Masada (1981)

No offense to the wars or the soldiers who fought in them, but thank goodness we have a war miniseries that is not about World War II or The Civil War.  "Masada" reaches back 2000 years to tell the story of the Jews fighting against Rome.  The outcome is as inevitable as the Confederates and the Japanese getting pulverized in their respective wars, but "Masada" is an inspirational tale.  Gone are the gooey trappings of modern war miniseries (in other words, the backstories that fill time between battles).  Instead, we return to the sword and sandal epics mid-20th Century Hollywood loved to produce.  This one is all about might versus right.  The Romans have the might and the Jews have the right.  To be fair, "Masada" does have two leading characters who are very flawed in the eyes of their own people.  The Roman General actually starts out lenient and trusting of the rebellious Jews, while the leader of said rebellious Jews can be awfully heavy-handed and pompous.  However, that cannot obscure the rah-rah inevitability of the few hundred Jews trying to overcome thousands of Roman soldiers, which makes this an action/war miniseries like all the rest, just with much smaller costumes.

Serious narration gives us bit of history before the action starts.  A camera comes from deep in the Israeli desert to swoop across the remains of the citadel that was once a live fortress.  In fact, modern Israeli soldiers are still sworn in at Masada, with the claim that they are "the most daring and defiant soldier in the world," certainly not an untrue statement.  Part of the ceremony is to recall the 960 Israelis who fought to defend the mountain from at least 10,000 Roman soldiers.  A cascading Jerry Goldsmith score, replete with a Jewish influence and the brass of Broadway, follows the soldiers up to the peak.  "A soldier has to wonder..." the narrator says and that's our cue to turn the clocks back to the year 70 AD.

Jerusalem is being destroyed by the Romans, it's holy Temple burned and pillaged, it's people slaughtered (including one woman pinned against a wall to have her arm chopped off in close-up), but some are fighting back.  Peter Strauss certainly is.  As he and his family formulate an escape plan, he and a Roman soldier, both showing a whole lot of leg, fight until Peter overcomes him.  Peter and his gang escape Jerusalem, going up in fake blue-screen flames that would made DeMille proud.  It's certainly an exciting opening.

Skip ahead three years.  Peter has vowed not to give into the Romans and he's set up camp atop Masada.  They have gotten good at picking off small bands of Roman soldiers, using clever ruses to intercept money and letters.  The latter reveal that the Roman government is going to tax the hell out of Palestine, but the General who has been in charge of the area is leaving, much to the dismay of his soldiers, who have been lagging in the hot desert for years. 

Said General would be Peter O'Toole, giving over his command to Dennis Quilley.  Peter is at his most regal here, playing miniseries dialogue like it's Shakespeare, and not one of the comedies.  As he's dictating a letter, a sad soldier somehow makes it through a legion of soldiers outside his tent door to assassinate him.  He gets him in the leg, but his his men ultimately get him.  Peter gives the troops a rousing speech.  "You stupid bastards.  It's almost over," he tells them to shame them, reminding them of their loyalty to the Emperor.  It's quite a speech, delivered with aplomb, and he wins back the affection of his men by not putting his would-be assassin to death.  "Masada" aired only weeks after the assassination attempt on President Reagan, and was therefore filmed long before, but leaving in this scene had to resonate with people at the time.

Back up on Masada, Peter Strauss decrees that it's time to go down to Hebron, but not everyone agrees.  The elders in the synagogue think eventually the Romans will go away and don't agree, but Peter is pretty convincing.  Not only does he have a big noble speech as well, but he also promises death to those who don't help, always so damn pushy.  The elders wonder why they bother.  "We can remind them that some Jews are free!" he roars dramatically.  He's obviously a good leader, because General Peter dictates a letter to the Emperor on the eve of his leave to say for sure, "the Judean War is over," noting that the band of Zealots of "melted into the population and the taxes have been collected for the first time in seven years.  He doesn't realize Zealot Peter at that very moment is assaulting Hebron, the soldiers caught in a trap and the grain reserves set on fire.  Victory for the Zealots!

This is bad news for General Peter, who orders a cavalry readied so he can ride majestically into Hebron, his face glowing from pounds of eye shadow rather than the sun.  He's not happy with the soldier in charge, who burned every third house without asking questions, thus having made the problem worth.  "Confess it, you just hated to see all that fire put to waste," he clucks at the stupid soldier who has learned absolutely nothing from the whole ado.  He yells, the soldiers yells back, hoping to be relieved of duty.  The only man captured in the whole escapade is Richard Pierson, who laughs at the General even tied upside down for a whole evening. 

Richard is allowed to go free so he can report back to Zealot Peter and ask for a meeting between the two leaders (the Peter leaders, if you will).  "These aren't Britons or Gauls we're fighting...these are grainy bastards without ethics," General Peter tells Dennis, with a world weary attitude that leads one to think he's personally conquered the entire known world.  He's just jealous and pissy, wise to the fact that Zealot Peter has waited until the dead of night to show up for the meeting, when the soldiers cannot see how many men he's brought. 

The meeting between the two men is a lesson in acting styles.  Peter Strauss doesn't really have one and Peter O'Toole invented his own, loud and bombastic, sounding full of grog and ham at all time.  General Peter makes a "statement of fact" that Zealot Peter's band will be killed, no matter how long it takes.  "I'm sick of dead Jews, live Jews, men, women and children and of your miserable and unyielding country," General Peter brays, and Zealot Peter tells him to go already!  No, no, General Peter isn't going anywhere because his pride as an officer of Rome won't let him leave while bandits still wander.  "Give us our due, man, we know how to kill," General Peter says, but Zealot Peter replies with, "prune the orchards and the best trees survive."  Geez, DeMille WOULD be proud: spectacle and atrocious dialogue, just what he always aimed for.  Zealot Peter says rebellions will rise forever and eventually overcome the Romans, an unlikely proposition, to General Peter marks him as "insane."  "I'm not about to argue about insanity with a man who got his commission from Nero," Zealot Peter snaps back.  Good point!  The loopy conversation ends with Zealot Peter spewing about how Masada is impenetrable and his people can hold off the Romans forever with "rocks and boiling water."  He promises that the war will go on as long as his people remember the crushing power of Rome.  Having promised Zealot Peter no harm if he came to talk to him, General Peter of course imprisons him.  Zealot Peter reminds him that he promised on his family name and honor.  "Honor, like patience, has its limits," General Peter says, getting in the last word of a conversation made up entirely of Biblical-sounding phrases that are really just gussied-up schoolyard bully-speak. 

Unfortunately, the two meet up again only moments later, but Zealot Peter is in a cage and General Peter taunts him from outside.  From inside the cage, Zealot Peter is awfully full of bravado, and General Peter keeps egging him on.  He tells the captured man that pretending to be unafraid of death is a Roman trick and he can "smell it a mile away."  Zealot Peter only grumbles that the General is making it hard for him to sleep.  At Peter O'Toole's vocal level, it's making it hard to sleep as far as Damascus, no doubt.  They take a minute to discuss religion.  Apparently one of Zealot Peter's cousins presented him as a Messiah, just like that Nazarene, and all of the confusing Messiah wanna-bes have created deep factions among the Jews.  He then gives the General a pearl of wisdom.  "You want to know how to destroy the Jews?  Leave them in peace. They'll be at each other's throats soon enough.  But, as long as we have an enemy, we are brothers," he says.  Geez, that's optimistic.  Kind of damned either way, eh?

After that conversation, General Peter returns to his hovel, starts drinking and worries that his shadow is getting too thin.  "I was fat when I came here," he says.  So just go already!

What does he do?  He has the guards bring in Zealot Peter so they can go another round.  "What does it take to stop you?" General Peter asks?  He claims he wants peace, and Zealot Peter says he wants freedom and the country back.  The General reminds him for a thousand years, someone has always run it, why not the Romans?  He then offers to bargain.  Zealot Peter wants one tax-free years, the temple rebuilt, a Jewish governor through whom Rome rules (he reminds the General of Herod, but that's actually a really bad example if anyone looks at history), an army of Jews instead of Romans who are "allies instead of enemies."  The deal is that if General Peter pulls the troops to north of Jericho, Zealot Peter will retire to Masada and end all raids.  General Peter agrees.  "It does make perfect sense," he admits. 

The two then sit down to a meal together, prolonging their time together.  Zealot Peter actually trusts General Peter, who thanks him with a drunken quip, "God above, the Oriental mind!"  Thankfully friends, that's the end of the conversation.  Not a great end to the gab-fest, but at least it's over.  They really are doing an imitation of "The Ten Commandments."  Peter Strauss is Charlton Heston, completely unable to act, but good at saying the words to make you think he can.  Peter O'Toole is Yul Brynner, obviously annoyed that these conversations keep occurring, but making the most of them by overacting until someone stops him (not that Peter O'Toole can ever be stopped).

Dennis is not happy that General Peter has let Zealot Peter go, mainly because the tax cannot be paid, but the General says he'll pay the taxes himself, assuming the Emperor will reimburse him.  He tells the soldiers they are pulling back to Jericho, no taxes are to be collected and even the huts of Hebron are to be rebuilt.  But, Dennis thinks this is madness and adds a note to the one General Peter has sent to the Emperor, one with the truth, apparently so juicy that the soldier he trusts with it actually hisses, "noooooooo!" as if he's just discovered that pink ostrich plumes have been discontinued. 

Dennis represents the Roman faction that believes this is all madness and then Zealot Peter has to return to his people and tell them of the deal, where he faces the same raised eyebrows and disbelief.  Can you blame any of them?  Two guys meet in a tent and solve a political crisis together?  History doesn't bear that one out well, now does it? 

Enough with the desert!  Let's have some fun in Rome.  Emperor Vespasian (Timothy West) is watching "Oedipus" with a whole assortment of people, but once it ends, the virgins are dismissed (aka, all the women) for a bawdy pantomime that goes a bit too far in mocking the emperor.

General Peter is welcomed back to Rome by David Warner, who is the only one allowed to speak to him.  Dennis note has arrived first, of course.  David leads him an audience with Vespasian under murky circumstances.  Vespasian doesn't know what Dennis has written, but Senator Nigel Davenport does, wondering aloud why Peter agreed to a truce and the troop pull-back.  Since Peter cannot speak in the room, not being a Senator, Vespasian has to defend him.  That goes well until Nigel tells the Emperor about the whole tax issue, Peter paying them himself.  Senator David Warner tries to help, by speaking like a banker and confusing all present, talking about coins and rates and percentages and such.  It quells that part of the argument.  Nigel is on a tear, and he has a lot of support. 

The Emperor knows he's fed Nigel and his cohorts a load of bunk and Peter is forced to defend himself.  He says the concessions are a small price to pay for peace.  The Emperor agrees, but politically, he cannot agree to the demands.  He insists that the rebels be brought to Rome and threatens that if he is forced from power and if he has to kill himself like the past few Emperors, Peter is going with him.  Oh, and Peter should know that Dennis is a spy.  Oh, and Peter is now Consul General of Judea.  Oh, and...wait...did Timothy West just say what I thought he said?  Let me rewind, hold on.  YES!  He did.  Wait'll you hear this corker! 

"It's hard to recognize you without a drink in your hand," he dryly notes to Peter O'Toole. 

Oh, now really!  That's too easy a shot.  We're talking about Peter O'Toole the actor and not his character, I assume.  The once-great actor has been reduced to a bad Roman wig and having to spend time shooting on location with Peter Strauss, does the picture really need to ground him any further into the dirt?  Then again, it's hard not to laugh at that jab.  O'Toole probably would have if he weren't too drunk.

Peter and Timothy wander around the room in circles while everyone else stands mute.  Timothy and Peter once had a dream of peace, but he's powerless to do anything about it in Judea because of the politics in Rome.  His own position is perilous. 

Back in Judea, the soldiers are restless and Dennis isn't doing a great job of  keeping them happy.  They are bored and unpaid, looking for land instead of money, which appeals to him because he'll get to keep the money.  The wily villain has a whole scheme concocted to steal piles of money while blaming the Jews.  To him, it seems ideal, but his second-in-command does not agree, especially since they can't give the soldiers land that doesn't even belong to them.

So, they simply take it, killing everyone in sight except for Barbara Carrera, an Egyptian hussy who sets her sights on the tribune and seduces him.  The soldiers take everything in sight.  Some of the displaced Jews are saucy enough to fight back verbally, for they have seen it all before, but the end result is the same: they are forced off their land and livelihood.  The only place for them to go is up to Masada, where they inform Zealot Peter that the truce has been broken by the land seizure.  Peter is in no mood to receive the same holy men who have consistently resisted his attempts at banding together and tells them that though they think they cannot be separated from their holy books, they better be prepared to work and fight. 

"We have Vespasian's answer, now let's give him ours," Zealot Peter tells his cohorts to bring the first part to a dramatic close (and to cue that twinkly music from the title credits again).

