Michael_Elliott Butterfly (1982) ** (out of 4)Based on the James M. Cain novel, this film centers on the young Kady Tyler (Pia Zadora) who returns home to live with her father Jess (Stacy Keach) and soon she begins to seduce him. Yeah, you read that right. Zadora made history with this film as she won the Razzie Worst Actress award while at the same time winning the Golden Globe New Star of the Year award. You can read about the controversy behind the Globes win elsewhere but to say this film is normal would be a very big lie. BUTTERFLY isn't nearly as bad or as trashy as its reputation would have you believe. It's not a soft-core porn flick if that's what you're expecting but more of a romantic mystery that probably shouldn't have been made. Those coming to the film to see how horrid Zadora is are also going to be disappointed because I really didn't find her as bad as the film's reputation. It seems she just became a punchline after winning the Golden Globe and while she's certainly not great or even good here, there's no doubt that she's taken way too much heat for the performance. I thought she played that dirty teenager well enough for a film like this. What she lacks is certainly made up by Keach who is actually very good here. I thought he did a very good job at showing the conflict that his male/father character had over the sexual advances of his daughter. Another person who's "bad performance" reputation is somewhat of a lie is that of Orson Welles who plays a judge. I really didn't find him to be bad here and in fact I thought he was quite good and that his performance certainly had a wink to the viewer to it. The film falls flat on a few levels including the running time, which just goes on way too long. The screenplay itself just doesn't have enough interesting moments to help keep the thing entertaining from start to finish. Another problem is that director Matt Cimber just doesn't add enough spark or energy to the picture. BUTTERFLY will probably always been known as a disaster but I think its reputation is quite unfair. It's not a good movie but there are certainly much worse out there.

Gong5 I give this a graceful 8/10 because I 've watched so many crap films in my life that got 10/10 from all the morons at IMDb. This is a film that deals with incest in a crass way. But how does the rest of society deal with incest when at the very least about 1/70 girls are abused by members of their family in private? Not well at all, actually worse than in a crass way. So how do we expect a film about incest as a western to be? As freud said, it's the ultimate taboo. Pea is wonderful here, Orson is drinking his .. off and it shows, all in all a great movie not to be missed, but it will be, because it's not even out on DVD.

Robert J. Maxwell It's not an atrocious movie. It's just a little dull except when Pia Zadora is waltzing around in the nude -- or in the semi-nude, which is all the time.Poor Stacy Keach is the lone guard at an abandoned silver mine in the middle of the desert, living a bearded sloppy life in his cabin, when his daughter Zadora, whom he hasn't seen for ten years, descends upon him with her sexual elan and grabby adolescent ways. And, boy, is she a terpitudinous slut. When they first meet in 1937 rural Nevada, Keach doesn't recognize her and tells her that whatever she's looking for, he hasn't got. Her first line of dialog in the movie: "How can I tell what you've got if I ain't seen it yet?" And this is her Daddy she's talking to. Later, after she's been slinking around for a while, she asks him: "Don't it get lonely out here in the desert, or is milking that cow enough?" She steps buck nekkid into a bath tub and asks him to wash her back, then guides his ministering hand down her frontal aspect. Not to worry, though. There isn't much nudity and the frisson of incest is an illusion.Pia Zadora was a singer and became an actress by means of being married to an influential husband but she's not THAT bad. Her talent is about the same as that of a performer in any college play. And she has a tiny but bewitching figure. If the director had had that amount of talent, we would have seen more of her agreeable frame.You might have the impression that this is a soft porn film or some kind of "erotic thriller" but it's not. The story is by James M. Cain, a pulp writer of some note at the time, who also gave us some major noirs like "Double Indemnity." But this murky and confusing story of abandoned gold mines, immoral liaisons, and court trials isn't his native territory. Erskine Caldwell, maybe, could have handled it with aplomb.The award for best performance goes to Orson Welles as a cranky mountain of a judge. He plays the role for its comic effect, which is entirely apt because the film is best appreciated as a comedy.Stacey Keach can be quite good in the right role. He was fine as Martin Luther and Ernest Hemingway. His default facial expression is a kind of sour, open-mouthed, dumbness. That was good enough in "Fat City, where he's a somewhat worn-out aging pug, but this part calls for a little more animation. There are some other recognizable names in the cast and they all perform professionally except that lightweight James Franciscus really belongs on television.The climactic courtroom scene is a little hard to follow and sometimes ludicrous. Keach (and perhaps Zadora) are up on charges of incest, based on the account of a single eyewitness who saw them smooching before entering a cave. That's what's known as a "weak case." All the defendants had to do is deny that it happened. They could easily have done it since no one saw them having intercourse. Kissing your nubile daughter on the mouth and feeling her up? Just an excess of fatherly affection, that's all.Incest is a curious business when you come right down to it. It's a universal taboo with no obvious function. Exceptions are reserved for hereditary royal families -- the Inca, the Hawaiians, the Ptolemys of Egypt. This notion of a child born of an incestuous union being deformed doesn't hold too much water. Cleopatra was the result of twelve generations of incestuous marriages and whatever else she was she was not deformed.Well, anyway, I found the thing rather slow and not very interesting.

schneb99 This is a movie that would have been good as the "B" film at the drive-in. You could tell from the beginning that it was a movie made for television. I worked extra on the set, and Orson Welles had a bottle of wine behind his podium as he did his judge shtick. He drank so much he would forget his lines, and he abused the cue card holders something fierce. After awhile, we ungrateful extras were yelling, "He will drink all wine before its time!" Cruel, but we were frustrated. Stacy Keach was a consummate professional, however. He acted as though the movie was "Citizen Kane." I have had great respect for him ever since.