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Movies / On DVD / The Cotton Club
The Cotton Club

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The Cotton Club (1984)

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74 %
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Reviews Counted:23

Fresh:17

Rotten:6

Average Rating:6.3/10

Runtime: 2 hrs 45 mins

Genre: Dramas

Synopsis: It's the height of the 1920s Jazz Age and Harlem's famous Cotton Club is the home to both talented performers and gangster molls. Dixie Dwyer (Richard Gere) is a cornet player who unexpectedly... It's the height of the 1920s Jazz Age and Harlem's famous Cotton Club is the home to both talented performers and gangster molls. Dixie Dwyer (Richard Gere) is a cornet player who unexpectedly saves the life of mobster Dutch Schultz (James Remar). When Schultz takes Dixie under his wing, Dutch's girlfriend Vera Cicero (Diane Lane) and Dixie become dangerously entangled. Meanwhile, the performers at Owney Madden's (Bob Hoskins) club, led by Sandman Williams (Gregory Hines) and his brother Clay (played by real-life brother Maurice Hines), balance their lives as stars on the stage with the real-life discrimination of being black. Sandman falls for ambitious light-skinned chanteuse Lila (Lonette McKee) while Dixie moves to Hollywood to become a movie star. The supporting cast is a colorful mix, including musician Tom Waits as club manager Irving Stark; Fred Gwynne (aka Herman Munster) as Madden's sidekick, Frenchy; Broadway legend Gwen Verdon as Dixie's mom, Tish; Andy Warhol star Joe Dallesandro as Charles "Lucky" Luciano; and founder of New York's Living Theater, Julian Beck, as the sinister Sol Weinstein. [More]

Starring: Richard Gere, Gregory Hines, Diane Lane, Lonette McKee

Starring: Richard Gere, Gregory Hines, Diane Lane, Lonette McKee, Bob Hoskins, James Remar, Nicolas Cage, Allen Garfield, Fred Gwynne, Lisa Jane Persky, Maurice Hines, Julian Beck, Tom Waits, Laurence Fishburne, Gwen Verdon, Jennifer Grey

Director: Francis Ford Coppola

Director: Francis Ford Coppola
Screenwriter: William Kennedy, Francis Ford Coppola
Story: William Kennedy, Francis Ford Coppola, Mario Puzo
Producer: Robert Evans
Composer: John Barry

[See More Credits]

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Release:

Jun 23, 2009

[DVD Details]
 
 

DVD Features:

  • Region 1
  • NTSC
  • Keep Case
  • Anamorphic Widescreen - 1.85
  • Letterbox - 1.85

Audio:

  • Dolby Digital 5.1 - English
  • Dolby Digital Mono - French

Additional Release Material:

  • Deleted Scenes
  • Trailers: Original Theatrical Trailer
 
 
 
 

Reviews for The Cotton Club

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1 - 20 (sorted by date)
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Given its garish production history, one rather expected The Cotton Club to sing with hot-jazz desperation. Instead, we get the mediocre craftsmanship of a pit band in Vegas.

Full Review Source: TIME Magazine | comment Comment
03/13/09
Richard Corliss
Richard Corliss
TIME Magazine
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

This musical gangster movie is a tour de force, even if a little muddled.

Full Review Source: Channel 4 Film | comment Comment
03/13/09
Channel 4 Film

No review available.

comment Comment
09/13/08
Cole Smithey
Cole Smithey
ColeSmithey.com

Lavish, interesting, evocative but strained and self-conscious, Cotton Club is all watchable curiosity.

Full Review Source: TV Guide's Movie Guide | comment Comment
12/11/07
TV Guide's Movie Guide

It was the most assured film Coppola had made in a decade, full of casual wit and visual invention.

Full Review Source: Chicago Reader | comment Comment
12/11/07
Dave Kehr
Dave Kehr
Chicago Reader
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

No review available.

comment Comment
10/24/07
Felix Vasquez Jr.
Felix Vasquez Jr.
Cinema Crazed

The narrative is a mess despite the simplistic twinning of tales.

Full Review Source: Time Out | comment Comment
06/24/06
Time Out

No review available.

comment Comment
07/07/05
Joe Williams
Joe Williams
St. Louis Post-Dispatch

No review available.

comment Comment
07/04/05
Emanuel Levy
Emanuel Levy
EmanuelLevy.Com

No review available.

comment Comment
05/06/05
Clint Morris
Clint Morris
Film Threat

Whatever it took to do it, Coppola has extracted a very special film out of the checkered history of this project.

Full Review Source: Chicago Sun-Times | comment Comment
10/23/04
Roger Ebert
Roger Ebert
Chicago Sun-Times
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

Energetic and involving.

comment Comment
06/05/04
Rich Cline
Rich Cline
Shadows on the Wall

No review available.

comment Comment
03/05/04
Carol Cling
Carol Cling
Las Vegas Review-Journal

No review available.

comment Comment
08/20/03
Nell Minow
Nell Minow
Movie Mom at Yahoo! Movies

No review available.

comment Comment
02/17/03
Jeffrey Westhoff
Jeffrey Westhoff
Northwest Herald (Crystal Lake, IL)

Coppola's most shamefully underrated movie.

comment Comment
01/17/03
Jeffrey M. Anderson
Jeffrey M. Anderson
San Francisco Examiner

No review available.

comment Comment
10/04/02
Brian J. Arthurs
Brian J. Arthurs
Beach Reporter (Southern California)

Ambitious, but like many post-Apocalypse Coppola films, it doesn't quite hit the mark.

comment Comment
07/25/02
Chuck Rudolph
Chuck Rudolph
Matinee Magazine

There're always something and someone interesting just around the corner; and, if Coppola seems to have difficulty with the story's narrative line, he does manage to help the audience keep straight the huge cast of characters.

Full Review Source: Boxoffice Magazine | comment Comment
06/05/02
Jimmy Summers
Jimmy Summers
Boxoffice Magazine

There are lots of good ideas, but none of them are really worked out or honed

Full Review Source: Q Network Film Desk | comment Comment
08/16/01
James Kendrick
James Kendrick
Q Network Film Desk
 
 
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