gwnightscream Steve Martin, Daryl Hannah, Rick Rossovich and Shelly Duvall star in this 1987 comedy based on the play, "Cyrano de Bergarac." Martin (The Jerk) plays Charlie, a fire chief with a unique nose which becomes handy for his profession. Hannah (Splash) plays the title character who is an astronomer he falls for. Rossovich (Top Gun) plays firefighter, Chris who joins Charlie's team and who also falls for Roxanne. He seeks Charlie's help in wooing her and Charlie begins writing romantic poetry which swipes her off her feet. She eventually learns that Charlie is her poet and Duvall (The Shining) plays Dixie, his friend. I grew up watching this and always enjoyed it, Martin is great as usual, he and Hannah have good chemistry and I like Bruce Smeaton's score. I recommend this good 80's romantic comedy.

grizzledgeezer If you've seen the José Ferrer "Cyrano de Bergerac", it's permanently etched in your memory. (The Depardieu version is good-but-not-great.) It's one of the great romances, true or fictional, and Ferrer's Oscar-winning performance will leave you in tears. What can you do to improve it?NOTHING. Leave it alone. A timeless work doesn't need updating, let alone a translation to another venue, which only diminishes it."Roxanne" has a basically happy ending, which spoils the whole thing. We all cry over the things we want, but can't have. (In 2008, I lost the thing I most loved in life, but could never have.) We need catharsis. "Cyrano" supplies it. "Roxanne" is devoid of any real emotion.

jarrodmcdonald-1 Steve Martin is a treasure in ROXANNE. This retelling of Cyrano de Bergerac is imbued with some great shtick (expected), as well as some real tenderness (unexpected). Darryl Hannah is charming and Rick Rossovich exudes sex appeal, which sharply contrasts Martin's character due to his proboscis. Shelley Duvall rounds out the main cast, sticking her nose into Martin's love life.The motion picture was filmed in Nelson, British Columbia, where my family vacationed one summer. It's refreshing to see something not made entirely on a studio back lot but in a real town and inside real old-style houses. I have wondered why a sequel was never made, but nobody nose.

mark.waltz Steve Martin is Charlie, a fire chief in a small Washington State city where he is as legendary as Cyrano de Bergerac, the French hero whom he emulates in this sweet comedy that was a major crowd pleaser in its day and hopefully will one day be considered a classic. He is an easy-going fellow, well liked by the firemen under his command, yet he has one feature strangers will find hard to avoid staring at: his enormous schnoz. Yes, like Durante, W.C. and Streisand, Charlie is famous for his nose. He can even drink out of it, uses it as a stand for his little bird friends and can even peck obnoxious bullies in the eye with it if he gets too agitated by their harassment. When first seen, he takes on two golfers with his tennis racket, dancing around as them if he was Charlie Chaplin on roller skates.The gorgeous Darryl Hannah gets rid of her mermaid fins to play the beautiful new girl in town, a student of the stars who is not only a looker but personable and intelligent. The sweet but dumb Rick Rossovich is Chris, a brawny new fireman in Martin's brigade who falls head over heels for her but can't seem to get an intelligent word to come out of his mouth. This is where Martin comes in, as poetic as he is temperamental of his head's middle appendage, and in the process, he falls in love with her too, but his love is not based upon lust; It is based upon knowing exactly what to say to her to make her feel special, and in the process of communicating to her for Rossovich, he makes Hannah fall in love with the idea, if not the man, whom she had animal attraction to and pretty much nothing else.This movie is practically picture perfect, taking what in other hands would come off as idiotic humor and making it seem as graceful as the ballet. Martin makes this clear in the seemingly infantile opening as he takes on the two idiot golf players, turns it onto a bully in a bar (20 big nose jokes to put the man to shame) and eventually proves that it isn't the physical that matters but what's in the heart and what that heart will share with the heart it is meant to be aligned with. One of the best romantic comedies of the 1980's, this was Martin's most praised performance, and many critics yelped about him not getting an Oscar Nomination when he clearly deserved it. Yet, other earlier films from his resume seem to be more remembered today, and as entertaining as they are, they don't hold a candle to this.Who else emulated feminine beauty in the 1980's more than the gorgeous Darryl Hannah who made film history as a mermaid and allowed herself to become dowdy for "Steel Magnolias" simply to get the chance to play a real character. She is beautiful without being unapproachable, an earthly goddess one could look at and fall in love with in a sisterly way. Shelley Duvall takes on one of her least weirdo characters here, as far from Popeye's Olive Oyl as possible. She is the voice of wisdom here for both Martin and Hannah and the transition for her is a nice change of pace.I also want to praise the original music score by Bruce Smeaton, a mostly saxophone score back when that was the most popular instrument for movie themes. (Think also "Crimes of the Heart"). Yet, in spite of the many scores which focused mainly on the Sax, this one stands out, and will ring in your ears as so romantically appropriate for this film for which many bags of popcorn were crunched and munched on during 1987. Beautifully directed, written and filmed, "Roxanne" is a throwback to the old romantic comedies of the 30's and 40's which are seldom made today, and rarely as great.