Behind the Candelabra

awww...

When I was a pup I used to enjoy looking through my Dad's records.  For those of you who are under 35 :  a 'record' was a black vinyl disc that played music, kind of like a big CD you had to turn over halfway through.  Among such luminaries as Des O'Connor and David Whitfield there was a Liberace record. 

On the cover of this record the lovely big old poof himself was sitting at a big gold piano in a gold room, on a gold stool surrounded by other gold stuff.  Now I actually used to like listening to the track 'Boogie Woogie' on this record, on which Lee (to his friends) played a, well, boogie woogie tune and encouraged the audience to shout 'hey!'.

So, it was with an air of familiarity that I watched Lee's introduction to the film 'Behind the Candelabra' - in which Michael Douglas as the piano tinkling 'fruit flavoured' (Lee sued someone for calling him that) superstar performed that particular number.  I'm pretty sure he was the kind of guy who would call songs 'numbers'.

Scott Thorson (played by Matt Damon) enters a Las Vegas club and approaches his table... and there is Liberace in the background, out of focus, doing his thing... before coming very much into focus... and then going very much out of focus again as plastic surgical procedures take effect.

Basically this is a film about their relationship - and it is portrayed very touchingly, with all the familiar aspects of long term relationships which some of us will recognise - gay or straight.  It's just two people who love each other and get on each other's nerves - but one of them happens to be hugely famous.

And it's a lot more than that.  Michael Douglas is amazing and shows Liberace's ego, his vanity, his love and ultimately his humanity.  Taking him out of the lights and showing us his bald head, wrinkles (till he has them yanked over the back of his bald head) and surprising sexual appetite doesn't do the man a disservice at all.  I am kind of a Liberace fan now.

It's a really special little film - oddly domestic and intimate.  And, really, really funny.

- 'This isn't exactly the life I had planned for myself.  I wanted to be a veterinarian.'
- 'You wanna help the animals?  Go pick up the dogshit.'

And Rob Lowe as Lee's plastic faced plastic surgeon just has to be seen to believed.  That is, if you can open your eyes at all.  Or close them...