The rag-tag Jews are fighting back.  They are taking more Jews and all of the food and such up to Masada while poisoning the water, killing the Romans.  "Well, it seems to be localized," and increasingly idiotic Dennis Quilley says.  Before he and his cohort can formulate a plan, Governor General Peter O'Toole returns, with Anthony Quayle in tow, one or Rome's best soldiers.  Peter's servants redecorate the tent as he chews out Dennis big time, but also ordering all legions to "move on Masada."  While on the march, Peter notices "Jewish harlot" Barbara Carrera, mistress of the tribune, and finds her "rather stylish."  She plays Jewish about as convincingly as she played Native American as the unforgettable Clay Basket in "Centennial," which is not very convincingly, but she does make attractive window dressing in a story that really has no place for women. 

Incidentally, have you been asking how the Jews got all of their supplies up Masada, a rock with no easy way up?  It's a mountain that literally pops out of the land, straight up.  When we see a cow on pulleys, we have our answer.  It's not easy work, that's for sure.  Atop the mountain, Zealot Peter Strauss is proud of the work his people are doing in a montage that has him helping the farmers, the knife carvers, the guy with the sheep, pretty much everyone because he's that knowledgeable and talented. 

Work has to stop when the Roman army is spotted, so Zealot Peter orders the catapults brought and the stones readied.  As the two sides prepare, a bunch of nomads gather at the base of Masada, purely commercial agents who aim to supply the Romans with whatever bounty they can afford (prostitutes, don't you know).  Zealot Peter says he wishes sometimes he had that life, no worries about having to ever fight.

Zealot Peter than gathers the people and gives the pre-war speech.  He says the Romans can't survive the summer without supply lines of water, that the Roman catapults cannot reach up the steep mountain.  "Where they march is where we want them to be," he says, touching each child's head as he passes, all but sticking campaign buttons on everyone. 

The Romans do exactly what he predicted: they gather at the base of the mountain and look imposing with their horses and uniforms and masses of men on horses.  They are placed in positions of might.  "Impressive," says Consul General Peter.  "Impossible," notes Anthony Quayle.  "Exactly, that's why I brought you," Peter retorts.  The flags and trumpets are sent to the front of the line to dazzle the Jews, who react by tossing manure over the mountain.  Anthony says not to bother shooting rocks up the mountain because they can only be used as weapons back against them. 

Our two Peters argue by shouting up and down the mountain.  It's that easy to hear each other?  Thousands of soldiers and horses, wind, rock and all, and they just have to shout to be heard?  "Formalities are over.  Let's get to work," General Peter says.  The Romans build their own fortresses surrounding the mountain.  They manage to get a few men up a neighboring mountain to report on what they see, which isn't much, just a few children playing.  General Peter finally gets his revenge on Dennis and tribune Clive Francis by sending them on a suicide mission up the mountain for recon.  Before the tribune goes up the mountain, he wills Barbara to General Peter.  "Long live..." Clive starts to say, but Peter stops him.  "It's not necessary," he barks.  Zealot Peter orders the men to "test their marksmanship" and kill the two, who fall off the mountain in slow motion, from which Peter merely turns his head dramatically.

General Peter goes to look through the spoils of the two he's just had killed, meaning Barbara.  She's a sassy dame, asking to be let go, but knowing she's more valuable staying with the powerful man.  "Then I can be expected to be sent for?" she coos?  "You can be expected to be alive tomorrow morning," is all Peter will promise.  Sagacious Anthony tells Peter they have to build a ramp of rock up the mountain.  "It's a terrifying amount of work," they agree, as if they are putting lumps of sugar in their tea since the servants have the day off.  General Peter does ritual sacrifices to the Gods that involve blood, goat liver and shirtless boys. 

Completely bored extras dressed as Roman soldiers (they can't even summon up the energy to hoot properly at the end of a Peter O'Toole speech) start to haul rocks and build that blasted ramp up Masada.  Anthony Quayle is also something of an engineer, with all sorts of tools to make it go better.  I bet he wishes they had some Hebrew slave labor about now.  They built all those grand Egyptian monuments and never had to be paid!  Then again, they didn't have the opportunity to watch "The Ten Commandments."  Up atop Masada, Zealot Peter chirps, "I like to watch them work," rather than be frightened their ramp might actually work.  When General Peter allows the men to stop working and go buy goods from the nomads, the Jews pelt them with stones from above.  The rain of the stones does a lot of damage, to the men, to the horses and to the building operation, but General Peter has time to stop and ask Barbara how she feels about it all.  If she's getting paid per scene, she needs a whole lot more to do.

The Jews celebrate, but General Peter has a good point: why did they attack so early in the process?  They wasted an awful lot of stones.  However, he insists that the ramp project continue.  He issues all sorts of commands and then retires to his chambers, tired and thirsty.

Then comes the second great dig at one of Hollywood's most impressive drunks, but this time HE himself says it!  General Peter's servant silently brings him a cup of wine.  "Is the need so obvious you can see it in my face?" he asks his servant.  I'll answer that one: not exactly, rather what CAN be seen in his face is years devoted to the stuff.  This was before Peter O'Toole turned yellow, but after he started to look 20 years older than he was.

Back atop Masada, Zealot Peter is having a crisis of faith, for about the fifth time.  He claims to have stopped believing in God, and his poor wife only exists to play the foil in these conversations.  She asks him why he fights so hard if he doesn't believe, since the whole purpose of fighting is to preserve their monotheism against the Romans.  What he does believe for sure is that "no man should be another man's slave."  Then he unexpectedly shows up to pray in the synagogue, a place he has consistently avoided except to force the elders to work.  He's even invited to lead the congregation in a psalm.  He reads from the Torah, right to left appropriately, though in English.  Hey, the elders will take what they can get, I suppose.  Reading from the Torah, even in English.  Oh, DeMille would have a full erection watching this, especially when the voices become voiceovers to the Romans conscripting any humans they can find into forced labor.  I guess NOW they finally watched "The Ten Commandments."  It does not please the Jews on Masada to see slave labor brought in, especially since most of it is Jewish slave labor, the people who refused to join them on Masada.  That's a dirty trick, because now it means Jews will have to kill Jews if they attempt another rock raid. 

Anthony gives the Romans a speech about how to handle slave labor.  He believes in a strict eight-hour workday, followed by a day off, because after all, "these are soft, city types."  Apparently he thinks he's raided Paris and taken all the artists from the Left Bank.  Moreover, they are to be fed and watered on the job.  And, slaves to best when they see a reward in sight.  "Finally, whipping.  Now, we must expect to love five men a day from whipping...overwhipping is worse than no whipping because if the death rate is too high, we won't have enough men left," he says to the astonished crowed.  "Treat 'em decently and they'll do very nicely," he summarizes.  It's a terrific speech that would have gone over so well in the Antebellum South (though they wouldn't have bought a word of his bunk), but sounds utterly ridiculous and humane coming from a Roman general. 

A bath is brought to Barbara's quarters and filled with water, a precious substance forbidden to the soldiers because of its high salt content.  "Compliments of the Governor General," the pissy soldiers snap on their way out.  General Peter's mute slave pulls out the master's dead wife's death mask and then comes ANOTHER line about his drinking (Peter's, not the General's I suspect).  "I didn't drink this much even when I was in the field and knew I was coming back to her," he groans.  As if Peter O'Toole remembers why he drank on most nights?  "And I cannot keep drinking this way now!" he says, actually refusing another cup of wine.  That is the character, not Peter.  Peter O'Toole never said no to a topping off.  His dead wife speaks to him and then Barbara shows up in his tent.  Gulping down his wine, he lays it out plainly: he wants her as his mistress.  He has human needs.  "I hope I can make it reasonably pleasant for you," he says and she disrobes.  He explodes at that!  Apparently he wants more than just sex.  He wants "civility."  It turns into an argument, but eventually, he apologizes.  "From time to time, it would be important for me to have someone to whom I could talk to freely," he says, which doesn't make a whole lot of sense because he's just lambasted her for being Jewish, but she's not THAT Jewish, I suppose.  Essentially, we're giving her something to do and trying to humanize him a little.  What is their first civil conversation about?  His dead wife and her suicide when she found out she had throat cancer.  Talk about a scene in desperate need of editing. 

There's trouble up on Masada.  The archers want to file a volley, but the elders will not let them because the slaves are fellow Jews.  Zealot Peter agrees with the elders.  He says they will only use two weapons: intelligence and the sun.  As they fill a water hole gleefully, the Romans on the next mountain can see, which doesn't help morale since water for the Romans and their slaves has been rationed.  The Jews start swimming in their abundant water, which can be heard down below.  That one hurts! 

Back in the time killing part of the story, Babs and General Peter are in bed, with silk sheets, where Babs is bubbling over with the events of her life.  It's not very interesting.  Was she a virgin on her wedding night?  Did she want to kill her arranged marriage husband? 

Another Roman animal sacrifice, more shirtless boys, more eyeliner on General Peter, and the soldiers ain't buying it anymore.  This time, the extras are told to barely react, which we know they do particularly well.  The kids on the mountain just laugh at laugh at the sacrifices.  Anthony comes up with another engineering marvel, this one approaching the engineering know-how of a suspension bridge, and General Peter goes for it.  The Romans and the slaves are barely alive, but they build this thingamajig.  Unfortunately, as good as the work is going, Anthony admits to General Peter that there is envy among the men because Peter is keeping Barbara.  She certainly looks well fed and wined.  Hell, the men are playing dice games to win water rations, but up on the mountain, there's a ton of water for laundry.  Zealot Peter decides right at noon to let the dirty laundry water cascade off the mountain.  To make it worse, Zealot Peter yells from the mountain that he wants to share it with their Roman "strangers," who aren't strangers anymore because they have all been watching so closely.  Okay, that would be fun, but then he has to go and ruin it by telling the story of Sodom and Gomorrah and then gets just plain long winded.  He uses the power of suggestion to try to turn the Romans against their commanders and on it goes.  Another DeMille moment, full of pomp, meaning absolutely zilch.  He compares General Peter to a monkey and asks if the soldiers will follow the "monkey up this hill on a pile of your rotting corpses?" 

Not only can the two Peters talk to each other, they can see each other easily, so once Zealot Peter is done, General Peter raises his fist to him and Zealot Peter bows his head mockingly.  General Peter goes into his tent and rails at Barbara that it's all so wasteful, when all he wants is peace.  But, a plan is formulating in his head because he knows Zealot Peter knows the Jews cannot survive up on that mountain forever.  "Vespasian's monkey!" he toasts to end the second portion.

Somehow, the Romans continue building Anthony's contraption.  The wind is picking up and a soldier suggests perhaps it means rain.  "It could be cantaloupes from Egypt too, but it's not," wise Anthony reminds him.  The Jews know a storm is coming, but the Romans of some legions are sent off to the nomads for "recreation."  That means a bunch of women wildly gyrating their hips.  Mutiny is on the lips of some men, while whores on on the lips of the others.  Peter and Barbara wander around and he buys her a necklace, which offends her because she's made to feel like a hooker when truly they are in love, or getting there. 

Zealot Peter and his cohorts, dressed as ninjas, repel down the mountain to feed the goats something that strange that will affect the way the sacrifices of the Roman priests will occur.  They do it and make it back up the mountain, but whatever they did remains unexplained.  Instead, we have ANOTHER bed scene with the general and his harlot that brings the movie to a dead halt.  Stick to the damn battle.  That's where the tension is.  A ridiculous love plot is completely without merit. 

So, what's been tossed down the goats' throats?  Live maggots.  The priests say that's happened only once before, at the death of Pompey the Great.  General Peter decides to give everyone a morning's rest so he can figure out how to fight the omen, which the priest tells him means the General has to run through the camp naked.  But, if he pays a huge amount of money, a priest will do it for him.  Peter doesn't believe the omen; he knows the Jews managed it at night.  "Oh, don't sulk like an underpaid streetwalker," he tells a confused Anthony, "I need you too much.  Without you, I feel outnumbered."  I'm not sure how the first part of that sentence has anything to do with the second part, but I'm going blame the heat and general frustration of the Romans on their inability to make any sense at this point (or the writers, who are clearly stretching a three-hour story into six and change).  The Jews watch in hilarity as priests run naked around the camp. 

As the Romans soldiers are planning mutiny, a gigantic wind storm of DeMille proportions tears apart their camp.  The buildings collapse.  The animals run wild and General Peter protects Barbara.  In the morning, the whole camp is in disarray.  However, the work must continue.  The mutiny is discovered and they must face trial.  Notably, one among the accused is the man who had earlier tried to kill the General Consul.  The punishment is to circumcise the men and send them into the desert with no rations.  That's gonna hurt. 

Purim arrives and the sound of merriment on Masada is just another reason for the Romans to be miserable. And it gets worse!  Unctuous David Warner shows up from Rome.  He says he's there to make sure that the schedule is still on time, but Anthony knows David has only self-interest motivating him.  However, General Peter is philosophical: what could be worse than this assignment?  David's visit couldn't come at a worse time.  Rations are being cut while work detail is increased and a series of mishaps get written down by his persnickety secretary. 

