Days of Wine and Roses

source: Days of Wine and Roses

Acting drunk is one of the hardest things for an actor to do really well. Many have tried and failed. Acting slaphappy-drunk seems to be more difficult than angry-drunk, and this is where Jack Lemmon and Lee Remick have a hard time. It's also director Blake Edwards' fault: the drunk highs don't seem spontaneous, and the couple's gaiety as they plan to get their hands on more booze is forced (and Lemmon's drunken glee is accompanied by a maniacal laugh which sounds more appropriate for something like "Some Like It Hot"). However, this couple's dramatics lows are harrowing (if not always convincing), and Jack's big scene in a greenhouse trying to find his hidden bottle is an amazing actors' feat. "Roses" is a good-looking film with a sobering conclusion, and many moments do come off successfully, yet overall the picture doesn't take chances, it isn't reckless enough and it doesn't feel natural. This is imperative for films about addicts on the edge. ** from ****

Started off a little slow but turned into one of the hottest dramas I've ever seen. Remick and Lemmon were sensational as the two drunks who couldn't control their actions after a few drinks. I had to laugh at some of their antics, but the greenhouse scene and especially the pitiful, horrible DT's in the rubber room were sobering indeed. Great picture showing the ravages and uselessness of booze.

The above quote is from director Blake Edwards, it's taken from the highly recommended commentary track he provides on the DVD for this excellent and compelling piece of work. Joe is a social drinker but he's social all the time, during one of his arranged parties for a client he meets and falls in love with teetotal Kirsten. They get married and changes start to dominate their marital bliss, he is stressed from work and drinks daily to forget the rigours of the job, she being the loving wife chooses to drink with him to help ease his pain, but soon the joyous days of wine & roses will turn to something dark and terribly turbulent, and this will threaten their own respective sanity. The film begins with Henry Mancini's academy award winning title theme tune, it's a truly beautiful piece of music that perfectly sets the tone of the film for its first third, it lulls you into this couples love, the bond they share is a truly wonderful thing, it really is all sweetness and light, but then the bottle becomes part of this couples life, they become a threesome from which only dark horrors will form. Containing emotionally shattering scenes that once viewed can not be forgotten (witness Joe's soul destroying search for liquor in a greenhouse), Days Of Wine & Roses still manages not to force feed the viewer a moralistic stance, it lays down the facts of alcoholism and the perils of co-dependency with honest appraisal, we as the viewers are left in no doubt that it is us, and us only, that can make of it as we see fit, the ending especially is a particular poser of which we ourselves seek clarity. Wonderfully written by the talented hands of J.P. Miller, Days Of Wine And Roses boasts marvellous direction from Blake Edwards and two academy award nominated performances from Jack Lemmon & Lee Remick, it's a testament to all involved that come the finale the viewer feels drained, yet strangely...not at all thirsty for the amber nectar. Quality drama. 9/10

Actually, I think it's only the second, after "The Lost Weekend" in 1945. I apologise if there's any others I don't know about. But it's certainly true that the made-for-TV movie has ruined the genre. Today's alcoholism movies are dreary considered as movies, and offer no pleasure except indulgence of a feeling of moral superiority - which, it seems, is enough for some. It was just this dull moralising that "The Lost Weekend" and "Days of Wine and Roses" broke away from. Forget about issue-of-the-month TV. Edwards wanted a film that was realistic AND worked as a story, and he found one. Indeed this is his finest work. He gets great performances out of his two stars - here he was considerably more lucky than Wilder was, although there's nothing wrong with Wilder's cast. The story appears to wander but is really quite tight. Some scenes are fun; many dig into you like small knives. Perhaps there's one too many premonitions at the beginning (this is a problem Wilder didn't have, since his central character was an alcoholic at the start); and some may find that the guy from Alcoholics Anonymous near the end is a bit too good to be true. I also wish that Henry Mancini had stood firm against the temptation to write a smoozy bubblegum theme song for the opening credits. None of this matters, though. Your eyes will be on the central characters the whole time.

The tragedy of this love story is that of unkept commitments. The emotional, financial, and child-rearing commitments of marriage are discarded for a primary relationship with alcohol. And other obligations too, such as daughter to father. The character development of Kirsten is well done. We are privileged to skip years at a time, seeing her going from having fun with alcohol (where most people stay) to it consuming her, a little at a time, with the snapshots spread over years. We see Joe wander unhappily for half a lifetime before finding himself. We see his initial shallow love becoming real, and we see it tested. At one time or another, both Joe and Kirsten's love is real, which makes the ending so powerful. The most heart-wrenching scene for me is the confrontation between Joe and Kirsten's father in the greenhouse. After many years of denial, we get to see a sample of Kirsten's father's intense emotional pain, with the final acceptance that his daughter will never be the same. Even worse, his age indicates that this is near the end of his life. Even if Kirstin could turn back, it will be too late for her father. After I saw this movie, I found myself analyzing what human relationships are about, and the expectations that come with those relationships, so I could figure out exactly what went wrong. Is the movie just about a partner leaving, as with infidelity? It is much worse than that. This is about theft and destruction of identity and purpose, choice and control. Dulled by the pleasure and escape, Kirstin doesn't even know what is being taken from her. Even though everyone she hurts loses much, her loss is even greater. This movie counters the popular belief that alcoholics are just partyers or problem drinkers. This may be where they start, but it's not where they end up. Even with the most powerful of reasons to stop drinking, the love for their daughter, Joe and Kirsten are unable to stop; they drink because they are addicted. The portrayal of the AA meeting isn't as good as it could have been. I suppose it may match the world's perception, with overtones of a religious tent meeting. Go to one, and you'll find that they aren't about swearing off addiction, they are about self-acceptance and seeing yourself objectively. Somewhere between the denial that you are not an alcoholic and self-disappointment / guilt is a realistic view of who you are. By accepting yourself and having the support of peers, life's challenges can be met without alcohol. Hope for internal improvement is given to a higher power, rather than trying yourself, then being disappointed. Having loved an alcoholic at one time, I can tell you that the pain portrayed in the film is all real. It is not just that alcoholics can't stop; smokers can't, but only hurt their families financially. The pain comes in because alcohol causes loss of emotional identity. Alcoholics have no idea who they are anymore. They cannot love, they cannot even be very good friends. They push everyone away to love their addiction, then become emotionally needy, so use those around them emotionally. (The worst way to be taken advantage of.) Thankfully, most people are genetically predisposed to get sick when the alcohol dosage gets to levels that can cause real addiction. Those that can drink may never have opportunity to sustain that dosage long enough to get addicted. But for the rest, this movie is a warning of what alcohol has waiting for you -- the destruction of any kind of normal life. See "When a Man Loves a Woman" for a more modern setting for this type of story, though it is not as good.

