One of the last true Hollywood giants, the death of Ms. Taylor also marks another step towards the final demise of an entire era of filmmaking, one in which films really mattered to the mass culture, and were, arguably, much richer.
Of course, Ms. Taylor was also an icon of personal excess, and thus bridged the gap as few others between the glamour era of Hollywood (she was one of the few child actors to go on to become a major star) and the bad boy celebrity culture that we are all steeped in today. Her ‘stealing’ of Eddie Fisher–she was then his best friend’s recent widow–from his then current wife Debbie Reynolds, followed by her world famous affair / subsequent leaving of Eddie Fisher / marriage (two of them, actually) to fellow jet setter Richard Burton, really set us on the road to the Paris Hiltons and Charlie Sheens.
I’ve never been a huge fan of Ms. Taylor’s good to great films, but as a bad movie icon, she had few equals. Often working with Burton, perhaps THE bad movie icon, Ms. Taylor’s taste for outrageously overripe, ponderous, self-important and often laughably self-indulgent projects such as The VIPs, Reflections in a Golden Eye, The Sandpiper, (especially) BOOM!, among many others, have made her a subject of some fascination to those of us who love the epically bad movies of that more glorious age.
I hope I in no way sound like I am attempting to insult Ms. Taylor. She will always remain one of the silver screen’s great stars, standing alongside luminaries such as Marilyn Monroe and John Wayne. If some of us, however, prefer to trod the lesser traveled paths of her filmography, well, perhaps that’s to her credit as well.
