THE BAREFOOT EXECUTIVE (1971) **1/2 It's a movie about a monkey that really likes television and it can pick out shows that will be popular so everyone pays attention to it. The obvious and powerful metaphor is almost entirely ignored, I guess they figure that if you're smart enough to see it you'll probably indulge on your own. Or maybe the monkey didn't tell 'em about it. Obviously Kurt Russell has to be smack in the middle of such a thing; no, not as the monkey, c'mon! As the wheeler-dealer nice but doesn't know it yet kid. A stable of faces from the golden day of Disney shows up and I'll go out on a limb and say that I believe it to be Joe Flynn's finest of many fine performances as a neomaxiezoondweebie. Something to appreciate, few have ever done it better. Heather North would go on to even greater things as a voice of Daphne on Scooby-Doo, but I think I like her character here even better. Why don't they write these kind, gentle, innocent, supportive, forgiving, passionately supportive young female roles any more? Is this Women's Lib's fault? I mean, she's a working gal for goodness sake, why can't she have classical nurturing virtues too?! The film travels along at a reasonable clip anyway, at least until it can't fight its way out of maybe 20 minutes of quicksand towards the end. Ah, it's all good propaganda about holding on to your ideals and principles, played out before a generation that apparently lacked ears to listen, unfortunately.
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