shows promise, then falls flat

siler

warning: possible spoilers

This is the story of a couple (played by Susan Sarandon and Don Johnson), high school sweethearts who made the mistake of getting married and having kids. Now, 20 years later, they are separated and hate each other. Their brief interactions end in one's (usually Johnson's character's) rude, insensitive, or indifferent comment, followed by the other running away. After a couple of these interactions, I thought "now's the time when they sit down and try to work things out", since they clearly still "loved" each other (as all couples who fight constantly in the movies really "love" each other) and were in some kind of emotional pain.  But this never happened. So, the movie's "plot" is the constant fighting.

Presumably in some attempt to revitalize their relationship (I think the writer at least had the insight to realize he was boring the audience, so he gives us some fresh scenery to make up for the stale "plot"), Sarandon's character decides she want to go to the Caribbean with her hubby. She overhears him commenting on a sunbather's "hooters" (the best he's ever seen). Of course, not one for talking, she instead tries to sleep with her hubby's best friend.

Like a good chap, he refuses, but as they lie in bed, hubby (of course) walks in and throws some furniture out of the sliding door. (Still no discussion.) But at least the best friend has enough emotional intelligence to suggest they "sleep it off"; they will feel better in the morning.

The next evening, after hubby gives a brief "speech" (mostly rambling, but ends by saying he wants things better, meaning his marital relationship). that night in their motel room, wife asks hubby if he wants to see her naked. Of course, he does. He tells her she's beautiful; she asks "but not the best you've ever seen?" and gets mad when he doesn't appease her. They yell. And, FINALLY, in their yelling, he asks her what she wants. "I want us to love each other!!" "Well, that's just great because so do I!!". And they sleep together. After all that time, all they really needed was to yell a few nice words at each other. Ah, movie romance! In the last scene I could bear to watch, they seemed to have reverted back to childhood. They stole hubby's best friend's car (it's fire-engine red!!) and were attempting to put it to sea when hubby asked wifie if she'd go to the dance with him. This is when I turned it off, seeing no hope that it could re-direct itself and still make any sense at all.

So, the moral of the story? Don't grow up. That only leads to complicated relationships and talking and all that nasty stuff. Sex might technically be for "grown-ups", but at least it's fun and you don't even have to talk afterwards! Maybe the writer was more clever than I gave him/her credit for, and the movie was really a satire on immature high school-sweetheart marriages. One can only hope.

score 6/10

siler 21 December 2000

Reprint: https://www.imdb.com/review/rw0262557/