An easy solution for the gang on Masada would be to pick off the slaves with skilled archers, but Zealot Peter still refuses.  Now the men on Masada are beginning to doubt his leadership. 

As Romans are dying from thirst, Anthony is summoned to David's tent.  They start by trading insults in the best dialogue yet, but David gets to the point: is the big contraption going to be ready on time?  Anthony guarantees the tower and ramp will be done on time, as promised, "if I have to carry the dirt on my own back," Anthony says, though of course David has his doubts, toady that he is to an Emperor who needs all finished on time politically.  He sends a missive to the Emperor that the soldiers are no longer of any value to to the empire and gets in the FOURTH did at Peter O'Toole directly.  He's not sure what to say about the General, fearing blaming him outright will be politically dangerous.  He tells his secretary to write, "something about the drinking, perhaps."  Ah, the double entendre alcoholic lines never get old!

Anthony comes up with a way shave weeks off the project when he is hit in the neck by an arrow from Masada.  That's a setback, and now David has to start his letter to the Emperor all over again!  Before Anthony dies, he tells of his brilliant new plan, down to the hour of the attack due to the angle of the sun.  General Peter says all will continue as per the plan, but David puts his foot down.  In his capacity of Legate, he has the power of the Emperor, he relieves Peter of his command.  Peter gives him his necklace of Consul General and David orders fresh attack orders for the next day.  He's lacking the understanding General Peter had of his enemy and acts only for political expediency. 

Now it's David's turn to yell up to Masada (as General Peter makes plans to take Barbara home--"everyone should see Rome," he tells her) and fills the catapults with old Jews instead of rocks!  Zealot Peter is in a very difficult position here.  "It means they're losing and they know it," he tells his friends, who are looking to him for a decision.  The Jews on the mountain are horrified when David follows through with his threat and catapults old men against the mountain to sure death.  The third victim is to be Richard's father.  David just gets meaner and meaner!  He does it well, and that's why he won an Emmy for this, no doubt. 

Zealot Peter storms into the synagogue to have a conversation with God.  "Is this what you want?  They've done nothing wrong.  They're afraid of you and they love you...what more can you make them suffer?...If you are here, Jehovah of Sinai, TALK TO ME.  TALK TO ME or kill me," he rails as he clutches the Torah and cries.  He tells his wife he has to surrender to stop the Jew catapult routine. 

General Peter can't take it anymore and rushes from his tent to try to wrestle back control and it works.  The soldiers remain loyal to him and David only has his few German bodyguards, oh, and his fey fat secretary.  The worm leaves the white cylinder of Legate power for Peter.  Barbara is overwhelmed with joy. 

Now that the folks on the mountain have seen the catapults being pulled away, the elders change their tune.  They tell Zealot Peter they will fight, the first time they have done so.  Since he went into the synagogue and prayed himself, and since God has apparently listened, they feel "God has sanctioned your leadership" and everyone on Masada is behind him.  This makes for a hopeful end to the third part of the story. 

General Peter has an arrow shot up to Masada asking for a midnight rendezvous.  Those around him think he's insane, but those of us who have been watching since the beginning know these conversations are inevitable, not to mention long.  It starts with General Peter apologizing for the human catapult business.  Then he has to apologize for the broken treaty.  Zealot Peter throws it all back in his face, but General Peter yells louder, and more honest, saying that there is no way for the Jews to win.  Zealot Peter invokes the name of God as often as General Peter invokes the name of Rome as the ultimate being and ally.  "The odds are not five to one, and the bazaar is closed," Zealot Peter says, referring to their last meeting where they negotiated like marketplace buyer and seller. 

Barbara realizes that all hope is lost for he Jews once General Peter tells her Zealot Peter "has been favored with a religious conversion."  When religion played no part in what he was doing, when it was simply politics, he had an understandably spark in him.  Religion turns the situation into one where spiritual belief replaces reality and that will ultimately give Rome the upper hand. 

General Peter has decided that work on the ramp must be doubled, working day and night, and he even does the drudge work himself.  He is an inspiration to his men, who find it in them to work harder and the ramp and tower are built at terrifying speed to those who watch.  Up on Masada, the Jews finally arm themselves with breastplates, swords and shields.  The Jewish leaders inform the population on Roman tactics and how to beat them. 

The name of the Lord is Zealot Peter's explanation to his son as to why they will win.  They won't win this battle against the Romans, but they will win in the long run because God has promised them the land and every enemy who has taken it from them is no better than the dust he lets slip through his finger.  But, in the long run, Rome will be vanquished too.  The Jews then turn their fear into anger the Jewish slaves and they scream at them to fight back, which of course they can't do. 

It's Barbara's turn to let loose with a big loud speech.  It's rather unimportant because her character is so silly, but basically she says she admires the Zealots and that since Peter has never asked her what she wanted, he's assumed she's happy being a slave to him.  "I hate him.  I hate them all," she says of her fellow Jews, "because without them, I wouldn't be here," referring to the way they treated her when she first arrived in Judea.  "Then why hate me?" Peter asks.  "Because without you they wouldn't be here," believing in a hopeless cause.  The worst things the Romans have done is "force the rest of us to learn the truth about ourselves," she says.  He's assumed all along that she wants to return to Rome with him, but she replies that she's never had a choice.

Mercifully, this conversation ends when it is announced that the ramp is finished.  Hopefully it also means an end to the goat slaughters, shirtless boys and braying priests.  The the ramp finished, the tower is wheeled to it.  DeMille would have loved this too.  It makes for an imposing set piece, even though up close it looks like it's made of papier mache. 

The Jews all congregate outside to hear a sermon and pray together.  Service over, it's time to get ready for battle.  The men are arranged in battle formations and the women fill huge pots with water to boil.  They are all very excited until they see the tower the Romans have built for the first time.  Zealot Peter is told to think of something fast to tell everyone and to make it sound like Moses or everyone will lose hope.  His idea is to build an "inner wall that will absorb the blows" from the battering ram, but he's not so sure himself, because he mutters a bit old "damn you" under his breath. 

Everything is in place below the mountain.  The tower is moved into place and the soldiers are ready to climb it with ladders.  The music swirls and the tension mounts.  This is what we've been waiting for.  It's taken a few hours too of rhetoric too long, but now we have our exciting battle scene.  The Jewish archers are powerless against the metal tower and right before the battering ram starts smashing against the wall, General Peter sends a mind-to-mind message to Zealot Peter to surrender.  Of course he doesn't hear it and the battering ram does the trick, smashing through the wall, but only the first wall.  The second wall is impenetrable to the battering, so the Romans set fire to the wall, which means the water will have to be used to douse the fire.  But, the Romans are too close and can pick off Jews one by one with arrows. 

Both sides stop to see which way the wind will blow.  If it turns toward the tower, the tower will burn and be damaged, except for the iron plates.  So, General Peter sounds the retreat.  "We'll take it in the morning," he says.  The elders praise Zealot Peter for his faith, but he also knows the wind will shift back in their direction, destroying their walls. 

General Peter gives Barbara her freedom, hoping she'll choose to accompany him to Rome because he loves her.  He's hoping she'll stay.  "Do you love me?"  "Yes, of course," she says in a whisper and leaves his tent. 

The wind changes again after Zealot Peter and his wife tell their son the story of their meeting to waste some time.  He calls together his core people and asks each one, "what is possible?"  Everyone has an answer, but no matter what, "we will become Roman trinkets," he says.  He says even the worst of the Jews don't deserve the treatment the Romans will heap on them.  "I say we shouldn't insult the Roman flesh by letting them touch it while we live," he states gravely.  He's talking of mass suicide, Jonestown style.  I don't remember seeing vats of Kool-Aid, but I guess Zealot Peter has a plan.  Everyone agrees, but they worry about telling the whole Masada population.  So calm is Peter that he asks one of his men if he's had time to make love to his gal.  The answer is yes.

In order to tell everyone else what has to be done, Zealot Peter asks the butcher to explain how to kill without pain.  It's not making sense to anyone, and it gets worse because Peter works himself into a speechifying lather that sounds like random words sewn together, but delivered with enough gravitas that it sounds important.  Classic DeMille, yet again.  "There is only one way to stand before God and say 'I am free.  I have always been free,'" he tells them, reminding them that the Romans have never made good on a promise to not turn Jews into slaves after winning a battle.  It's a heavy bit of brainwashing, but apparently effective.  The women do their part for the cause by dressing in their finest and donning make-up.  "This is how I want them to find me," Mrs. Zealot Peter says.  The soldiers remove their armor and everyone agrees to the plan.  Then there is a hugging montage as everyone says their silent goodbyes. 

The holy books are placed in a secret chamber and then the knives come out.  Zealot Peter approaches his wife and son with a knife, all resigned to their fate. 

In the morning, the Romans are rested and ready.  Barbara has fled, as was her choice, but left behind the necklace he gave her.  General Peter tells the soldiers he wants Zealot Peter taken alive (oops, too late) and remember, "do your best!"  If that were the motto of the Roman empire, they wouldn't have gotten very far, now would they?  The Romans stream onto Masada, to "no sounds of any fighting."  General Peter goes up to Masada himself and finds nothing but quiet and emptiness.  Oh, and nearly 1000 dead bodies.  Naturally, General Peter wants some time alone once he finds his arch-enemy/best friend's body.  "I made a novice's mistake.  I overestimated you," he says.  "What in the name of common sense does something like this prove?" he wonders aloud.  "I would never have let this happen to you," is part of his speech, but does he really believe it?  Does he really think he could have saved them from slavery? 

"We have won a rock in the middle of a wasteland on the shore of a poisoned sea," General Peter expounds wearily as the Romans stake their claim. 

Back in the present, the Israeli flag flies over Masada as the army holds its induction ceremony there.  There is a sign promising that Masada will never be overtaken. 

Theoretically, the story of the Masada chapter in history is a fascinating one and the last section of this movie is quite thrilling, full of not only spectacle, but ethical and moral questions, characters with flaws and tough decisions to make.  Unfortunately, it takes over five hours of long speeches and lazy days to get there. 

Alex Haley's Queen (1993)

Try though they may, the miniseries powers-that-be could not milk the Alex Haley machine dry.  After "Roots" came "Roots: The Next Generation" and then that odd little Christmas movie.  But, that was all just one branch of his family.  "Alex Haley's Queen" (the official title, as to separate it from "Queenie," which is another miniseries completely, or even "Halle Berry's Queen," which it no doubt would have been called if she had done this later in her career--as late as 1993, we still had authors who were stars, especially a beloved one recently deceased) runs up the tree to grab the branch of his paternal grandmother. 

This is a prestige miniseries very late in the genre's arc, right near the end, almost the last of its kind.  There would be romance and adventure miniseries peppering the 1990s, but "War and Remembrance" had pretty much not only killed the historical miniseries, but then kicked around the corpse for a few extra hours.  World War II had been done ad nauseum and with the growth of cable, the miniseries was no longer a guaranteed event.  Unless, of course, someone went way back in the miniseries history and pulled up Alex Haley.  He had written other books after "Roots" and "Roots" still held a special place in the collective hearts of America.  So, "Roots" begot "Alex Haley's Queen" nearly a decade and a half later.  The cast list is impressive.  Everyone seems to have wanted in on this one.  If there was another "Roots" in the making, who would say no?

"Alex Haley's Queen" is certainly no "Roots."  The story is nowhere near as potent, interesting or epic.  It's narrowed by a few generations (and a lot of hours) and tells the story of Haley's grandmother Queen from her birth soon before the Civil War and long after.  This is not the story of slavery, though that dominates the first third of the movie.  This is the story of a half white-half black woman trying to struggle through the racial minefields of the last third of the 19th Century.  It's lacks the freshness of the "Roots" saga, and it's a story told many times by many different people.  It also falls apart completely in the final 45 minutes or so, but it's strong enough up until then to withstand too much criticism. 

However, it's unfair to compare anything to "Roots," because "Roots" is sui generis, the apex of the genre.  Looking at "Alex Haley's Queen" for its own merits, one will find plenty.  All of those stars actually give heartfelt performances and the writing is excellent (except when it turns preachy, because the story itself is strong enough that we don't need to be hit over the head with it).  In the central role, there isn't a trauma Halle Berry doesn't endure, but she is forced to play Queen as a bit too innocent, which at times makes her seem less a character than a symbol.  She does fine work, no doubt about it, but the standouts tend to be the supporting cast members, from a surprisingly touching Ann-Margaret to a strong Lorraine Toussaint and, most notably, Tim Daly in his finest television performance.  Patricia Clarkson and Frances Conroy, early in their careers also, are damn fine villains. 

A bunch of black women are doing the laundry in a river where three white men want to bathe, scaring the women out by shooting above their heads.  The women are saved by James Jackson (Tim Daly), who is compassionate to his slaves.  "We don't make sport with our slaves...I will make you sorry if you ever bother one of our slaves again," he says bravely before having to fight the other three, and losing badly.  "That's how it is with nigger lovers," the horrible men cackle as Tim hops up, all black and blue.  His own slave, Cap'n Jack (Paul Winfield) didn't do anything to help his master, but even a kindly slave owners is still a slave owner. 

