sphere: Related Content