I wouldn’t call this a fantastic watch, but it distracted me sufficiently when I watched it 5 years ago. The starcast is powerful, even if rumours around Morgan Freeman in the recent past have left me mostly sad and a little angry. Remember the scene in this movie when he is trying to escape from his house? That’s a work of art.
There is also another scene I recollect. Kevin Kline’s Sam character is being driven to the airport by his wife Miriam - a moment of astonishment for me – and she encourages him to have fun at his friend’s bachelor party. She basically encourages him to cheat, and when I now think about it, I wonder how her character is as confident about their marriage not unraveling or if it is fiction that makes misplaced confidence work. It struck me that if there had been a role reversal – the husband driving the wife and encouraging her to have fun/ cheat – I would have been uncomfortable then too. Why be as self-sacrificing? If they had been serial monogamists, this is perhaps the right time to leave!
Sam mouths a lovely line, “The thing is... It's crazy, but whenever something spectacular happens to me, the first thing I want to do is tell my wife about it. And, after 40 years of marriage, if I can't tell her about something wonderful that happened to me, it sort of stops being wonderful.”
This must be true for so many married couples, and it is a beautiful moment.
The movie scores because it targets a different age group – senior citizens – and shows their perspective. Wish more movies did this. I also thought about who the writer is – there are moments that strike as outright dysfunctional – and then got to know that he is the same writer who wrote the script for Crazy, Stupid, Love. Something about cheating seems to appeal as far as he goes, and he doesn’t like marriages breaking down because of it.
There is also another scene I recollect. Kevin Kline’s Sam character is being driven to the airport by his wife Miriam - a moment of astonishment for me – and she encourages him to have fun at his friend’s bachelor party. She basically encourages him to cheat, and when I now think about it, I wonder how her character is as confident about their marriage not unraveling or if it is fiction that makes misplaced confidence work. It struck me that if there had been a role reversal – the husband driving the wife and encouraging her to have fun/ cheat – I would have been uncomfortable then too. Why be as self-sacrificing? If they had been serial monogamists, this is perhaps the right time to leave!
Sam mouths a lovely line, “The thing is... It's crazy, but whenever something spectacular happens to me, the first thing I want to do is tell my wife about it. And, after 40 years of marriage, if I can't tell her about something wonderful that happened to me, it sort of stops being wonderful.”
This must be true for so many married couples, and it is a beautiful moment.
The movie scores because it targets a different age group – senior citizens – and shows their perspective. Wish more movies did this. I also thought about who the writer is – there are moments that strike as outright dysfunctional – and then got to know that he is the same writer who wrote the script for Crazy, Stupid, Love. Something about cheating seems to appeal as far as he goes, and he doesn’t like marriages breaking down because of it.
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