Actuakers One of my all time favorites.

Claysaba Excellent, Without a doubt!!

Dorathen Better Late Then Never

Onlinewsma Absolutely Brilliant!

PWNYCNY This movie is a scathing satire of the institution of marriage in modern American society. It offers a honest and frank glimpse of the problems associated with marriage. In the movie, the women are depicted as shrill and manipulative, the men as dupes and drunks, marriage itself as transient and temporary, and love as a sham. According to the movie, marriage is something "to be worked at," not to be enjoyed. Lawyers are crass and insensitive and the judicial system unforgiving. Dick Van Dyke plays Richard Harmon, a man whose life becomes a living nightmare when his marriage starts collapsing. far from being victims, the children are depicted as deriving much joy from their parents' bickering. Men are shown as being crushed under the weight of alimony and the women openly sneering at their men. Marriage counseling is depicted as being pedantic and out of touch and incapable of resolving marital discord. Set in 1967, the movie also depicts heavy consumption of alcohol and the use of cigarettes to deal with anxiety. Society in general is depicted as decadent and materialistic. The parent-child relationship is shown to be situational and shallow, with little love or affection. The story contains no heroes, nothing gets resolved, with the story ending the way it started, the details of which will not be disclosed in this report. The relationship between men and women is depicted as being a power struggle, with both men and women being prone to fits of acting out behavior bordering on outright physical violence. The Harmon character is shown breaking dishes, drinking, yelling, and losing his composure. His best friend is depicted as a cheater and panderer, and a white-collar pimp. The only character that has any redeeming qualities is the whore who has sense enough not to play into Harmon's acting out, not because she cares but because it would put her at risk. The potential for violence permeates throughout the story. Another of Harmon's friends is an out and out drunk. In the movie nobody cares about anybody; everybody is self-centered. There is no sense of community, no real desire to resolve issues, no personal warmth. Psychologically, all the principal characters are neurotic and are resistant to dealing honestly with their feelings. The worst offender of them all is Harmon whose affable exterior hides a deeply narcissistic personality that sets off his wife, which in turn triggers her own defenses. Sadly, these scenarios are not implausible; indeed they are too, too true.

jwkenne It seems that not everybody remembers the world in 1967.To begin with, there was no such thing as no-fault divorce. A divorce had to involve one "guilty" party, and one "innocent" party. Two "guilty" parties would just be blown off with "You two deserve each other." And it was regarded as standard good manners for the man to offer himself up as "guilty", unless the woman was a complete slut or psycho. (See "The Gay Divorcée" for an example of a man who /doesn't/ follow this social rule, because he's a pig.)Now, also during this period, the usual rule was that the wife got the kids, and the wife and kids were entitled to be just as well off as they had been before the divorce. (Remember, as far as the Law was concerned, she and they were officially innocent victims of the Big Bad Man.) So alimony could be very high indeed.As to her getting a job....There was no such thing as professional daycare. If a divorced woman were poor, she could probably leave the kids with a neighbor, because poor folks have been doing that for thousands of years, but for a middle-class divorced woman to do that would have been regarded as shameless freeloading.There were relatively few jobs for women, and even fewer that paid decently. A woman could be a secretary, but shorthand and typing take years of practice. (There were no personal computers then; few people could type except for writers and secretaries.) And secretaries didn't make much more than minimum wage, anyway. The same for stitchers in clothing factories (America had clothing factories back then). Beautician? Cleaning woman? Hotel maid? Nurse? None of them paid all that well. There were a handful of woman doctors, lawyers, and the like, but the closest pointer to the future was that there have always been quite a few women in computer programming. But you couldn't just walk in and ask for a programming job if you'd never done it before.In short, this movie makes the usual exaggerations you expect in a comedy, but it is nowhere near "preposterous" or "ridiculously unrealistic". It's pretty solidly grounded in 1967 reality.Now, on the other hand, I can't say I like the movie all that much. I guess I'm too romantic to take divorce as a joke. But the performances are sound, and I have to say that Van Dyke and Reynolds both had guts to tackle this script at all. Both of them have always been typecast as "lovable".

reader4 I had mildly looked forward to seeing this film because of the stars. Dick van Dyke is usually good, and Debbie Reynolds almost always is. And I loved "Divorce Italian Style," so I thought the American version sounded promising as well.I shouldn't have gotten my hopes up. What a disappointment! The first twenty minutes consists largely of people all yelling at each other at once in different venues: a conference room, a living room, a courtroom...Debbie Reynolds has never looked less attractive. In fact, I have never seen her look unattractive until I saw this film. With her hair piled up on top of her head, and her pallid makeup, she reminded me of a blond version of the Katzenjammer Mamma.I nearly recognized Jean Simmons with her short blond hair, reprising her faded look from "Mister Buddwing" the previous year.Almost any movie that keeps my interest till the end rates at least 4 stars. I turned this turkey off after a grueling forty minutes. I didn't even laugh once. The only reason I gave it 3 stars instead of 2 is that it has a lot of well-known and talented people in it.

edwagreen The film fails because it could have easily been made into a drama with some twists.Dick Van Dyke has some actual dramatic moments as Richard, a non-college graduate whose promotion has put a strain on a 17 year marriage to Debbie Reynolds. Ditto for the Reynolds character as well.Their marriage actually falters because of their friends, attorneys and marriage counselor, all of whom literally drive them to divorce.The film does take on some comical tones when it is shown that alimony is so high that an ex-husband, nicely played by Jason Robards, tries to marry off his wife so that he can be rid of that money responsibility.The film is all-too predictable. You know that some sort of reconciliation will be reached by Van Dyke and Reynolds just before their one year divorce decree becomes final.Van Johnson appears as a bachelor caught up in Robards'scheme to marry off his ex-wife Jean Simmons.