dvorak@houem.UUCP ( Chuck Dvorak ) (01/11/84)
OK, I plead ignorance. Why did everyone think this movie was so great? For example, a TV critic in NYC (Dennis Cunningham) gave this a 10, and I bet it has been 2 years since that happened. While it was entertaining with SOME good acting, well... Basically it's a long soap opera; very little character development. For example, nearly all of the women are unidimensional. Emma loves Flap and her kids. She enjoys sex, and has more kids. She makes lotsof rubbery faces when no one else in the set is looking at her (but Winger knows the audience is looking!). She gets cancer and dies. Gimme a break--LOVE STORY was deeper! Take away the cute little kid crying about his mother dying, and you don't really care. By the way, I have 2 kids, and so I was crying at the right parts,too. But I wondered the whole time, "If I were not a parent, would this kid affect me as much?" I felt mechanically manipulated, and for me it was melodrama and nothing else. More unidimensional women--those in NYC who were friends of Patsy's, Patsy herself, Flap's girlfriend, all in fact except perhaps for Aurora. For me she was the bright spot, although only in comparison. And more unidimensional people--Flap, even Garret the Astronaut, while funny was just Nicholson typecast again. I really enjoyed him and his shenanigans with Emma as humor--but NOT GREAT CINEMA. And in 1983-4 (after Kramer vs Kramer) we have a movie that says, "Hey, a father is not a mother, so let Grandma raise the kids." Nice, deep, current message. Finally (I could go on), what the hay does the title mean? Who is endeared to what or whom? What are the terms? Boy, I sure ask a lot of questions for someone from New Jersey... At all events, to end this in an upbeat fashion, the only sense I made out of it all (looking for more meaning than how unfair life can be) was that (1) people can go on for years not really understanding each other; (2) life goes on even if it is unfair; or (3) teaching English in Iowa and reading a lot warps one's mind; and (4) the writer really hated New Yorkers. Not too much there for me. Would someone please tell me what this flick did for them, aside from jerk them around emotionally? --Chuck Dvorak (...houem!dvorak) Bell Labs. Holmdel
gam@proper.UUCP (Gordon Moffett) (01/19/84)
I agree -- this movie was just `OK', a few good laughs, but little character development. It was never clear to me if Flap really was having an affair or this woman was just following him around a lot. Also the joking around seemed to relieve us of having to deal with peoples' feelings, which I think was a cop-out. Another disturbing thing was Flap's just handing over his baby to his wife as if that were that -- did he really not care about the child or what? The death scene was a mixed-bag. I felt the mother's (Shirley MacLaine) line "I thought I'd feel better when she died but I don't" (or something to that effect) most touching, but the melodrama elsewhere put me off. The daughter waves bye-bye (or was she reaching for Flap?) and then appears to drift off to sleep. Pure Hollywood. Terminal cancer patients don't usually die nice calm deaths -- it's sometimes awful to watch -- but this is pretty lightweight film anyway. See `Silkwood' instead.