James' favorite slave is Easter (Jasmine Guy), the slave who tried to protect the women working before James arrived.  "Whatever would I do without you?" James asks Easter as she applies salve to his body.  He's about the only one in his family who has that attitude.  His father, James Jackson Sr. (Martin Sheen), quips that whites are the last to know any local gossip and his mother, Sally (Ann-Margaret) and her friend Mrs. Perkins (Charlotte Moore) laugh dutifully at said quip.  Mrs. Perkins is only around because it's expected that her daughter Lizzie (Patricia Clarkson) will marry James.  Lizzie calls Easter horrible names and slaps her when Easter isn't dainty enough with her shawl.  We know that marriage won't happen!

There's a lot of ado because of an approaching grand marriage.  Everyone is expected to go and Cap'n Jack asks James Sr. if his daughter Easter can go, and James Sr. says she can tend to the ladies.  He hands Cap'n Jack the invitation to read and Cap'n Jack dryly notes, "I can't read.  You know it ain't legal," but both know he reads very well.  James Sr. then gives his son a list of "eligible heiresses," with Lizzie at the top of the list, but James Jr. is uninterested in her.  He says he doesn't love her, which causes James Sr. to launch into a story about how he didn't love Sally when he married her, but he came to (which has her smiling listening at the door).  When James tells Easter she can go to the wedding, they fall in a heap of laughter and laundry like any two young no-doubt-soon-to-be-lovers.

As everyone congregates for the wedding, there are two receiving lines, one for the whites and one for the blacks.  The camera pans out wide to show how long both lines are and how well the whites have dressed their slaves.  Naturally, at the wedding, the two colors are not allowed to mix, but at the party, they actually do.  Kind of.  Both colors are on the floor at the same time, but they stay completely with colors of the same, until Easter by accident gets tangled with a white man.  "Does anyone own this girl?" he barks.  James wants to claim her, but instead has Easter and Cap'n Jack follow him outside.  He wants to console her, but Lizzie comes and asks for the next dance.

James Sr. is dying.  He calls Cap'n Jack to him and gives him his freedom, having promised it to him years before.  Cap'n Jack refuses and James is baffled, but Cap'n Jack reminds him of a time he asked for his freedom to marry his love and James kept him and sold the woman.  "What would I do, where would I go?" Cap'n James says, but not because he feels any devotion to the family.  In fact, he tells James honestly that he's staying only so that every time James looks at him, he'll remember how he broke his promise and messed up his life.  The distinction is clear: there is no distinction.  A man who owns slaves is a bad man, no matter what is in his heart.  James basically confesses as much to Sally, but it's too late.

Hunky James Jr. is swimming naked when Easter sits to watch.  They argue about Lizzie again.  "You got the fever for her," Easter says, before running off with his clothes.  She wants James to promise to visit more often and she'll give him his clothes back, but Cap'n Jack saves the day to bring James Jr. to his dying father.  The old man dies holding onto Cap'n Jack's hand and no other. 

For succor, James goes to Easter's cabin.  Besides being his true friend, this particular night she looks awfully fetching in her nightgown and hair down.  They are soon kissing and making love in front of the fire.  It's a tender love scene, not the kind of master-slave union we've read about so often that comes from horny white men doing what they believed was their right to do.  This is real passion, real emotion.  The scene is handled in a way too soapy fashion with slow motion and barely lit limbs moving around each other, but it's important to show how real the love is. 

"Love will come later.  Duty must come first," Sally tells her son in yet another attempt to get him to marry Lizzie once and for all.  He agrees, but later that night, gazing at the stars with Easter, he finds out she's pregnant.  He's so sweet, he's concerned about the pain of labor as his first reaction.  Nine months later, she indeed feels that pain as she gives birth to a daughter.  On the very night James proposes to Lizzie.  He has to do the right thing and marry a white woman, no matter what he's done with a black one.

Cap'n Jack knows just what he's doing when he interrupts dinner, where the topic is, of course, miscegenation, to announce that a slave child has just been born and "Easter is doing just fine."  Lizzie figures out what it all means and refuses to marry James, but her mother convinces her otherwise.  Sally goes to visit the new baby and tells James that, "she won't have any easy life.  She looks as white as you or I," giving him the family book.  James enters Easter's name in the book as the mother, but leaves the father column blank.  He then names the child Queen.  He goes to visit Queen, proudly holding her and inquiring about the labor while holding Easter's hand, announcing he's proposed to Lizzie.  He's a product of his time, no matter how good his intentions.

At the wedding, Queen is being cooed over by everyone, including Sally, but only because she'll make a good lady's maid.  James is forced to endure a conversation with his father-in-law about the issue of abolition.  We'll table that for now, but don't worry, we'll be back.

Queen grows up to become Raven-Symone.  Cap'n Jack teaches her to read and makes up stories about her father, but Easter just wants her to knows she's nothing but a slave.  "You go on and dream.  You let that child be," Easter tells her father when he starts talking about the end of slavery.  James looks out for her from afar.  He's there when the black children taunt her for being white and learning to read, and even gives her a few books.  When Lizzie becomes pregnant, he decides Queen should be the child's slave.  Easter is no happier about it than Sally or Lizzie.  He feels it will give Queen a better life, but no one else is convinced.  Lizzie is so mad about it that when Easter shows up with Queen, she not only barks that they should have used the back door, but since Queen is going to be raised right (aka white), "when you see her, keep your distance.  I don't want her learning the Negro ways."  Ouch!  She joins the Miniseries Evil Hall of Fame with that one! 

Queen (now Halle Berry) does grow up with advantages, though always a few feet behind her half-sister Jane (Jane Krakowski).  Time has done nothing to dim Lizzie's hatred for Queen.  On the eve of the Civil War, Jane and Queen are accosted by soldiers.  Jane likes the flirtation, but when one grabs and kisses Queen, Jane steps in.  "How dare you kiss my slave," she says and the soldier is horrified because he had no idea she was anything but white.  Though Jane seems to enjoy having a constant companion, she too has proper Southern lines drawn into her subconscious.  "You're just an itty bitty raggedy slave, who's gonna marry you?" she chirps when they discuss what they want in a potential husband.  And Queen has to sleep in a pull-out bed at the foot of Jane's enormous four-poster. 

After a very weird encounter with Sally (which serves no purpose but to give Ann-Margaret a scene to sink her teeth into), Queen rushes to Easter to ask about her father, the white side of her, but Easter won't say anything.  James goes off to fight in the war, the oldest soldier to enlist, I would think.  The women of the homestead are upset, but he tells Queen to take care of them.  "Pray for him, Queen, he's your pappy," Easter FINALLY reveals. 

Sally summons the slaves to tell them that slavery is a good thing.  The slaves get fed, clothed and buried by their masters, unlike their poor cousins up North.  This scene takes place outside around a fire, with only Sally believing any of the bunk she's spewing, and music approaching "Battle Hymn of the Republic" swells as she prays and a montage of Civil War fighting and dying is shown.  It's another bizarre Sally scene, and again, I can only assume no one wanted to waste Ann-Margaret. 

After James gets a brave post-battle scene, it's back to the homestead where diphtheria is raging.  Jane has it and Lizzie is beside herself.  She rages at Easter, slapping her and threatening to sell her.  "Get the overseer," she says, but things have gotten so bad, he's gone too.  The house slaves have to work in the field, even faithful Parson Dick (Ossie Davis).  Sally comes rushing over with a letter and her eyesight is too bad to read (the Civil War lasted only four years, but the characters here seem to age about 20).  She begs Queen to read it, as opposed to Lizzie.  "You think I want her knowin' my business?" she says.  Queen demures, saying it's against the law for her to read.  "What's it matter now?  Who's gonna whip you for it now?" Sally responds, at least somewhat in touch with the changed world. 

The letter is from James, saying he's coming home.  She's jubilant in telling Easter, but Easter has a cough which assures us she'll be dead soon (people in miniseries don't ever simply get a cold).  Sally says she'll make dinner, but can't even husk corn.  "What you gonna do, go out in the field like some Negra woman pickin' cotton?  None of us would be here if it wasn't for you.  Now it's your time to rest," Easter tells her.  Somewhere along the line Sally has become a sympathetic character, which is fine because it gives Ann-Margaret some acting opportunities, but it's rather unexpected. 

Queen has Lizzie working in the fields when the old overseer's wife (a howling Linda Hart, having a blast) stops by, horrified that anyone is listening to a slave!  But, that's when James arrives home, to find out his daughter Jane has died.  It's also the exact time Sally calls for Queen because Easter is dying.  By the time James gets to Easter's cabin, she is gone.  Sally takes Queen from the shack so James can have a last moment with, "my love." 

We keep up with everything that happens when Queen talks to her mother's grave.  James shows up while she's doing so and apologizes that Queen has to work so hard because he's so sick.  "We love you," she says honestly.  He says he wants to go back to war, and once again the women have to bid him goodbye.  Sally, Lizzie and Mrs. Henderson sing hymns while tearing up linens to re-use, trying not to listen to the bombs so close that they break the dishes in the cupboard.  "Hallelujah," shouts Parson Dick and breaks more.  The Yankees show up at the ruined manor to requisition food and cotton.  Sally says she will not fight them.  "You will not harm us, but you will bankrupt us?" she asks.  A tough buzzard, she wants to watch as they destroy her only means of income.  "How would you have us live now?" she asks after the soldiers dynamite everything.  "I lost two brothers to Johnny Reb. I don't care how you live...or if you live," he says.  His men take all the livestock and then the soldiers manhandle Queen.  Cap'n Jack tries to stop them and is beaten nearly to death for his trouble.  James has an arm amputated.  No one is doing well in this monstrous war. 

Super-sympathetic Sally comes to encourage Cap'n Jack not to give up on living and once again gives him the freedom papers her husband had drawn up.  They even discuss how the two of them conspired to get Sally married to James Sr., a much-needed laugh in their drab existence.  He begs Sally not to ever let Queen be sold.  She vows never to do so, but Sally tells him all the slaves are about to be free anyway.  With that happy realization, he dies. 

Parson Dick bolts the place, but Queen refuses to go.  "This my home," she tells both him and Sally when they each try to get her to go to a better place.  Sally even tries a bit of tough love, telling her they are not her family, never to think of James as her father and to leave, to go with her own people.  Queen is left at her mother's grave to cry and wonder what she should do as the first part ends.

James and Mr. Henderson make it home from the war, a lot worse for the wear.  James is missing an arm.  Not much better are the women at the plantation.  Queen has made tea out of acorns for Lizzie and Sally, who have only a few sticks of furniture at home by the time James gets there.  James apologizes to his mother when he sees her in a very tender moment, but she's only glad he's home.  Lizzie is equally thrilled, but James ignores Queen.  A few of the fleeing freed blacks offer to take her with them, but she stays. 

James tries to apologize to Queen as well, and offers to pay her, but she says no.  He has to.  "Slavery is illegal now," he notes sadly.  James sells land for a bit of money, but he's going to need more than a little: Lizzie is pregnant again.  Not meaning to be obtuse, but appearing so, James hopes it's a girl to replace Jane, because the house feels empty without a little girl.  Queen isn't happy about that. 

At Henderson's store, Mrs. Henderson is nasty as hell to Queen, giving her less feed than she ordered, charging more, and talking about her sass.  The men there make it even worse, but Queen gallops away (without the feed), though the men are just a hair behind her.  She luckily falls off her horse and is able to evade the men.  However, when she doesn't come home on time, James is worried about where she is.  His moments of ignorance and moments of care are a nice dichotomy and make him quite an interesting character.  Lizzie is not so tolerant.  She says she hopes Queen is gone for good because she knows he loves Queen more than her.  "I had to cook dinner last night!" Lizzie snarls when Queen comes home the next day, looking haggard and obviously in trouble.  Lizzie has forgotten Queen is no longer a slave.  "So ungrateful," Lizzie snaps when Queen announces she's leaving, "after all we've done for you!"  "You ain't never done nothin' for me!"

Queen goes to the graves to say goodbye, with Sally upset, but honest.  "It ain't enough to be nearly white.  Even a little drop of black blood is enough," she tells Queen, letting her know how the world will view her.  All she can give her is a handkerchief, the only thing of beauty she has left.  "I'll miss you," Sally says sadly as Queen wraps her arms around Sally's legs one last time.

On her way down the dirt road from the house, Queen encounters James, who has been searching all night for her.  "Are you sure you want to go?" he asks her.  He says he will miss her, his eyes just avoiding hers as he does so, and tells her to write to them.  Their father-daughter love is not something they can discuss, so James only says, "remember, there is God in everyone" as a parting tenderness. 

