Scenes from a Mall

1991 "On their 16th wedding anniversary, Deborah and Nick decided to work out all their differences... in public."
5.4| 1h29m| R| en
Details

A comedy about a married couple -- he's a sports lawyer, she's a psychologist -- which takes place on their 16th wedding anniversary, when they make some startling confessions.

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Touchstone Pictures

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Reviews

UnowPriceless hyped garbage
Tayloriona Although I seem to have had higher expectations than I thought, the movie is super entertaining.
Kaydan Christian A terrific literary drama and character piece that shows how the process of creating art can be seen differently by those doing it and those looking at it from the outside.
Nicole I enjoyed watching this film and would recommend other to give it a try , (as I am) but this movie, although enjoyable to watch due to the better than average acting fails to add anything new to its storyline that is all too familiar to these types of movies.
Steve Pulaski Scenes from a Mall is a hard film to describe. It has a great premise, two great leads that immediately click, a skilled director, and a setting that is one of my favorites. Why the low rating? It's hard to put my finger on what actually goes wrong. The best way is to pick and choose certain scenes and events to explain why the film becomes inferior to expectations.The film is about Woody Allen and Bette Midler playing Nick and Deborah Fifer, a married couple with more baggage than you'd expect. He is a stressed out executive, and she is a marital psychotherapist. In honor of their sixteenth anniversary, they both agree to go to a trendy mall in order to pick up their anniversary gifts. She gets him a surfboard, with his name engraved on it, and he gets her a beautifully framed picture of the entire family.Deborah then finds out Nick has took part in several acts of infidelity. Nick then finds out Deborah has took part in several acts of infidelity. Rather than doing the logical thing and leaving the mall, they continue to wonder around the setting, squabbling, and getting attention from innocent bystanders.Does this sound like a film you'd truly like to see? No. But considering the remarkable talent involved most Woody fans would see it solely because he is in it. Right off the bat, the premise is tiresome. We hear many conversations, incorporating lengthy monologues and several fights. Only about a half a dozen truly interesting. Mostly because there is no zest. The couple is right, and so is the tone, but the true killer is the uninspired dialog.It doesn't seem to have much confidence in itself either. Because it's in a mall, or a sound stage built to look like a real functioning mall, inevitably, you like to look at all the background events. The film is pictorial, in every sense of the word. It relies on goofy setups rather than its own material. Maybe because it feels inferior, boring, or just plan self-conscious. Truthfully, it is a little boring, but those pictorial backdrops don't do much justice.When Deborah buys Nick the surfboard, what does he have to do? Carry the thing around the mall for most of the film. Rather than walking out to the car, he has to carry a big, yellow, protruding board while they walk around the mall aimlessly. At least the film doesn't have some ridiculous cartoon gag where Woody Allen's character hits people with it.There's also a mime, played by Bill Irwin, and he has got to be one of the most annoying film characters of all time. The mime is put in the mall to entertain shoppers, and in the film to provide a failure of comic relief. He mimics the bickering couple in frequent points of the film, and never seems to stop miming or being a nuisance. He's an unnecessary, poorly conceived character who has no purpose in a film like this.Some scenes work, some scenes don't. Some scenes are funny, some aren't. It's a mere gamble. Woody Allen and Bette Midler create some undeniably fantastic chemistry, but the rest of the film fumbles because that is truly the only thing it has to offer. Scene from a Mall is cute and often harmless, but it suffers from a dreary script and "too cute of a setting" syndrome.Starring: Bette Midler, Woody Allen, and Bill Irwin. Directed by: Paul Mazursky.
gcd70 Well-regarded director Paul Mazursky's one joke film, "Scenes From a Mall", is a hopeless going nowhere comedy that only succeeds in making one yawn. The unoriginal, predictable script from Mazursky and co-writer Roger L. Simon manages but a few laughs, while the unlikely characters fail to generate any sympathy.This is not a memorable performance from the Divine Miss 'M' either, and while Woody Allen does okay, neither one of them create believable characters. Obviously Woody is better doing his own brand of dry, observational humour while Bette Midler has been better in dozens of other movies. Give this "scene" a miss!Saturday, February 22, 1992 - Video
moonspinner55 Someone from Hollywood with a sympathetic heart should gather up all the prints of "Scenes from a Mall" and take a match to them. It would be an act of generosity. This comedy from Paul Mazursky is pretty much an appalling waste of film, and a waste of time for stars Woody Allen and Bette Midler. Allen and Midler play a California married couple 'celebrating' their 16 years together as husband and wife; they share a scene near the beginning in the bathtub, and see if you squirm through it as much as I did. I laughed one time during this atrocious fiasco (where Bette buys a new dress and Woody tells her she looks like his aunt). Otherwise, it's a claustrophobic drag with seemingly no script to fall back on. Everyone is winging it--badly. NO STARS from ****
Gyran Allen and Bette Milder play a couple visiting a shopping mall on their 16th wedding anniversary. They confront each other's infidelity and then they make up.This is an effective vehicle for Allen and Midler who go well together. In their grotesque sex scene you do not know whom to feel more sorry for. Director Paul Mazursky's plot is fairly mechanical and predictable but it is a good conceit to have virtually the entire film take place in a shopping mall.

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