Day Seventy-Three: Paper Moon

PAPER MOON

Starring:
-Ryan O’Neal
-Tatum O’Neal
-Madeleine Kahn

Directed by: Peter Bogdanovich

Screenplay Credits: Alvin Sargent

MPAA Rating: PG -horror of horrors! A nine year old smokes!



“It’s only a paper moon, sailing over a cardboard sea...”

Oh, hello!

I didn’t see you there.

I was just singing that song PAPER MOON, which just so happens to be the name of today’s film. Of course, if you’re anything like me, you can’t hear that song without thinking about Blanche DuBois and wanting to take a shower to get the “creepy” off of you.

Or maybe you just want to get into the shower with Vivian Leigh.

At any rate, this movie has very little to do with Blanche DuBois, except I can picture Miss Trixie Delight getting involved with a Neanderthal Marlon Brando type, but I’m getting ahead of myself here.

PAPER MOON starts off at a pathetic little funeral for a dead prostitute. Her little girl Addie (Tatum) stands adorably by in one of those little Tabitha dresses (so called because they’re the outfits that Tabitha always wore on BEWITCHED). She’s pretty bummed now that her mom is dead because she doesn’t seem to have a father, either.

Cue Moses Pray, a Bible salesman and, ironically, Tatum O’Neal’s father. Moses knew Addie’s mother (in the biblical sense, more than likely) and came to pay his respects. Somehow he gets roped into taking Little Orphan Addie (sorry… I couldn’t resist) to her aunt’s house in Missouri.

Along the way, we learn that Moses is a conman. Addie proves to be as asset to his business, so he keeps her around. The pair is really raking in the dough when Moses falls head over naughty parts in lust with Miss Trixie Delight, a stripper who is traveling around with her expressionless black maid.

Addie becomes jealous of Trixie and tricks her into getting into bed with the desk clerk at the hotel they’re staying at (who also happens to be that skinny, brown-haired, moron cowboy from BLAZING SADDLES). Addie makes sure that Moses sees them together. He gets mad, and they’re off like a jug handle.

Moses has a hard time bouncing back after Miss Delight broke his heart (“broke his ego” is probably more accurate), but Addie convinces him to take a stab at cheating a greasy old bootlegger. Moses gives it a whirl and sells the crooked man his own liquor. Moses and Addie are barely out of town with their $600+ bucks when the sheriff (who just happens to be the bootlegger’s brother) stops them and throws them in the clink.

It’s good to have family in high places, especially if you’re going to bootleg in the Depression.

Addie hides their money and manages to steal the keys to their car. She and Moses escape and hurry to Missouri, where the bootlegger’s brother can’t catch them. Unfortunately for Moses, the long arm of the law still extends to con men, and the local sheriff robs him and beats the crap out of him.

This is the last straw for the battered Moses, who sends Addie to be with her Aunt. Addie is miserable, so she runs back to Moses and they hit the road together once more to con the crap out of honest, hard-working people.

I love a happy ending, don’t you?


This film was originally slated to star Paul Newman and his daughter Nell, and I honestly think that would have made a far superior film, at least where the character Moses is concerned. This role earned Tatum a Best Supporting Actress Oscar, and I believe she still holds the record for youngest Oscar winner ever. Naturally, the Academy was dumber than dumb to give the award to the kid over Madeleine Kahn, who is clearly far superior to Tatum O’Neal, even in death.

PAPER MOON is shot in black and white, which I think was a very wise decision. The picture is very crisp looking, and the color choice makes the Depression-era story come to life in really interesting ways.


FINAL GRADE: B+

Off in search of some rich sucker,

M.