Getting onto the coach for Charleston, an elderly woman thinks she's completely white (Halle is light-skinned, but wearing a huge amount of pancake make-up that is not blended well below her chin).  "Queen, you is a white girl now," she beams when the woman is excited to have a nice white travel companion.  But, not everyone is so blind to her color.  She applies for a job doing menial work and the woman hisses that she knows she's black.  Queen is forced to steal food just to eat.  She joins the line in a soup kitchen, but the man looking at everyone thinks she's white, but picks out a girl a few behind her with black blood and tosses her out.

At the soup kitchen, Queen meets Alice (Lonette McKee, a superb actress and two-time Julie in "Show Boat," so she knows her way around these "passing" roles), who is also assumed white by everyone.  She takes Queen under her wing and teaches her how to pass.  Frustrated Queen says, "I'm just a mistake."  "You ain't a mistake, but you do smell bad," she jokes and gives Queen a relaxing bath, treating her more kindly than anyone else has.  Alice admits to sleeping with white men for money, but Queen says she could never do it because she's not pretty.  Alice holds up a mirror and tells Queen how beautiful she is.

Alice dolls up Queen and takes her to an all-white dance.  She immediately picked by a hunk for a dance and then back at Alice's, admits to having a wonderful time.  Alice spent her time with George (Dan Biggers), but Queen is still not up for the whole kept woman thing.  Alice says George has a job for her, not sex, but working in a flower shop.  That's where she meets Digby (Victor Garber), who buys a rose and then gives it to her. 

Digby takes a liking to Queen, who says she's the daughter of a Civil War veteran (as is Digby) and then tells a few lies so he doesn't learn the truth, though Alice says, "every moment you with him, you livin' a lie...he gonna catch you!"  She also cautions Queen not to fall in love, "because there's dangers for women like us."

Her new suitor says all the right things.  He has done some checking up on her and thinks she's the daughter of a poor Alabama family, saying everyone is different after the war and he then proposes!  Yes, after what seems to be only three meetings.  A fight between two black men in the street leads to one man being pushed against Digby, who beats the man and hurts epithets.  Alice is furious.  "What in the world is he going to say when you have babies and a little pickininny pops out...You get out of this as fast as you can!" she berates her, worried that all of them will be ruined should Digby find out the truth. 

Resolute in telling Digby the truth, Queen tries, but before she can, Digby tells her, "I've written to your father" and she passes out.  When she wakes up, he gives her laudanum.  "It's like floatin' on a fluffy pink cloud," he says, kissing her.  He unbuttons her blouse and she tries her best to fight him.  "I'm nigra!" she finally says, in order to stop her.  "Slut!" he replies and slaps her.  That's the least of it.  He punches her and then rapes her, with the scary line, "you'll get what cheap nigra bitches deserve!"  He's now taken over from Lizzie as the movie's most evil character.

She wanders home and Alice is not at all sympathetic.  Someone has already thrown a brick through the window.  "You're not special, we've all been raped," Alice roars as she packs Queen's clothes and tosses her out.  She doesn't want to lose her place with George or her passing lifestyle. 

The only place Queen can go is to the outskirts of town where the poor blacks live.  But they aren't any friendlier.  "You hungry?" the woman at the pot says, seemingly helpful.  "Take that, white bitch," she then says hurling the food at her.  Queen is hungry, so she eats it off the ground.  She also arrives just in time for the Klan to arrive and burn all the homes, killing at least one man in the process (not to mention in slow motion). 

Just to make sure she goes through EVERYTHING bad that can happen to a human at one time, she falls into a mud pile.  Slavery, beatings, rape, fire, famine and mud.  Everything but a plague of locusts follows this poor girl.

Tired and ready to die, she wanders into a black church in the middle of a fiery sermon, screaming "I nigra" like a woman possessed.  Joyce (Lorraine Toussaint) gets her a job working for two spinsters (Sada Thompson and Elizabeth Wilson).  Quoting the Bible, they promise her fair work and pay, and comment on her excellent teeth.  They are true Bible thumpers, doing little else but singing hymns with angelic smiles plastered on their faces.  They make sure she goes to church, though they condemn the "African ritual" of her church, telling her to attend with them instead. 

Now that life has gone from the lowest of the lowest to even tolerable, it's about time our Queen met a man!  That would be Davis (Dennis Haysbert), who comes into the garden one day and offers his services.  "I big and I black.  If I come knockin' on your door, would you have talked to me?" he asks one spinster when she wonders why he just presumed and came into the garden.  He offers a free afternoon and if she likes his work, she can hire him.  She agrees.  "I wonder, does he know he has a friend in Jesus," she asks Queen, in a line that begs for laughter among the all-too serious surroundings.  Queen is interested too, but doesn't realize it.  She feeds him a superb dinner, peppering him with questions about his whip marks.  He admits he was a handful, but then launches into a speech about "taking charge of his life" and never having to live under a white man's rule again.  I hate to say it, but that sort of thing is better handled through action in this story than out-and-out dialogue, which sounds like a textbook.  The miniseries is so sturdy in the way it's written, so this is a rare lapse, and probably an inevitable one.  I suppose there has to be a degree of preaching. 

Davis takes a break one afternoon for a massage from Queen, who asks against about his whip marks, and since she was never whipped, he launches back into a quiet tirade about hate.  "It's all there is," he says when Queen tells him not to hate.  What do you think she responds?  "No, there's love."  And then there is love.  The kind that happens in a bed with soft candles and even netting to make it all soft and gauzy.  This is the first time Queen has had consensual sex and she's talking about having his child in afterglow.  He's not thrilled with the idea of having children and she says he doesn't have to marry her if she has one.  She lacks self-esteem and he lacks humanity, having had it beaten out of him.  This is not a relationship fated to last long.  When he gets preachy again, she turns away from him in bed, while the camera pulls up to the ceiling to show them naked through the gauze. 

Caught stealing a biscuit, the spinsters literally "tsk tsk" her and send her to her room for violating the Eighth Commandment.  They don't realize she's eating for two.  She does, for she's already started knitting baby clothes.  Joyce forces Queen to tell Davis, who says he'll try to love Queen.  "If'n you don't love this girl and cherish her...I'll fix it so you don't give no poor gal no baby again.  You know I will," Joyce says, in no uncertain terms.  "Now, you can go to him," she instructs Queen. 

She leaves the spinsters because she and Davis have agreed to meet and go away together.  Joyce wishes her the best and Queen heads over to the train station.  But, alas, no Davis.  He never shows.  Life was nudging Queen a bit too much toward actual happiness for everything to work according to her romantic notions.  Another man has disappointed her. 

Thinking it's the only option, Joyce takes Queen to get an adoption, but Queen changes her mind and they return to the spinsters.  "Queen is lost.  All the prayers in Christendom couldn't save her now," Spinster Sada chides, but says it's their duty to take care of the baby, and thus the mother.  Joyce says no and tries to take her away, but the spinsters point out that in her condition, she can't really go anywhere else.  They banish Joyce from the house and set up Queen, telling her to "remember your prayers tonight!"  It ain't a great situation, but it's better than nothing.  "Don't let them two old dragons be too hard on you," she says before going to sleep. 

Queen still has to do chores, but give her some slack the more pregnant she gets.  When Spinster Sada asks her what it feels like, she has a sweet speech about how much she already loves the child and how devoted she will be to it.  Spinster Sada says both she and Spinster Elizabeth are jealous as they have never found love and thus never had children.  "We spend our lives trying to increase God's family, not ours, but I would give anything in the world to know what it feels like, really feels like, in my heart," Spinster Sada attests.

Then it's birthing time.  It's a boy!  Both spinsters were hoping for that.  They won't let her hold him at first, saying "he's not very dark, he'll get lighter."  She wants to name him for his father, but the spinsters have him baptized as Abner.  The ladies are a little too into the baby, even asking Queen to breastfeed in front of them because they like to watch anything related to the baby.  The sight of Sada Thompson singing a hymn as Halle Berry nurses and rolls her eyes is a welcome comedic moment. 

Late one night, the ladies try to take Abner to their room, thinking it's better, "the promise of salvation."  She screams at them that they want him because they are old and dried up, and she wins, keeping the baby for the moment.  "You will regret this," she's told as she grabs the cradle.  Queen goes off to her preacher, who tells her the truth, that since the women are white and she's black.  It's a hard thing to hear, but she knows it's true.  When she finds the spinsters with a preacher discussing putting him up for foster care through the church, she takes the baby and plans to run.  She better do it quickly, because the preacher is telling the spinsters to have her committed to an asylum.  Queen takes Abner in the middle of the night and leaves, promising a better life.  Thus ends the second part of the story.

Ever-resilient, Queen finds her way to a tavern where Mrs. Benson (Frances Conroy) is eating alone.  The woman running the joint tries to make Queen sit in the back, but Mrs. Benson invites Queen to join her.  She offers Queen a job as a wet nurse.  She has one who is "uppity and her milk is a little sour," and she wants a replacement.  Before Queen agrees, she makes sure that Mrs. Benson isn't a Jesus freak.  "I don't believe you Negroes have souls," Mrs. Benson says with a laugh.  Done, Queen is in.  Slur or no slur, she'll take the job as long as the Lord isn't hanging around. 

Mrs. Benson is prejudice in equality.  Not only does she find blacks to be without souls, but she will not spend money in a "Semitic" grocery store.  As she's picking apart everyone along the street, Queen sees Davis giving a rabble-rousing speech in the town square to get the blacks to strike.  The white men in town arrest them, but the warrant is not signed and the judge releases them, knowing they technically have the same rights as whites.  The judge knows that, but the white men in town don't and vow to bring him down.

Queen shows up at Davis' house, hoping that she can get him to take responsibility for her and the child, and the only way he can stop the torrent of words and fists is to have sex with her.  "I'd ask you to stay, but it ain't safe," he tells Queen, because he's a marked man.  With Queen at Davis', Mrs. Benson has had to deal with her own crying baby all night and she's not happy.  In a surprise move, she sends Queen to Davis' to warn him that the Klan is coming to him.  That is until we see her holding Abner on her balcony and smiling as the Klansmen chase Queen unnoticed to Davis', now knowing where he's hiding out.

Queen returns to Mrs. Benson's.  "Abner is doing the Lord's work tonight," Mrs. Benson tells her, but Queen doesn't understand.  Ah, Mrs. Benson, now taking over from the last 25 people the title of the Most Evil Character, is a female member of the Klan (they didn't do the dirty work) and she has given the Klan Abner to take to Davis'.  Now that's wicked, truly repulsive.  As they hold the baby, they lynch and burn Davis.  Queen arrives in daylight to see his scorched body still hanging from the tree, with Abner in a box at his feet, still alive.  This segment nails American race relations, the whole history of it, right there.  It's chilling. 

It's time to hit the road again.  Queen seems a bit deadened to life now, having experienced every atrocious act that can be committed upon one person.  She gets on a ferry run by Alec Haley (Danny Glover), a very nice man with a son, Henry, hoping to head "north."  Queen doesn't disembark because she doesn't have the money for the ride she's taken.  She promises to pay him back and he jokes that of course, he just "doesn't know how much interest to charge."  She's in no joking mood after what she's been through.

He tracks Queen down to a maid job she does and she doesn't give into his kindness.  She doesn't understand it.  Everyone who at first seemed kind has always disappointed her.  The job is at Mr. Cherry's (George Grizzard), another man who seems nice at first, even though he's holding a Bible, which in her mind marks him as evil.  He admits to being "an abolitionist who kept slaves," saying that after emancipation the slaves stayed on as employees.  At a dinner party at Mr. Cherry's, Queen spills water on a white lady, who berates her.  Queen explodes, yelling at the woman and telling her she may have black blood in her as well.  One of her fellow employees tells her to lose the hate routine and let someone in with love.  Queen isn't ready yet.

Dora (Madge Sinclair) finishes that harangue and follow it up with one aimed at Alec.  She insists, though he refuses, that he is indeed looking for a new wife and mother for his son.  A little matchmaking can't hurt.  Abner runs off to Alec's place and a frantic Queen finds him there on Alec's knee telling him a "story written by a fine old man named Aesop."  Rather than be grateful, she unleashes her temper on him.  For the umpteenth time, she says as soon as she has the money, she'll be on her way.  Alec does a smart thing and offers her a second job running his house at night.  He watches her through the window with a smile and a laugh. 

Queen asks Mr. Cherry for Saturdays off so she can work the other job, but still expecting to be paid since she's doing the same amount of work.  Mr. Cherry wants to be fair, to pay her only when she's working.  Finally, Alec forces her to sit down and listen to him.  "If you think you can live in a glass case with that boy all your life, you're a fool, woman," he chides her.  It actually penetrates.  Perhaps she's getting tired of carrying around so much hate.  She takes a seat in his dead wife's rocking chair and this starts a conversation, a pleasant one, though a short one.  Hey, it's a start.

