Choreographer-turned-director Bob Fosse (Cabaret, Lenny) turns
the camera on himself in this nervy, sometimes unnerving 1979
feature, a nakedly autobiographical piece that veers from gritty
drama to razzle-dazzle musical, allegory to satire. It's an
indication of his bravura, and possibly his self-absorption,
that Fosse (who also cowrote the script) literally opens alter
ego Joe Gideon's heart in a key scene--an unflinching glimpse
of cardiac surgery, shot during an actual open-heart procedure.
Roy Scheider makes a brave and largely successful leap out of
his usual romantic lead roles to step into Gideon's dancing
pumps, and supplies a plausible sketch of an extravagant, self-destructive,
self-loathing creative dynamo, while Jessica Lange serves as
a largely allegorical Muse, one of the various women that the
philandering Gideon pursues (and usually abandons). Gideon's
other romantic partners include Fosse's own protégé (and a major
keeper of his choreographic style since his death), Ann Reinking,
whose leggy grace is seductive both "onstage" and off. Fosse/Gideon's
collision course with mortality, as well as his priapic obsession
with the opposite sex, may offer clues into the libidinal core
of the choreographer's dynamic, sexualized style of dance, but
musical aficionados will be forgiven for fast-forwarding to
cut out the self-analysis and focus on the music, period. At
its best--as in the knockout opening, scored to George Benson's
strutting version of "On Broadway," which fuses music, dance,
and dazzling camera work into a paean to Fosse's hoofer nation--All
That Jazz offers a sequence of classic Fosse numbers, hard-edged,
caustic, and joyously physical.