Boom! (1968)

8% of critics liked it
(12 reviews)
57% of users liked it
(381 ratings)

Boom is taken from the Tennessee Williams play The Milk Train Doesn't Stop Here Anymore. Flora Goforth (Elizabeth Taylor) is a foul-mouthed, booze-swilling, pill-popping, middle-aged woman near death. She spends her time swearing at the servants and looks forward to the end of it all, until poet… More Boom is taken from the Tennessee Williams play The Milk Train Doesn't Stop Here Anymore. Flora Goforth (Elizabeth Taylor) is a foul-mouthed, booze-swilling, pill-popping, middle-aged woman near death. She spends her time swearing at the servants and looks forward to the end of it all, until poet Chris Flanders (Richard Burton) comes to her island home. Known in literary circles as the "angel of death," the poet gives the dying woman some measure of comfort in his presence -- while he takes comfort in her liquor cabinet and her jewelry. Often she is visited by the Witch of Capri (Noel Coward), a gossip-minded homosexual who appears to be Flora's only friend. Williams wrote the screenplay, which unfortunately proved ineffectual, as Taylor and Burton were seemingly caught up in their own world of wallowing in self-importance. The feature did little to boost the sagging careers of Burton and Taylor or to alter the public's negative opinions of their personal lives. ~ Dan Pavlides, Rovi

Rating, Runtime: PG, 1 hr. 52 min.
Directed By: Joseph Losey
Genres: Art House & International, Drama

In Theaters: Jan 1, 1968 Wide
On DVD: Oct 31, 2000

Critic Reviews

, TIME Magazine
This film makes it official: Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor have given up acting for entertaining. Or rather, trying to.
Variety Staff, Variety
Taylor's delineation of the lead role is off the mark.
Vincent Canby, New York Times
Those things that in the earlier versions of the work had been metaphorically stylized, have been made stunningly literal in Boom!
Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times
There are different kinds of bad movies. Some are simply wretchedly bad, like well, you know. Others are bad but fascinating and Boom! is one of these.
, TV Guide's Movie Guide
Even the great Coward cannot save this unbelievable disaster.
Fernando F. Croce, CinePassion
A brilliant film, or rather a brilliant "sen-sation"
Dennis Schwartz, Ozus' World Movie Reviews
The mostly negatively reviewed film did little to help the plummeting careers of Burton and Taylor.
Tom Milne, Time Out
It gets Burton and Taylor, comfortably matched, making nonsense of theme and relationships, and giving monotonously unsubtle performances (she screeches, he glooms).
Michael Dequina, TheMovieReport.com
If you can make any logical sense of the curious lines of dialogue, then congratulations--you may be the first to be able to decipher this cinematic non sequitur.
, Film4
A whole bunch of stars, including Burton and Coward, show up to lend a hand in a film which becomes stranger at every turn.