Both Mr. Cherry and Dora are surprised to find Queen going about her chores while singing.  At Alec's, she bonds with Henry, who doesn't want to stay in school in order to earn money as a sharecropper.  Then comes this whopper out of Queen: "Instead of wakin' up each morning saying 'I hate it,' why not wake up each morning and say, 'I like it?'"  That's a personality change so fast one wonders what the hell kind of pills she's taking.  I know we've got only an hour to wrap this movie up, but damn, that was a quick transformation!  She's now comfortable sitting on the porch and quips (yes, quips) that she will have to stay with him a long time to earn enough money ever to leave.  They hold hands.

Queen marries Alec, with Mr. Cherry to give her away.  It's a lovely church wedding and they even jump the broom, and old slave custom that was used to signify marriage that the white people didn't understand.  Queen gives birth to a son named Simon.  This baby is born with smiles and love. 

The years fly by and Simon's teacher tells Queen that Simon should stay in school because he is smart, loves to learn and does not belong in the fields sharecropping.  He tells his mother he wants to stay in school and "maybe even go to college."  She tries to get Alec to agree to let him stay in school, but he needs him on the farm.  She throws one of her girlish tantrums, though they have now started to use the age make-up on her, and Alec gives in.  Simon can go to school, but he has to work for the book money.  "Don't you get no ideas about leaving," she tells Abner.  She makes him promise never to leave her. 

Simon makes money in the oldest profession: selling lemonade by the roadside.  Two white boys come for some and a fight starts when they refuse to pay.  Queen drags Simon to the boy's house to get the money for the lemonade and when he calls her a nigger, she slaps him and calls him trash.  Queen stands firm, though the boy's mother defends her son.  Luckily, the father comes along and pays the money.  This episode seems to exist for Emmy-grabbing purposes (and to echo "Roots").  Queen unleashes years of pent-up anger on the white woman, starting from her white father and going all the way up to the present, the money they are owed for the lemonade.  Simon manages to get her to come home, but something inside her has clearly broken.  "I scared," she tells Alec.  "I scared of me."  Obviously her happy pills have worn off.

Queen takes her sons to the plantation where she was born to show them where she grew up.  She arrives just as a funeral is taking place, the funeral of her father.  That's a bit too sudsy, no?  The miniseries is falling apart in its last hour seemingly just to add time.  Queen shows her boys the grave of her mother, the house where she lived and then the big house.  Guess who is there?  Yup, the first Most Evil Character in the story, Lizzie, descending the stairs with a glass of wine in hand to tell Queen one more time that she doesn't belong and never did. 

Simon graduates from school with the top honors ever in Savannah in a joyous ceremony with a band and dancing and all.  His teacher asks to speak to Queen alone, to tell her Simon deserves to go to college.  Queen is convinced, but Alec isn't.  "We still think like slaves," she tells her husband, telling him that the future is different from their life.  This would be Queen #2, the cranky-but-lovable personality, somewhere between Queen #1, the angry one and Queen #3, the strangely "scared" one who rocks in a chair oddly. 

Anyway, everyone thinks Simon should go to college.  Mr. Cherry thinks so and even Henry thinks so, because he's no damn good as a farmer.  Finally, Alec agrees.  "I am sending you to normal school and you better do good," he rails and then tells him to stay away from women.  Simon is given $50.  "Most fool thing I ever done," he mutters to himself.  Queen is thrilled, but Abner isn't.  He wants to go away too, but she's holding onto him too tightly.  He wants to go up North, and she tells him he doesn't know how to do anything and to put the thoughts out of his mind.  Just when he convinces Alec to let him go, Queen #3, the crazy one, blurts out the truth that Alec isn't Abner's father.  That upsets both men.  Alec rides away on his horse.

In a tizzy, Queen sets herself on fire accidentally.  She runs out of the house and is found by neighbors still trying to put the fire out.  I guess this is Queen #4, batshit crazy, the kind played as a drooling hag in most movies. 

In a completely unnecessary turn of events, Queen is committed to an asylum straight jacketed, water torture and all.  I'm not sure this is the place to go into the horrors of 19th Century mental health treatments, true story or not.  It's certainly way too late in the movie for such a plot twist.  "I ain't mad," she tells Alec when he visits.  Honestly, the writing is so different in this section, and so sloppy, it's as if it's been written by someone new.

Queen summons Mr. Cherry for a visit, asking him for $50 so Abner can go away and live the life he wants.  He is glad to lend her the money and "as for paying it back, we'll worry about that another time," he says to her.  Now Queen #1, or maybe Queen #2 with a bit of #1, returns.  She insists on going home.  Why?  Leaving all the shrieking mad people in the hovel hell house?  "I ain't that sick.  I got a few demons in me.  I don't suppose they will ever go away, but I'm not a danger to anyone, except maybe me," she says, which sounds pretty damn rational.  The doctor tries to reason with her, telling her it's 50 miles and she can't even tie her shoes, but she insists.  She wants to say goodbye to her sons, even if it means coming back.  Silently, the doctor bends down to tie her shoes.  Oh, for crying out loud! 

Alec comes to pick her up and she looks better.  They have done her hair and given her fresh clothes to wear.  And her shoes are tied, of course.  They have even scraped away some of the age make-up to make her look a bit more Halle Berry ravishing (not that much, but a bit more).  Queen gives Abner a parting e speech to beat the band, telling him he's always loved and he can always come home. 

"I'll just have to make do with you then," she teases Alec and tells him the story of her early years as they sit on the porch rocking.  "Who'd have known that my prince on the white horse wouldn't have no horse, but a ferry crossing the river?" she says to her smiling husband as grip hands again. 

For James, to learn his Haley authors properly.

Lace (1984)

"Which one of you bitches is my mother?"

With the exception of Kunte Kinte naming of himself in "Roots," and I think that's a distant second, the above line is THE most famous and well-known piece of dialogue to come from an American miniseries. 

Ah, "Lace."  "Lace" itself seems to have burrowed into the collective minds of people who watched long-play format television in the 1980s as the one they seem to remember the most.  Based on Shirley Conran's novel, it is easily the cheesiest, easily the most ridiculous, easily the looniest and easily the most fun that can be had.  "Lace" is a romance miniseries of the highest degree, thought it veers off into creating its own sub-genre of out-and-out miniseries camp.  Phoebe Cates gives a Hall of Fame performance of a lifetime so unique that it basically made her unusable again so as not to dare tarnish it, as a world-famous personality on the most insane quest to find one's self in miniseries history.  There is glitz, melodrama, tears, marabou and sublime overacting enough in "Lace" that it can make one forget Jaclyn Smith in her Sidney Sheldon roles, all of the Kennedys and, yes, even Polly Bergen's drunken antics in the Herman Wouk productions.

"You've got to climb Mount Everest to reach the Valley of the Dolls," Anne Welles says in that movie, considered the ne plus ultra of camp cinema.  The same applies to "Lace."  This is the pinnacle of miniseries glee.  It is the most preposterous of miniseries and that's why it's one of the favorites. 

The best way to start is just to start.  From the very beginning, the level of madness is so high, we can't possibly lose. 

The melodrama is obvious from the credits.  A very expensive car drives through Alpine splendor with a full orchestra blaring with overzealous intent.  In the car, we see only pieces of a veiled woman smoking a cigarette.  The woman in the veil is Phoebe Cates.  The ruin she drives up to is a former school that has been closed, with scandal attached to the headmaster.  "And she was a student here?" she asks of her driver, who informs her that yes, it is thought her unknown mother was a student there.  "But we must get back to Paris.  The old woman has all the answers," he says as Phoebe tosses her cigarette out the window. 

As she steps out of the car in Paris, in front of Notre Dame, no less, the gawking tourists all turn their focus to her.  We hear expected chatter like, "it's Lili!  What's she doing here" along less expected chatter like, "and with her clothes on!" 

If Phoebe Cates thinks she owns this movie, she has a serious problem immediately, because she faces Angela Lansbury, as Aunt Hortense, a veteran scene-stealer who could mop floors with dramatic actresses with one hand and hams with the other.  Angela adopts a ridiculously hysterical French accent and tries to fluff the conversation, but Phoebe is all business.  She wants to know where her mother is.  Where is Lucinda Lace?  Angela begins to unravel her maternal heritage for her.  "It happened at that school..."

The school is Gothic and parochial, run by stuffy Herbert Lom.  We meet our three leads, who have a difficult task at the onset: they are trying to sing a hymn to which none know the words (bubblegum watermelon isn't working, trust me) and all are trying to look like teenagers.  Teenagers?  Bess Armstrong, Brooke Adams and Arielle Dombasle?  At least the other girls, including the requisite nasty fat girl, look more like girls.  Herbert is as irate as a 2-watt light bulb over violations in the rules ("I wish I were violated," one of our heroines chirps) and our leads laughs.

Bess is an American, a would-be authoress who writes romance novels about Lucinda Lace, novels that sound exactly like the tripe we're in for.  Just as Arielle comes in with a package of contraband goodies, the fat girl, named...what else...Piggy, is hot on the trail, hoping they are not breaking the rules.  "You three always stick together."  "Though thick and thin," Bess says, as their motto.  "Through sick and sin," Arielle agrees, in her French accent.  "No, stupid,  you're sin and she's sick," Brooke jokes looking first at Arielle and next at Piggy.

Okay, so in this one exchange, we've learned literally everything we need to know about the heroines.  Bess is strong but romantic, French Arielle dimly comic and British Brooke proudly bossy.  Arielle drags her friends to a hockey rink where she's obsessed with a player she meet only clandestinely.  Another obsession of the girls is Simon Chandler, a banker's son from snobbish Philadelphia.  The gals follow him to a restaurant where he seems to have eyes only for Kansas-born Bess.  Their lunch is interrupted by the arrival of a caravan of cars carrying Anthony Higgins, Prince Abdullah, who has Brooke interested.  "I love their bathrobes," Bess notes, sounding less like a teenager than just and out-and-out moron.  "They call them bernoooooooze," Arielle intones.  Prince Anthony comes in handy a scene later when he gallops on his white steer to stop a wayward carriage Bess and Arielle have accidentally started while Brooke was snapping photos.  Brooke is offended that he introduces himself as a prince, so she says she's the "Queen of China."  Yeah, that'll teach him manners! 

All three girls are virgins, though they live through Bess' Lucinda Lace character, who is always about to have sex in the next chapter.  "I think you two have sex on the brain," Bess says during a midnight smoking session.  Let's be fair, losing virginity is important to this trio, all looking like they are about to hit 40.  It's decided that Arielle cannot wait any longer, so the girls rent a hotel room in town and her hockey player shows up as Arielle has put on a negligee.  The hockey player is not allowed to have "anything to do with women" because of a big upcoming game, and Arielle picks that moment to tell him she's a virgin.  "Don't worry, I've been in this situation hundreds of times," he says, though she quickly deflates that boast.  The "do not disturb" sign goes on the door as Piggy stands outside the room glaring. 

Arielle isn't sure she did "it" right, though it was "wonderful" and he was "wonderful" but Arielle says, strangely, "I'm not so sure I love him anymore."  Who the hell cares?  It was about deflowering!  At another meal, the girls crack wise a few more times and then note that the headmaster is supposedly having an affair with his chauffeur. 

It's the big Valentine's Day dance.  "How do we look?" they ask themselves in the mirror.  Utterly ridiculous as teenagers, I wish the mirror would respond.  To the sleepy strains of "A Summer Place," Bess dances with Simon as the other two chatter and turn down any man who isn't up to their standards.  Prince Anthony arrives, dressed for an audience with the Pope, rather than a winter formal.  Now "Mack the Knife" is playing and Prince Anthony sends a servant over to ask Brooke to dance.  "Tell him to get stuffed," Brooke says as they tell the poor guy either the Prince asks himself or no dice!  Before Anthony's dark make-up starts to melt from his face, he better truck it on over to Brooke.  "She won!" Bess says as the Prince does approach her, suddenly informal enough to crack sexually wise. 

In rush the hockey players, who have won their big game.  Arielle finally has her partner too, but the song ends in time for Brooke and Arielle to wonder where Bess has gone.  "I'm going to have to rewrite Chapter 3 in my book," she says while Simon smokes a cigarette.  Apparently losing ones virginity is better than Lucinda Lace got it.  "It's like a winding country lane.  I always knew it was there, but I never wanted to walk down it before," she tells Simon.  Pause for a moment to consider that.  Are we speaking anatomically?  Is Bess the possessor of some freaking insides?  Are we speaking horticulturally?  Is not a blooming rose but perhaps ten different kinds of trees?  Or is she speaking metaphorically?  Ah, that must be it!  But that doesn't help because I have no idea what the hell that metaphor could mean, but Simon seems to understand, so the dialogue moves to Bess saying she loves Simon and Simon saying, "I'm very fond of you." Oh, crap.  That's never good.

Brooke goes to Prince Anthony's royal suite, with has a painting of the sky and constellations on the ceiling and enough faux-Arab bric-a-brac to fill a DeMille movie. 

Simon explains himself.  He does love Bess, but his family has a "master plan" and a fiancee already picked out for him and it's all to start the following week.  "You might have told me this before," Bess chides, but he's as horny as she is.

