smile

Smile
$17.98
This gal is great. I've seen her live in a relatively small venue and she was phenomenal. She was a child prodigy and has sustained her playing ability. She is on a CD with Perlman and Zukerman which should indicate how she ranks with the best in the business.

Smile
$0.99
"Smile" is Uncle Kracker's latest "hit." It's bland,inoffensive,and probably best used as music for a truck commercial. Or played at a country western bar. It's not so much tranquil as it is a tranquilizer. It's so bad... it's well,bad. Uncle Kracker's music is like a bland cracker,that's a dip. So this bland song is called a comeback after Uncle's run-ins with the law? He's better off hanging out with Kenny Chesney. Not that there's anything wrong with that.

Brian Wilson presents SMiLE
$29.98
This is one of the most moving experiences you will ever see recorded . If you have ever followed the Beach Boys, or you are into the creative proses, or if you just enjoy seeing someone conker their demons and achieve some greatness, and produce a completely moving work of art this is a DVD that you can not miss.
In disc one, After over 30 years of waiting, Brian Wilson was able to receive the help of friends and family and create this beautiful piece of music. It fully documents the making of this artistic masterpiece. You see Brian Wilson go through the emotional changes as the piece comes together and watch him change from pain to joy as the music gradually comes together.
In disc two you see a full live concert of the entire piece. The title SMILE is what you do during the playing of the entire disc two..
Do not miss this moving experience

Smile
$14.98
I have to admit when I selected this movie I thought I would be watching a made for TV movie I enjoyed as a kid about a beauty pageant that starred Farrah Fawcett and Eleanor Parker. When the cast of characters at the beginning of SMILE did not list either actress I did a little internet research and found that the film I was thinking of was 1973's THE GREAT AMERICAN BEAUTY PAGEANT which was one of the ABC TV movies of the week. 1975's SMILE was a theatrical release I had never seen before.

SMILE was filmed on location in Santa Rosa, California and the authentic small city feel as well as the clothing, home furnishings, hairstyle and attitudes of the mid 1970's make the movie worth watching to baby boomers or anyone curious about that time period. Fortunately the viewer also gets a funny and insightful satire. The plot is pretty simple as it involves a fictional beauty contest for high school girls from throughout the state of California. The action takes place over the period of a week and the days are announced in a clever and memorable manner. The pageant contestants include several different "types" of high school girls from around the state many who are not particularly pretty and whose "talents" are often hilariously bad. Even more interesting are the townspeople and other adults involved. Barbara Feldon is very good as an uptight former winner whose husband's suicidal and alcoholic tendencies only concern her as a potential source of embarrassment. Bruce Dern is very sympathetic playing an earnest if silly successful salesman who is pathetically proud of being a pageant judge as well as belonging to the Jaycees' organization. Dern's character has a tweenage son who with a couple of his friends provides some of the biggest laughs in the film. Also memorable is real life choreographer Michael Kidd playing an exasperated Hollywood professional hired to direct the girls in dance numbers.

SMILE is laugh out loud funny because even though the characters and situations are often way over the top it stays so close to truths about human nature. One caution even though this film is rated PG it would definitely be PG-13 today as it contains some brief nudity and quite a bit "adult" humor.