Sunday, May 27, 2018

At the movies: Book Club

First of all, this is not a bad movie, so gather up everyone you know to go see it because we need to convince the Powers That Be that movies about older women can be fun, interesting, and above all, financially viable.

The story is about four women, played by Candice Bergen, Jane Fonda, Mary Steenburgen, and Diane Keaton, who have met monthly for decades for book club. (In real life they range in age from 65 to 80, but in the movie they graduated from college together and they seem to be in their late 60s, maybe early 70s.) Even better-- these are intelligent, savvy women. There's not a depressed alcoholic among them--not that there's anything wrong with movies about depressed alcholics, but it's just so unusual to see Hollywood movies about smart, successful older women. The premise is terrific, especially given the lack of roles for women "of a certain age" in Hollywood movies.

And the actresses--no surprise-- are having a ball. There are several moments of almost perfect chemistry between the four of them. They may be slotted into their individual roles--the divorced woman who hasn't had a date in 18 years, the married woman who hasn't had sex in 6 months, the widow who lived for her children, the never-married career woman who prefers sex with no commitments--but the roles are believable enough, and they're perfectly cast (although one wishes Diane Keaton could, after all this time, play someone besides Annie Hall).

But having said that, there are lot of odd things that just make you shake your head. So when the credits rolled and I saw that the director was male, and the writing team included the male director and a woman whose IMDB picture looks like she can't be more than 35, it wasn't a big surprise. There are several moments that just don't make sense. I mean, ask a successful enterpreneur at the height of her career what her favorite thing in the whole world is, and of course she's going to say arm tickles. Whaaaaaaat? Arm tickles? But yeah, that's what she says. And then, predictably enough, when she gets her romantic moment, he's continuously stroking her arm.

And not far in, you find out that what sets the plot in motion is that they are going to read Fifty Shades of Gray. Now I know that there are a lot of women who love those books. But there are also a lot of us-- a whole lot of us--who don’t.  (I suppose I should confess that I only read the first one and had no interest in reading the other two). So I was already irritated at the writers, because I'm pretty sure that if you got any set of four intelligent, successful women of any age together, there would be at least one of them who would be hooting with laughter while she read, entirely unable to take the book seriously.

But not these women. And I have to say there's something a little-- disdainful? contemptuous? smug? -- about a man and a young woman writing a script about women old enough to be their mothers whose lives are transformed by questionable erotic romance novels. It's almost insulting.

And then add in that all four of them get a happy ending that includes a man-- no happily single women or lesbians allowed, I guess-- and you've got a movie that just didn't quite make it to the level I really, sincerely wished it would. (to be fair, this movie is not about the men, it's about the friendship between the four women, but still.)(A little diversity wouldn't have hurt, either.)

The women look terrific, and they're all great actresses with enough skill for half a dozen movies of this caliber. The four of them almost manage to pull this movie above the level of the writing to make it a really terrific film. Unfortunately, they need better material.

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