How sad is this?

what a terribly boring film. I'm sorry but this is absolutely not deserving of best picture and will be forgotten quickly. Entertaining and engaging cinema? No. Nothing performances with flat faces and mistaking silence for subtlety.

Easily the biggest piece of Right wing non sense propaganda I ever saw.

Exactly the movie you think it is, but not the movie you want it to be.

I have seen THE FAN at least 3-4 times and am never disappointed in it. Of course watching Lauren Bacall in any movie is a thrill. Sad that she recently passed away. R.I.P. She plays an actress of the Broadway stage doing a musical, not unknown to Miss Bacall having done several Bway shows including musicals such as APPLAUSE and WOMAN OF THE YEAR. As a matter of fact her first film break had her singing to Humphrey Bogart in TO HAVE AND HAVE NOT with Hogey Carmichael. She had Hogey and Bogie. Just a little humor.Back to this movie. The wonderful Maureen Stapleton plays Lauren's secretary and as usual is brilliant almost stealing the film. She never misses a beat this fine actress. Add to that James Garner in a somewhat thankless role and Hector Alonzo as Lauren's suitors. However the real treat is to watch Michael Biehn make his film debut as the crazed psycho who is an ardent fan that goes too far in stalking his favorite actress. He plays an in the closet gay boy, which isn't really the theme of the story but explains his frequent trips to gay bars and gyms in search of his next victim.The film had that New York theatre feeling. Well filmed and written, to me it is worth seeing again and again. Biehn has done well from his beginning work having done several good films since and still working in the industry. His gorgeous youthful face from THE FAN has now become a wonderful chiseled character face that is intriguing. Here's to THE FAN.

Released by Paramount, this late entry in Grand Dame Guingol was Lauren Bacall's last lead role in a feature film. Her character's name is Sally Ross, but she's basically playing herself;she smokes, she drinks, she croaks. Bacall does a good job of playing herself and Michael Beihn is effectively cast as the fan. The Fan is an efficiently directed slasher film sprinkled with nastiness and musical numbers featuring music and lyrics by Marvin Hamlisch and Tim Rice. Based on Bob Randal's novel, which was written in the form of letters, the film uses extensive voice over to good effect. Something of an oddity, The Fan mixes camp, songs, and horror. The slasher scenes seem inspired by DePalma and Dario Argentio. The worst aspect of the film is a dull James Garner as Bacall's ex; his character has no bearing on the plot, and no business being in this film. The film makes for an so-so thriller in which an individual in peril makes not all the wrong decisions and the concluding scenes are noticeably contrived. The film is distinguished by it's celebrity stalker theme, and gets a boost from Maureen Stapleton as Bacall's quick-witted assistant, NYC locations, a genre-appropriate score, and good photography.Several comments made regarding the film's perceived homophobia seem to miss the point of the scene in the gay bar; Douglas clearly planned to fake his suicide, and needed his victim's corpse for that purpose. Douglas is portrayed as delusional, so his sexuality, whatever it may be, would seem to be repressed. Whether Douglas is gay or not isn't the issue here. The Paramount DVD release omits the line heard in the theatrical release, "How'd you like to get f#*ked by a meat cleaver b*tch!?" It was heard in Douglas' voice-over when the maid's body is discovered. See The Fan for what it is:competent, glossy trash, and you'll wind up enjoying it.

I remember watching this movie when i was a kid every time it came on late night TV.I wanted to finally own a copy since finding it on DVD.It was just as good now as it was then.This movie was so well acted by everyone.I really liked the scene where Douglas was pretending to be having dinner with a famous actress while his sister was at his door grilling him saying the family was worried about him for not keeping in touch with them other then when he wants to borrow money.The conversation between them was so fun to watch. Not that this classic needs to be remade,but I would love to see a modern re-telling of this movie.It would make a great suspenseful thriller since it has such a good plot.The obsessive fan is a timeless story which could so easily be told today. I gave this movie an 8 out of 10.The only thing i didn't like was the ending because Lauren Bacall's character didn't seem surprised or scared of Douglas when he attacked her in the final scene.Up until then she did a good job being terrorized by this stalker who killed a lot of people to get to her.

This movie, 1981's "The Fan" stars screen legend Lauren Bacall, Michael Biehn, and Maureen Stapleton. Bacall plays an actress of stage and screen Sally Ross. Biehn plays a man named Douglas Breene, who is a fan of Sally's, and Stapleton plays Belle Goldman, who is Sally's secretary. Douglas works in a record store, and is a fan of Sally. But he is not an ordinary fan; he has an out of control, psychological obsession of her that turns pretty ugly. He writes Sally almost every day expecting an answer from her directly, but gets answered by Belle. During this movie, you see how crazy, disturbed (and increasingly dangerous) Douglas is. A variety of odd things start happening. In one scene, he is in his apartment pretending to have a candlelit dinner with Sally, he sends Sally a very pornographic letter that gets answered by Belle in a reprimand, he sends another letter to her (in person) that he hopes she will receive, but it gets to Belle instead, he goes and buys a straight razor as a weapon, sees Belle in the hall of the subway station, goes up to her and cuts her face, then he goes after David, one of Sally's friends and slashes him (possibly kills him) at a public swimming pool, then goes after Sally's maid and kills her in the apartment by slashing her breasts (which was the real shocker), destroys the apartment, goes to a gay bar and sees a guy who looks almost exactly like him, and kills him by dousing gasoline on the guy and throwing a match on him to prove to Sally in a note that she is free, etc., then attends Sally's musical when it's almost over and goes backstage to kill other people (first the stage office manager, then Sally's new maid), and then there's the confrontation between Sally and Douglas (a small chase and then he catches up with her). Then, after a bit of his dialog of obsession he has with Sally and embraces her, she quickly stabs Doug in the neck and he is gone. I first saw this movie on TV years ago when I was a kid, and saw it again years later in the late '90s on Encore (taping it). The chilling incidental music is wonderful as well. I do like this movie a lot (but not the sadistic slayings). I am going to get the DVD of this movie soon. See it while you can!! Also, James Garner (from TV's "The Rockford Files") plays Sally's love interest. The actors were great; kudos to them!! Great movie, so why give it negative reviews, folks???