[.ca] Husbands and Wives (Widescreen/Full Screen)

Amazon.com essential video:
In 1992, Woody Allen and Mia Farrow--heretofore the Lunt and Fontanne of Hollywood on the Hudson--went public with a media-saturated battle over Allen's affair with Farrow's adopted daughter. Only a few months later, Allen released this film, starring himself and Farrow acting out a virtually identical plot line: an unhappy marriage begins to crumble when the husband strays with a much younger woman (in this case, one of his students, played by Juliette Lewis). It turned out to be one of Allen's most lacerating comedies, a story about the fragility of relationships and the foolishness of older men seeking to recapture their youth with younger women. It features strong performances by Judy Davis, Liam Neeson, and director Sydney Pollack, as a friend of Allen's who chucks his longtime wife for an aerobics instructor, thus planting seeds of marital dissolution in all of his friends' heads. Husbands and Wives provided an uncanny peek into Allen's image of himself and his personal life, despite all of his protestations to the contrary. --Marshall Fine

Must See!:
I will start by saying this, to all the men and women who are in destructive relationships and they know it(!) but have been trying to fool themselves into believing that things will eventually 'work out', please see this film. Yes its a typical Woody Allen movie, with his deeply intelligent insight into human relationships, but unlike alot of his films, I was actually angry when I finished it. This is no shortcoming of the movie let me tell you, but rather a shortcoming of people (myself included) in general. It was so hard to watch the characters in the film, Sydney Pollack, Mia Farrow, Juliette Lewis, Liam Neeson, etc...enter situations that they knew were doomed from the begininng, out of desperation and loneliness. Obviously me feeling so strongly after the film shows that it is a subtly powerful film about human relationships and how stubborn we all are when we want something but know its not good for us. See this film please!!!!

Woody puts the "Fun" in dysFUNctional:
He's not happy with her, their friends aren't happy with each other, the friends break up, he flinging with his aerobics instructor, she, trying to indulge in an editor, while everybody self-consciously tells the viewers what they will not tell their (ex-)spouses. We see manipulation posing as truth, vulnerable facades imitating intimacy, lust mimicking passion, and discover, in the end, that perhaps the only true desire in a Woody Allen movie is to dodge happiness & to take pleasure in the misery of knowing that it probably wouldn't have worked out anyhow. Confused yet? I can't imagine anybody still in the "honeymoon" stage of a First Great Love appreciating this movie. For those scarred by years of relationship campaigning, much of Allen's view may ring all-too-true. I won't say how many times I saw myself, my wife, and ex-lovers plastered against the screen. Throughout the movie, individuals and couples long for intimacy, for lasting passion, for refreshment, but end up settling for comfort, manipulation, and denial. I wanted to scream. I hoped, hopelessly, for hope--this is, after all, a Woody Allen Movie--but was left, in the end, with Gabriel (literally "God's Hero") telling viewers that love, romance, and passion can only exist as a neurotic and fleeting figment of experience. Damned if I'm willing to settle for that. And perhaps that's the great strength of this movie. It could, after all, be a satire, not about mid-life-crisis-men seeking youth through young lovers, but showing, in the crassest relief, how barriers and little deceits ultimately lead to destruction and misery in relationships. And maybe that's where the hope lies, in learning to be honest in a way that none of Allen's characters can be, not even with themselves. (If you'd like to discuss this review or DVD in more depths, please click the "about me" link above and drop me an email. Thanks!)

Wince and Love It:
Never has a movie about relationships hit so many nerves on so many levels. It takes guts to view this film with an open mind. I takes familiarity with relational boredom and heartache to understand it completely. Woody Allen delves into the minds and dysfunctional lives of two and then four couples with the deftness of a ninja in "Husbands and Wives." Rarely have I seen such candor in depiction of the seven year itch. It is a place in time that will be familiar to many couples given the opportunity for honesty and will likely create interesting if not brutal debate in the most secure of unions. The hand held camera used in many of the scenes are not for those prone to motion sickness. Nonetheless, it creates an intimacy and urgency that grant the film credence at its most passionate moments. Each of the characters is someone that the viewer probably knows in situations that they would never discuss, leaving him both baffled and sympathetic. I highly recommend the film to those viewers able to be honest enough and possibly brave enough to face their most intimate relational demons.

WOODY IMITATES HIMSELF:
Handheld camera, documentary style, 1st person confessionals - all style and techniques Woody Allen has used before with success. After all the whiz-bang massive Hollywood movies Allen can sometimes be remarkably fresh - to me, he's always been the Film Students best friend, low budget, dialog driven...accessible to anyone with a camera and knack for writing. However, this movie's insider pseudo New Yorker intelligence really grates. Allen goes out of his way to tie all analogies to relatively obscure references to show just how cosmopolitan and educated they all are. To me they all come off as a bunch of whining elitist snobs with no real problems at all. They are annoying and unlikable in every sense. I have enjoyed Allen's films immensely, but this one seems like a good Woody Allen imitation, and not the real thing.

ONE OF HIS BEST AND MOST BITTER:
This is probably the best of Woody's "bitter" movies (DECONSTRUCTING HARRY, CRIMES AND MISDEMEANORS) wherein Allen continued to explore relationships with humor, but with far less of the optimistic, hopeful nature he shows in classics such as HANNAH AND HER SISTERS. HUSBANDS AND WIVES is crisply written and extremely well performed. Everyone is terrific, but Judy Davis and Sydney Pollack truly shine. They are married, but he dumps her for a very young woman. Davis finds herself on the dating scene again, but even as she goes on her first date, she is dealing angrily with her estranged husband. Mia Farrow and Allen are another disfunctional ex-couple. Throw into the mix nice, single man Liam Neeson, whom both women lust and fight over, and you've got a nice stew of relationships. The movie is VERY funny, but is tinged with bitterness throughout. Occasionally, the movie is presented as a sort of documentary, where the main characters are answering questions directly into the camera, but this device is a bit of distraction. It's a minor thing, though. Truly, the script is sizzling, but it is the performances that make this movie unforgettable. Judy Davis was nominated for an Oscar, but Farrow is very good as well, and it is a hoot to see Neeson in such an early role. Pollack could have been nominated as well, and Allen gives what is probably his last great performance (possibly excepting DECONSTRUCTING HARRY). Allen fans must see this film. It's one of his most important. If you're not an Allen fan, I suggest starting with a "kinder, gentler" film such as ANNIE HALL or MANHATTAN or HANNAH... before taking on this one