Purple Rain

Director: Albert Magnoli
Year Released: 1984
Rating: 2.0

Vanity project for His Purpleness (who, of all people, makes vanity an artistic statement and has been successful at it) that tells your basic girl-meets-boy, boy turns out to be effeminate, omnisexual urban pirate with a taste for scarves and frills, girl and boy fight but come back together kind of story. Though constructed as part-concert, part-drama, the drama is incredibly weak - the 'troubled family' scenes, with Prince's "Dad" using his "Mom" as a punching bag and eventually putting a bullet through his own brain is what I'd expect from a Lifetime movie. The concert footage, however, is (if anything) the reason to watch, and the Artist Currently Known as Prince gyrates, spins and takes time to hump his speakers like no one else could.