Prince Anthony had a private tutor, "two hours a day, three times a week" to teach him the art of making love.  "What was on the blackboard?  Did you have much homework?" Brooke jokes, as nervous as he is confident.  He finally shuts her up with a kiss, but Brooke pulls away.  Prince Anthony is incensed and calls her names, but Brooke stands firm.  "I've had lessons too!  From teachers like Deborah Kerr...and Doris Day and Jane Austen and all the Bronte sisters and your Hakim could learn a hell of a lot from them about how a woman should be treated," she rails before hightailing it out of the royal suite.  "Deborah Kerr?  Doris Day?" the Prince wonders, no doubt wishing to send servants to find these teachers.

Let's pause again.  What the hell was so bad about the way the Prince seduced Brooke?  Arielle got a quick tumble between hockey practice sessions, Bess just the same with a man who is engaged to be married, but yet Brooke had a Prince, in white gloves, take her to a fabulous suite, give her a rose and kiss her passionate.  That's the stuff of bloody fairy tales!  How did the score become Fairy Tales-0, Lace-2?  Because of Deborah Kerr?  She got pounded...by waves...in from "Here to Eternity" and was clearly no virgin.  Better rethink your role models, Brooke, or you are going to fall far behind your pals.

Brooke needs a ride back to school since it's the middle of the night and the only car to come to her rescue is the dastardly chauffeur.  He invites Brooke in and since it's cold, she doesn't have much choice.  He forces her to have a drink, or else he won't take her back, and instantly something is wrong.  The chauffeur, offended by her gay jokes, is saying, "maybe you're wrong about me" as she passes out from the spiked drink.  When she wakes up, he shows her pictures of himself with various girls from the school, as well as the headmaster.  "You're very photogenic," she snaps before he rips her dress.  But, she makes a dash for it and was able to run back to the Prince.  Ah, so his white gloves are goldfish aren't so bad, are they?  He doesn't even ask about the ripped dress before taking her in his arms.

All three have had sex just once and one is pregnant.  Sitting on an Alp, they need to decide what to do because "it's too soon for motherhood."  Here we get a bit of social commentary, the only "Lace" can manage.  An abortion is suggested and Brooke says it's illegal.  Ah, but feisty Bess tells us that "soon, in another 10 years, abortions are going to be performed like appendectomies in proper hospitals."  You tell 'em, Bess!  Of course, the part about 10 years speaks to the American Supreme Court ruling and these girls are in France, but let's not mention that.  Let's be proud that we have strong brave woman in 1960something (with a 1980something mindset).  The social commentary continues for a few more sentences before they vote on what to do.  They veto the abortion.  Bess things as three "intelligent women," they should be able to figure it out.  Hold on!  Intelligent?  In "Lace?"

The trio trundles over to an Obstetrician, observed once again by Piggy!  "Lucinda Lace" shows up to see Dr. Anthony Quayle.  All three are Lucinda Lace, but they don't intend to tell the confused doctor which one is pregnant.  They do actually tell him, but unfortunately, we get stuck seeing Piggy and her friend outside while it's revealed. 

Here's the decision on what to do: they want to give the baby up for adoption, but only until one is ready to handle a child, just a temporary adoption.  That makes perfect sense...to absolutely no one, let alone a doctor!  Do you see why this is so lovable? 

Herbert Lom hauls the girls into his office and demands to know who is pregnant.  Arielle says, "maybe it's all of us," and she's asked to stay behind because Piggy has told Herbert about seeing her at the hotel.  So, unless Auntie gives money to the school, she'll be labeled as a tramp and banished.  But, Bess and Brooke have a plan.  While Arielle distracts the chauffeur, they go inside his house and steal his dirty blackmail pictures. 

In turn, they use the blackmail pictures against the principal, so Herbert has no choice but to let them graduate.  With straights As.  And excused from gym class because of their "condition."  The doctor drives them by the house where the baby will be deposited, which will take money, and Anthony Quayle has a fee too.  Where will they get that money?

Aunt Hortense.  Thank goodness, not a moment too soon does Angie Lansbury return.  She has the money and the snappy Chanel-ish suits.  She gives them a sterling argument in favor of never having children and then lowers the boom: she's not rich.  "Which one of my favorite husbands and we, um, put the bite on?" she suggests, just when we think all is lost in terms of money and plot continuation. 

The doctor gets to know who is pregnant, though we don't, because she goes cloaked by midnight and in shadows inside.  "Of the three of you, you are the one I least suspected," he tells the mother.

Back in the present, drunken Aunt Hortense is still telling her story to Phoebe, but there's a problem.  Angela tells Phoebe that's the end of the story because the baby was killed, but Phoebe seems to be standing there.  It's hard to tell, actually, because she's wearing so many feathers on her costume it may be an ostrich dunked in motor oil.

"They made their schoolgirl pact and sent me to hell.  I show them what I learned there," Phoebe rails at Angie before tearing out.  Unfortunately, this is all too much for the grande dame, and she has a heart attack, while still talking, knocking over her last glass of wine before expiring.  She milks the death scene for full value, as well she should.  It's a hell of a scene! 

Phoebe shows up at the funeral, unnoticed.  Arielle is there, now a Countess with a 17-year old son.  Bess comes too, unmarried, a publisher of "Lace" magazine.  Brooke has fared the worst.  She's Lady Swann, the wife of a cancer researcher, and currently an alcoholic.  The three do not speak now. 

"Now it's time to make them suffer," Phoebe tells her driver as the funeral scene comes to a dramatic conclusion.  Actually, every scene comes to a dramatic conclusion in "Lace."

Bess is invited aboard a yacht by Phoebe, through her Greek intermediary friend who Ari Onassis in everything but name.  Finally, Bess gets to meet Phoebe, who is decked out in a ruffled outfit and a terrifying outfit.  Bess is trying to save her magazine and since Phoebe is the biggest star in the world (star of what, we're not quite sure), so Bess wants to do an exclusive interview.  In this extremely weird scene, Bess acts the business-like dame and Phoebe, once again, is so explosive she threatens to sink the yacht.  Phoebe teases Bess with her affairs with movies stars and senators, and then hits her over the head with the fact that it will save the magazine.  Bess, looking and trying (but failing) to sound like Julie Andrews, is game to start the interview right there.  "You tell it, I'll print it," Bess says.

"I was pregnant when I was 16.  Were you pregnant when you were 16?" Phoebe starts, before ripping off on a torrent about her life, delivered at such a fever pitch, one wonders how she will sustain it for the rest of the movie (let alone the sequel).  Before she became the world-famous...whatever the hell she is...Phoebe was indeed a pregnant teen with not enough money "to have a tooth pulled," the woman who recommends an abortionist tells her.  But, she doesn't have enough money to pay for the full procedure.

But, there is a way to make that money.  Gross old photographer Pierre Olaf, a long way from his days as a Broadway juvenile.  He gets the tiger out of Phoebe, who tosses her top and snares enough cash for the abortion, though of the worst kind, the kind her mothers worried about years earlier, and she gets sick from the procedure.  Sick and booted from her rat trap.  She has just enough energy to return to Pierre's and collapse. 

Phoebe stops there, though Bess is drooling for more.  Next up on Phoebe's list is Arielle, who likes to have the rich and famous at her chateau.  "You are rich and I am famous," she tells her Greek pal.  You can't buy dialogue like that, though one wonders how Aunt Hortense raised a niece to accept this sort of rich trash into her house. 

Coincidentally, at the chateau that weekends is the Prince!  Just as the discussion gets juicy about Brooke's tragic life, Arielle announces dinner.  Arielle's table seating leaves something to be desired, because her son is infatuated with Phoebe, who feeds him.  "She likes to feed strays," her Greek unhelpfully notes.  While flirting with Arielle's son, she also baits the Prince about contributing to Brooke's charity.  Arielle's son wants to know what Phoebe's new film is about.  "I never know what my new films are about."  "That's why her performances are so believable," roars the Greek.  And we've hit another screeching halt!  What in the world is that supposed to mean?  And why be proud of it?  Sorry, we can un-pause now.

"How did you become a great great actress?" Prince Anthony asks.  "Luck," just like the kind that made the Prince a royal.  Anthony and Arielle's son Simon are both intrigued, so dinner conversation turns to her history, in the umpteenth flashback of the ever-confusing saga here.  "It was 1979," she starts.  "Ah, a good year for Beaujolais," the Greek interrupts.  "And a good year for Lili," she says before diving in.  Nude photography leads to pornography for Pierre.  Her costar in the scene wants to know how motivation,  Pierre points to Phoebe.  "Try to look like you are enjoying every minute of it," Pierre commands and that's how Phoebe became a star.  The Prince is not as delighted, Arielle is uncomfortable, but Simon all but drills a hole in the table with his boner. 

Dinner over, the men go out to talk about oil tankers and Arielle can't find her son.  Three guesses, friends.  No, he's not behind the arras in the hallway.  Not in the fountain outside.  Yes, in Phoebe's room, although nothing has happened.  We hope.  I mean, they could be half brother and sister.  "Why?  Why did you?" Arielle asks.  "Why not?" Phoebe chirps before the two roll around on the bed in a cat fight that was a must in all 80s trash.  Phoebe spits on Arielle, who has the class to wipe it off on a piece of Phoebe's clothing.

Naturally, Phoebe is tossed out of the house.  "You threw her out like a common tramp," Simon says, and Arielle agrees with that.  "I didn't know she was so common," Arielle says, thinking she's done away with Phoebe.  What she has forgotten is that in "Lace," every man is incredibly stupid.  Her son therefore announces he's madly in love with Phoebe and is leaving to chase her. 

Back to Bess.  She doesn't trust everything Phoebe has said and she's worried about libel.  "Print it," she finally says and "Lace" magazine is hopefully back on track.

Brooke's husband Nickolas Grace is super duper excited because Prince Anthony, now King Anthony, has agreed to donate to the charity cancer and Nickolas is too busy, so Brooke has to go.  That'll be uncomfortable since their affair of years ago, but Brooke has taken to the bottle and isn't exactly looking her best.  Plus, no alcohol in a Muslim country, so she'll be drying out while having to sparkle for business and worry about the past.  This will be fraught.  FRAUGHT, I TELL YOU!

The Kingdom of...whatever it's called to avoid having any Arab potentate get angry at the United States, is an oil-rich gargantuan palace and not much else.  As the King and the former Queen of China get reunited, Phoebe turns up.  She's also a guest at the palace, though neither Brooke nor the King's head wife takes much of a liking to her.

Being with the King has made Brooke feel so much better that she doesn't even take a swig from her hidden stash of liquor.  There's a big dinner where Brooke confidently discusses her research.  "Cancer is being attacked on all sorts of fronts," she says (a statement that goes unexplained for all its wackiness).  Phoebe and Brooke argue about whether there is enough being done for cancer in the King's country.  "Different people suffer from different things in different ways," Phoebe offers, and just when it looks like Brooke has lost all hope of getting any oil money, the head wife says it's okay to make a donation.  "A small one, a token," she notes.  Brooke is not happy, and once again Phoebe has bewitched another dimwitted man, though this runs an entire country. 

When the royal family takes off from the palace, Brooke has it out with Phoebe.  She wants to know why the hell Phoebe torpedoed her mission.  Phoebe's explanation?  Being abandoned by her mother, and another flashback.  As Phoebe narrates the downfall of her self-respect (frankly, her self-respect seems very healthy, the strongest thing about her).  As confused as as anyone watching, Brooke asks, "what does any of this have to do with last night?"  Phoebe is honest: she wanted to see old lovers in action, because she intends to be the King's new lover.  Brooke battles back a bit, by reminding her that "first loves die hard" and then Phoebe orders her out of the palace.  That sends Brooke back to the bottle, poor thing.

Phoebe returns returns to her latest set, where she plays a wench who ends up in a hay stack, which is mind-boggling.  Simon is there, but she will not let him go to New York with her.  Why not?  "I have to play a scene.  It is the biggest scene I have ever had to play," she says dramatically.  Her maid sends telegrams to the mothers.  The one to Bess says the printed article is false, which would ruin the magazine.  "Some broad, some animal," her co-publisher says.  Brooke and Arielle are ordered to New York, one regarding the charity, the other regarding a son, and both fall for the bait.

Naturally, being an international sensation, Phoebe turns it into a press opportunity.  "She has graced us with her presence and her silence," a lady reporter says to the camera when Phoebe stomps through the press gathered at her insistence.  Even her agent has no idea what is about to happen.  At 4:30, all three possible mothers are due in her suite.  She better get out of those horrible white leather pants before they get there.  No respectable mother wants to see her kid tarted up like that.

It's time.  Arielle arrives first.  Then Brooke, who checks her hair in a mirror, as if she's about to meet her lover.  The two former friends are not excited to see each other, Arielle tart enough to suggest perhaps Brooke doesn't need a drink.  Phoebe's maid is no help, not offering any explanations, so Arielle and Brooke kill time wondering and speaking very slowly until Bess shows up.  "Somebody wants to make a big entrance," Bess mutters as they wait below a staircase for Phoebe to emerge in a ravishing white gown, as pure as snow driven through a sewer. 