I always saw this movie more as a love story than one of a couple trapped in alcoholism. Joe and Kirsten had that chemistry that drew them to each other through good times and bad, and I have never seen another film that depicted enduring love like this one. I can still recall the characters' honest, plaintive statements to each other and how they reminded me of how it feels when you're with someone who truly fulfills you. Joe to Kirsten on their first date: "Short story? Boy meets girl...beautiful girl, nice, the only kind of girl a guy should bother about...." Kirsten to Joe, desperately trying to hold on to what they have after her infidelities: "I never gave anything out of myself to them....love is the only thing that stops you from being lonely, and I didn't have that..." Joe to the AA counselor, who warns him about what alcohol can do to a marital relationship: "You don't understand, there's no trouble between us....we're in love..." Joe, in the depths of alcoholism, tremors, shaking..."I have to find my wife....I love her...I love her..." This movie is sad and somewhat draining to watch, but also does provide useful insight into the insidious disease of alcohol addiction, along with being a very moving, romantic drama of two people haunted by troubled childhoods, struggling to keep the sincere commitment they have to each other alive.

A very uneven film about the horrors of alcoholism. The problem seems to be Blake Edwards' and Jack Lemmon's penchant for comedy. The story, at its base, is pure tragedy, but it's like Edwards doesn't want it to be too dark, so he cast a clown in the lead. Lemmon sparkles during the scenes where he's supposed to be charming, but he's not very convincing during the more dramatic sequences. Oh, and he can't do a drunk act worth a damn. I guess that's the film's biggest problem, really. No one in the classic era could play a convincing drunk. They always seem to overact terribly, and Lemmon in particular is bad at it. His co-star, Lee Remick, isn't quite as bad, but during her big drunk scene she comes off as not that good, either. In fact, she's pretty bad at it, but does seem fairly excellent in comparison with Lemmon. Remick is actually very good in the non-drunk scenes. The biggest flop of the film is the big, dramatic sequence where, after having been dry for a while at Remick's father's farm, Lemmon sneaks in a couple of bottles which they share. Cut to Lemmon jumping up and down on the bed with the two of them giggling like school children. That's the film's idea of alcoholics: they get goofy like kids and then throw tantrums like kids when they finish up their booze. Jesus, Lemmon's scene in the greenhouse, where he's tearing it to shreds trying to find a bottle he hid and freaking out, it's just embarrassing. Contrast that with the film's final sequence. You can see just how good the film could have been if it didn't go so over-the-top. The ending of the movie is heartbreaking.

This is one of the most tiresome message pictures ever made, the story of the two liveliest, most energetic alcoholics in film history. The planned depiction of a good man, tragically brought down by alcoholism fails: he was a creep all along. Perhaps Jack Lemmon and Blake Edwards thought they were offering a critique of 1950s ambition, but Billy Wilder did it perfectly in "The Apartment (1960)." Perhaps Jack Lemmon and Blake Edwards thought they were exposing how alcohol can damage people's lives, but Billy Wilder did it perfectly in "The Lost Weekend (1945)." Hollywood does this all the time. Somebody makes a hit picture and mediocrities surface to try the same stunt or a combo of stunts since, after all, the formula worked so well the first time. Happily, Blake Edwards did much better work later. Henry Mancini's treacly music pours syrup over this stack of pancakes for two hours. Naturally, the Motion Picture Academy, that pantheon of bad taste, gobbled it up. Lee Remick and Charles Bickford must suffice for sympathetic characters.

Days of Wine and Roses can be taken as a good film on alcoholism --- indeed they show it in rehab clinics --- unless you've never seen Ray Milland in Billy Wilder's 1945 Oscar winner, THE LOST WEEKEND. Wilder's film was flawless; can't say the same about ROSES. To begin with, ROSES is a screen remake of a superior Playhouse 90 CBS drama. Jack Lemmon was an overrated actor who always simply played Jack Lemmon; no difference from one movie to another -- even when he wore a dress in Some Like It Hot. Although Ray Milland was no hero in Lost Weekend, Milland was the kind of actor who could immediately involve the audience in his problems, whether booze or women. Jack Lemmon's advertising man is impossible to like, and simply makes a fool of himself --- particularly going berserk in Charles Bickford's greenhouse tearing up dozens of plants looking for a key. The obvious impulse is to think about pushing Lemmon's head underwater till the bubbles get quiet; not the intended audience response. From the annoying, awful Days of Wine and Roses theme song to the final fade-out of the neon BAR sign, there are plenty of flaws here. It takes one to know one, they say. As a Recovering Alcoholic, I recommend LOST WEEKEND --- ROSES can drive a person to the bottle.