Today Criterion announced an upcoming Bluray of Bob Fosse‘s All That Jazz (’79) on 8.26. It impressed me the first time (the Manhattan press screening was at Cinema 1) but irritated me the second time. Parts are hammy or ham-fisted and not very hip, but it was quite the film of its day. Roy Scheider gave a career-peak performance as Broadway musical director Joe Gideon, whose story was modelled on Fosse’s own in the early ’70s. “Almost every scene is excruciating (and a few are appalling), yet the film stirs an obscene fascination with its rapid, speed-freak cutting and passionate psychological striptease,” wrote critic Dave Kehr. “This is the feverish, painful expression of a man who lives in mortal fear of his own mediocrity.” Time‘s then-critic Frank Rich wrote that “as a showman, [Fosse] has no equal. Music, performers, movement, lighting, costumes and sets all blend together in Fosse productions to create brilliant flashes of exhilarating razzle-dazzle. Yet the man just does not know when to leave well enough alone.”