The tension is high, especially since the lines are repeated over and over again, just in different varieties, as if to kill time before the next commercial break.  Okay, okay, it's supposed to be a tense scene, but a well-written one would be more helpful.  Phoebe reminds them, and any dozing viewers, what each woman is doing there, and how she can help them out of the predicaments into which she's driven them.  Will she help them?  Hmmm.  Oh, but...

"Incidentally, which one of you bitches is my mother?"

Thus ends Part 1 of this glorious camp-fest.  If you are like me, you've hooted and howled yourself into speechless awe and can't imagine how Part 2 will live up to what we've just seen, but there's more to come.  Much more.  We've simply hit the greatest climax in miniseries history, now we just have to pick up the piece (though heaven above, it's a long ride down that hill).

The answer to the question above?

Oh, not yet!

We return to "Lace" with a flashback to the girls graduating with full honors, with the help of Aunt Hortense's money.  Bess' parents are boring, we know Aunt Hortense is crazy fun but the biggest surprise comes from Brooke's mum, jaw clenched in the best British fashion, because she's got a lesbian in tow.  Whether mum knows it or not, Brooke does, because the dame hits on her.  The girls trundle off to the remotest part of the Alps where the baby can be delivered in private.  Eleven months go by so pregnancy weight disappears from whoever is the mother, and it's time for the women to start their careers in the hopes of getting baby Elizabeth back in their six idiotic arms. 

Bess goes to work for a newspaper as a fashion editor, ignored by the men at the paper who handle the real news.  This infuriates the always socially-conscious Bess, rebuffs the attempts of a man at the paper because she just wants to get ahead.  She bores him on their first date with her idea for a feminist magazine.  "Do you know how many women can do the same things as men?" she asks, though the man is more interested in a park mime.  I can't say I disagree.  Bess' speeches get longer and more tiresome as the movie progresses.

Perky Arielle, in Pepto-pink suit wants to remodel mansions and hits a home run when she discovers a huge wreck and the handsome man who goes with it.  Arielle, pretending not to notice the man, holds her pencil in the air and does some quick figuring.  I'm not sure it all has to do with the house either.  Since Arielle is the worst actress of the three we're forced to follow, all of her scenes without the others are awfully trying.

Brooke's mum and doting friend have turned their ancestral home into a fat farm.  The lesbian has banished her to the gardener's cottage, and Brooke knows just why.  "Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned," she says, to the confusion of her mother and the ire of her lesbian, who is now her legal partner.  "Either she goes or I do," Brooke says.  "But I couldn't run this place without Selma.  I couldn't begin to," mum says barely opening that clenched jaw and the lesbian smiles in triumph.  Mum tells her daughter to call her uncle and visit for Ascot, while the lesbian chides, "have you done the dinner menu?" 

Has anyone wondered what happened to the baby the mother had?  No, neither have I, but unfortunately, we don't have a choice in finding out.  She's become a delightful little lass brought up by two caring parents.  Moving on...

Brooke actually does go to Ascot, where she bumps into the Prince!  He has a "rather nice filly" in the race named...wait for it...the Queen of China.  His love for Brooke has never dimmed.  The horse wins, but so does Brooke, back in the arms of her beloved dashing Prince.  They go to leave a dance and Brooke insists on walking, which the Prince's men don't think is safe.  "An evening stroll is romantic.  Being driven to a man's hotel is not," Brooke insists and decides she'll walk alone if the Prince wants the car.  She knows full well he'll follow her.  As they kiss, there are sparks.  Actual sparks because the Prince's car blows up.  Yup, a big kaboom and the Prince's minions rush the Prince to safety, leaving Brooke alone on the street, burning car and all. 

Arielle is a bit luckier.  She gets to finally land her man down in the champagne mansion she's redoing.  There's a wacky non-sequiter when they come upon a statue of the man who started it all.  "I've never seen a statue that looks happy," the vintner says.  He says something about the quality of the champagne at "our table" and Arielle gives in, up against the rows of wine.  How very French of her.  What's more romantic than a drafty wine cellar?

The kid is in pigtails now.

Arielle is married and pregnant, and reunited with Bess and Brooke for the grand re-opening of the mansion (there is a comedy scene for Angie Lansbury that helps pick things up...temporarily).  It seems as if Arielle is the one who will get the child back because she's the first one to have really made it.  She's married and settled, though she doesn't want the child because she thinks her husband will react poorly.  The girls agree to wait one more year, just one more year.  A musical montage carries us beyond that year as the women follow other dreams. 

It wouldn't be a miniseries without a hint of war, so Bess is sent to Vietnam as a reporter.  She's sassy and snide with the men in charge.  "I'm calling you a lousy bigot," she says to one soldier who doesn't want her to go to the front and "I'll give you a Purple Heart the hard way," she says to another in the trench who has grabbed her fanny.  "Why don't you go home and have a couple of kids?" one asks just before being blown to bits.  The entire company is killed, but Bess manages to survive when their dead bodies fall on her. 

The kid is tormented in school by having no real mother or father.

Brooke goes to live in the Kingdom of...not a real Arab country.  Comedy tries to ensue when Brooke can race and beat the Prince riding horses but can't manage a camel.  Ha ha ha!  Or not.  It gets worse.  The Prince brings her into an opulent tent.  "Aren't you impressed?"  "You've seen one oasis, you've seen 'em all."  Or, how about this one: "Sensitive to be a loser?"  "How about a SORE loser" as she rubs her aching back.  Ha ha ha! Or not.  The puns keep flying as sarcastic Brooke lobs them back and forth with the Prince in their three-hour tryst in the tent ("It's like something out of a silent movie," she says, which is the last time this dopey take-me-to-heaven Sheik fantasy was exciting). 

The kid wants to know who her real mother is.

The year has passed and no one has claimed the baby.  Brooke has her desert romance, Bess is writing her book and Arielle is keeping her husband's business afloat. 

The kid waits by the road, hoping every passing car will be her mother coming to pick her up.

At a palace social function, the King summons Brooke to his side and to make sure she has not "misinterpreted any gestures of hospitality."  In his way, he's just told her there is no way she's marrying into his family.  She treats him with the same contempt she treats everyone, which would probably have her boiled in oil if this were a true story.  "Don't they make a charming couple?" he asks about his son and the lovely pair of eyes sitting next to him.  That's all we see of her.  Brooke has the actual nerve to remind the King that in England a king gave up his throne for a woman, but that meets with a sneer.

The kid has lines.  Yup, she speaks.  Her foster father has a brother in some sort of trouble in some resistance movement in some Eastern European country and is coming to live with them.

Bess' book "Rape in a Foxhole" is a big success.  Thing they'll turn that one into a movie?  With a title like that, how can they resist?  She tells her lover that she needs a bigger apartment for a special guest, but doesn't say any more.  Well, at least she's given some thought to the girl.

Not a moment too soon, because the foster family is in serious trouble.  The go get the brother in his dank Eastern European country where it's rainy and cold (remember, "Lace" was made in 1984, when bashing Commies was all the rage).  As they go back into a sunny Western European country, they are about to be stopped by a guard at the border and have to run for their lives.  The kid might as well be wearing a target on her head, sporting a red knit cap.  Off they go through the woods, quietly on their way to safety, trying to avoid the soldiers patrolling the area.  "We shouldn't have brought the child," the foster mother says.  You think?  Lady, you get no more foster kids! 

Unfortunately, the soldiers find them and foster mom, foster dad and foster uncle are mowed down.  A dozen or so soldiers with dogs surround her.  What will become of the child?

It remains a mystery, because when Aunt Hortense goes to make her monthly payment, she finds out that the last one has come back unopened.  Should the banker check up on them?  "By all means!  This is most peculiar," Angela chimes, praying she doesn't have to use this funky accent much longer. 

Bad news in the Kingdom of...not a real Arab country.  The King dies and her prince is now King.  He won't see her, and his minions won't let her near him either.  He has responsibilities now.  He can't just kick around an affair with an Englishwoman now.  I guess they haven't seen the 1986 miniseries "Harem," which clearly allows Western women in the harem.  Brooke returns to Mum and the fat farm.  Mum sends for Arielle, who shows up to be told by the old woman, "She drinks.  She drinks ever since she returned from the Middle East."  Arielle tells Brooke the good news!  She was going to call for the kid in a month, but since Brooke has nothing else to do, she'll have the kid sent to Brooke.  Good idea.  Give the kid to an alcoholic. 

Enough with the child (two seconds is more than any of these women ever care to think about her anymore) because Arielle and Brooke have to dash to New York to celebrate the opening of Bess' magazine.  The party takes place in a big room where the worst singer in television history ruins "Georgia On My Mind."  "Through thick/sick and thin/sin," they yell when coming down the stairs to find Bess.  Brooke is introduced to Nickolas, and her first line to him is, "I haven't got a drink.  Maxine (Arielle) says if you share some one's drink, you share their dreams."  "Share my drink?" Nickolas asks?  That's courtship for ya!

In the middle of the party, with the singer at full tilt, Aunt Hortense calls, full of hysterics and hysterical acting, to inform the women that the kid is dead.  "We killed her, all of us," Arielle wails.  "I need a drink," Brooke adds.  Bess is the voice of reason.  She reminds them that they have let six years pass without really lifting a finger to help the kid.  "Let's be honest.  A six year old girl was killed and none of us really knew her," Brooke notes.  "None of us really wanted to," adds Bess.  The women decide they have nothing more to say to each other and Arielle and Brooke leave the party...with the crooner doing "George On My Mind" again!  Does he only know three songs?  Only I noticed this?  Okay, bad news has hit them, but Bess has a magazine, Arielle a wonderful life and Brooke even met a man that night!

Back in the present, Phoebe returns.  It's been a long time since we've seen her harpy act.  Phoebe says the kid wasn't dead, but lived in a camp for 10 years.  "You know what I expected?  Or hoped?  Stupid me.  I hoped one of you would hold out your arms to me and call me Elizabeth," expecting a reaction from them.  Brooke stands up grandly, walks over to Phoebe...and keeps on walking over to the bar.  The three don't believe Phoebe's story, especially since she's been so evil to them.  "I wanted to make each of you suffer," Phoebe snarls at them  "Still no open arms?  Still so afraid?"  Geez, this dame doesn't know when to quit.  More bees with honey?  Not our Phoebe!  She has to drive the nails in further.  "Who wants a porno queen for a daughter?" she yells, but the three are unmoved because they still think the story may be false and she's after her own publicity.  She tries another tactic...why not pit them against each other?  "It would be so easy for two of you to save your fancy skins and point your fingers at the other," she offers, but the three just look down at the carpet.  After railing and begging, she then throws them all out, deciding, "none of you is good enough to be my mother."  Oh, and the cancer fund is saved, the magazine article is true and Simon can return to his mother.  As they trot out, Phoebe glides up her stairs recounting the details of her birth, the doctor, the foster family, all the details.

Now why didn't she say that earlier?  Couldn't we have lopped at least an hour of this scene alone?  No guarantees mom would have raised her hand, but it would have saved an awful lot of cheap dialogue for "Lace II." 

The three possible mothers congregate in the hotel bar where a female singer is just as bad as the male singer we heard a few scenes ago.  "Through th..."  Yeah, we get it, as they clink glasses.  They start to laugh, thinking of the gossip that would swirl around them if this got out, but it's not really funny.  "I guess we're too ashamed to cry," Arielle offers.  "Well, at least it brought us together again," they note.  But, what are they going to do about Phoebe.  Should they take a vote, like old times?  "I think this time Elizabeth's real mother is all on her own," Bess says, and the others agree.  Christmas music rings out in the bar, with no two drunk people singing the same words to the song. 

Phoebe is lounging in her bed when the phone rings.  It's the hotel manager.  One of his employees has let her mother up.  Phoebe rises from the bed in a full marabou gown, does a few bird flaps (for no reason) and waits for mom to arrive.  Back to the flaps.  Why?  It's insane!  It's truly the definition of this movie.  Does she flap when nervous?

Feet ascend the stairs to Phoebe's room.  In her marabou, Phoebe answers the door to find...should I tell you?  I mean, wouldn't it ruin the surprise? 

Don't worry.  There is still "Lace II" to bring it all home for us.

Actually, you should worry, because "Lace II" is unbearably bad, where "Lace" is gleefully charming in its lunacy.  It thrives on it.  If it didn't, someone would have stopped Phoebe Cates from working as hard as she does to fly so far over the top.  "Lace" is one of the best pieces of trash the US miniseries movement ever produced, the kind that was exported all over the world so everyone could chant, "which one of you bitches is my mother," no matter what his or her mother tongue is.  It's the Coca-Cola of miniseries.  Everyone knows it.  Everyone has seen it.  No one wants to admit it, but it's a guilty pleasure in which to revel.

So, everyone, grab your marabou and flap away!  We'll get to "Lace II" soon enough.

For Nancy.