Yar, you be here: Something's Gotta Give > Customer Reviews

Something's Gotta Give Customer Reviews (46 - 48 of 121 Reviews)

Refreshing to see the guy feel inadequate for a change
Jack Nicholson portrayed 63 year-old Harry Sanborn, owner of a rap record company, who only dates younger women (yes, fiction can mirror the truth). Diane Keaton portrayed Erica Barry, a famous playwright who has been divorced for a few years and never thought she would be involved with another man again.

Sanborn is dating much younger Marin Barry (Amanda Peet), Erica's daughter, and the two opt for two days of nooky at her mother's house in The Hamptons. When Erica and her other daughter stumble upon Sanborn in his boxers raiding the fridge, they're surprised to learn that this much older guy is Marin's boyfriend. Thus begins the adventure.

After Harry and Marin go into the bedroom for a little fun, Harry suffers a heart attack. He's ordered to take it easy for a while and his doctor, Dr. Julian Mercer (Keanu Reeves) orders him to stay in the vicinity of the hospital in order to keep tabs on him. Erica's house just so happens to be in the vicinity.

While Marin enjoys the nightlife, Harry recoups at her mother's house and, while sitting around, has nothing better to do than strike up conversation with Erica. They discover they are curious to know more about the other but just won't admit to it. The daughter sees the chemistry and gets out of the way (although she realizes that Harry broke up with her and not the other way around).

In the meantime, much younger Dr. Mercer takes an interest in Erica and she goes from a lonely divorcee to an older woman in the middle of two mens' affection (and I think Reeves was charming in his role).

Like another reviewer, I was thrown for a loop when it seemed that Harry and Erica were getting along great and then, boom, she's all of a sudden pissed at him because she sees him in a restaurant with another woman (whom he, typically, refers to as a "friend").

He admits that he's not a good "boyfriend" and Erica is devastated. She channels her hurt by sobbing uncontrollably and completing her autobiographical play, basing it on her experiences with Harry - which he doesn't find out about until a (young) actress he's wining and dining explains the premise. Feeling insulted, he confronts Erica, explaining that "...schmucks are people, too" and she wants to go forward as friends.

Fast forward: Harry retires to the Caribbean for a whole 2 weeks and seeks out his former girlfriends who inform him what kind of a jerk he's been to them. He travels the farthest to Paris to see Erica (remembering her favorite resturant there) and just when you think they might end up together, in comes Dr. Mercer who proposes. Erica accepts and one thinks that they may end up together and leave Harry in the cold. Not so.

How Dr. Mercer got out of the way was a little too easy (more conflict?) but Harry and Erica wound up together (and married) after all.

And Diane Keaton parle français très bien (and from what I could hear on my TV, Jack ain't too shabby himself).

Refreshing premise that proves women aren't obliged to sit at home and roll up into a ball for the remainder of eternity just because they're over 25.

Intelligent comedy based on age-difference relationships
Is Jack Nicholson good in this? Yes! Is he playing himself? You bet! Apart from the fact that 67 year-old Jack is a little healthier than the heart-attack prone 63 year old lead character in this movie, it could almost be written for him. Perhaps it's not so surprising that the more consistent Diane Keaton gives a good performance, although it's strange to see her playing an older character. That said, the person she plays is an intelligent, vivacious playwright who has (like Keaton herself, but more like writer and director Nancy Myers) aged gracefully into her fifties. The storyline attempts to address the Hollywood cliché of the older leading man with the younger starlet, something that is seen as much in the private lives of film stars as it is in the movies they appear in. Like many people, I am a little tired of the Conneries, Nicholsons, and even now the Bill Murrays ending up with girlfriends twenty or even thirty years their junior. It stretches credibility and is more than a little sexist. This film addresses this question with a woman who is not only prepared to challenge the status quo, but who almost in spite of herself ends up reversing it. With her younger lover played by a relaxed Keanu Reeves (no doubt relieved to be free of the technical demands of filming the Matrix series), Keaton is believable and sympathetic, even to the extent that we almost want her to end up with Reeves rather than Nicholson.

The dialogue is clever, seeming at times like a play, rather than a movie, and this gives the film an economic look which makes you concentrate on the characters. I should say a few words in favour of Amanda Peet, who plays Keaton's daughter. It's a good performance, and she's beautiful, but ultimately, she is just there for plot purposes and you are left feeling that she is a cipher rather than a person.

The DVD extras are OK, benefiting from two commentaries, both with Meyers, one also featuring Jack and the other Diane. The studio has put a little more imagination into the extras though, and it is particularly nice to see and hear Jack Nicholson sing. Overall, it's a thought provoking film, but ultimately entertaining, interesting, and quite funny. Highly recommended.

Predictable and Lame
How you could put Jack Nicholson and Diane Keaton together and come out with a film this empty and cliched is beyond me. Any filmgoer over the age of 15 should easily be able to predict every single incident in this plot five minutes before it happens. I mean every little moment, every expression, every line, every coy flutter of an eyelash. Certainly not every film demands a "plot twist" but to not present a single curve to make the audience sit up and take notice (and stay awake) is aggravating. Nicholson is a gigantic talent who is totally wasted here, and who I hope profoundly regrets taking the role. The bad boy skirtchasing thing is getting so, so tired. Diane Keaton proves that a woman of advancing years can still be quite stunning and sensual, but she's crippled by a deadly script. The scene everyone talks about (prompted by a studio campaign that centered on it) where Nicholson accidentally sees Keaton nude could, I'm not kidding you, qualify for Worst Acted Scene of the Decade, in which both actors present their characters as if they had their big toes caught in an electrical outlet. Frances McDormand is also on hand, but her work must surely be sitting on a cutting room floor someplace as she's totally irrelevant to the film and if you blink you miss her. Keanu Reeves again shows that he can't act his way out of a soaking wet paper bag... which is precisely what this script is. Just a dreadful, dreadful, dead film. An insult to the audience.

Previous Page

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41

Next Page